- Joined
- Feb 28, 2005
- Messages
- 198
- Reaction score
- 7
- Points
- 18
- Location
- Bagshot, Surrey, UK
- Your Mac's Specs
- Powerbook 17" 1.5GHz, 2GB, 160GB Momentus; iMac 24" 3.06GHz, 2GB; iPhone 2.5G 8GB; iPod 5G 60GB
Sheesh - should have been simple today. All I wanted to do was install an ADSL modem (D-link), use an Airport Express to share the connection wirelessly, set up port forwarding to a Web server, and extend the network to another Express.
It's taken about 6 hours of work, including a whole hour on a transatlantic phone call to Apple support. Now it's working. Some observations:
1) D-link's hardware works moderately well with the default settings. As soon as you alter some parameters (eg the IP address of the modem, the address range it serves through DHCP) things break in a subtle way. For example, it doesn't serve DHCP properly unless it's using its default settings. Way to go, D-link.
2) I suspect that the Airport Express port forwarding doesn't work on anything other than 10.0.1.x address ranges. I certainly couldn't get it working on 192.168.1.x ranges, although the problem with the modem could have been the cause of this. And Apple shied heavily away from supporting me using the 192 range, I suspect for a good reason.
3) Both the Express and the modem collided heavily with each other's settings as soon as I tried to get the Express onto 192.168.1.x range. After much, much fiddling I moved the D-link's addresses out of the way of the Express, but this then broke DHCP on the modem, and port forwarding on the Express, as above, so it's not really a solution.
4) Apple's tech support were remarkably good, once I'd got past the first-line guy, and once they'd given up trying to get rid of me. "We only support the basic consumer configurations" - ruruh? So if it's simple and idiotproof they support it, if it's more complex they don't? They saw sense in the end but were very skilled in trying to get me off the support line. And the only number I could find was Support in the US - that's great for us European and ROW customers who don't have local numbers published and have to pay transatlantic rates.
5) I should have stuck with the Apple mantra of "keep it simple". After many wasted hours of trying to get the network running on 192.168.1.x addresses, I threw in the towel, reset everything to its standard settings, and tried to go with the flow of what the Express wanted to do, rather than fight it and customise. From that point it took about 15 minutes to get everything working.
So next time I'll not try anything clever...
Whoever is responsible for QA on firmware for these network devices needs shooting. D-link, Linksys, Netgear, I've had silly problems with every last device I've gone near. They really need to sort it out, it's not like these are low-volume devices.
It's taken about 6 hours of work, including a whole hour on a transatlantic phone call to Apple support. Now it's working. Some observations:
1) D-link's hardware works moderately well with the default settings. As soon as you alter some parameters (eg the IP address of the modem, the address range it serves through DHCP) things break in a subtle way. For example, it doesn't serve DHCP properly unless it's using its default settings. Way to go, D-link.
2) I suspect that the Airport Express port forwarding doesn't work on anything other than 10.0.1.x address ranges. I certainly couldn't get it working on 192.168.1.x ranges, although the problem with the modem could have been the cause of this. And Apple shied heavily away from supporting me using the 192 range, I suspect for a good reason.
3) Both the Express and the modem collided heavily with each other's settings as soon as I tried to get the Express onto 192.168.1.x range. After much, much fiddling I moved the D-link's addresses out of the way of the Express, but this then broke DHCP on the modem, and port forwarding on the Express, as above, so it's not really a solution.
4) Apple's tech support were remarkably good, once I'd got past the first-line guy, and once they'd given up trying to get rid of me. "We only support the basic consumer configurations" - ruruh? So if it's simple and idiotproof they support it, if it's more complex they don't? They saw sense in the end but were very skilled in trying to get me off the support line. And the only number I could find was Support in the US - that's great for us European and ROW customers who don't have local numbers published and have to pay transatlantic rates.
5) I should have stuck with the Apple mantra of "keep it simple". After many wasted hours of trying to get the network running on 192.168.1.x addresses, I threw in the towel, reset everything to its standard settings, and tried to go with the flow of what the Express wanted to do, rather than fight it and customise. From that point it took about 15 minutes to get everything working.
So next time I'll not try anything clever...
Whoever is responsible for QA on firmware for these network devices needs shooting. D-link, Linksys, Netgear, I've had silly problems with every last device I've gone near. They really need to sort it out, it's not like these are low-volume devices.
