A Tough One for you chaps

[MarcJF]

OK I have a work laptop which connects to my work server via Sonic Wall. Laptop works fine, internet fine and Sonic Wall lets me through. When I open Outlook I can't reconcile email and apparently the reason is that the IP Range used by my ISP is the same as my work one. Now I use AOL, and before I get shot down in flames and told to change it, I can't at the moment for various reasons. So any ideas on how I can get my Netgear router to work off a different IP range?

[timmcat]

The only settings you can change in your router is the IP range for your local network which wouldn't help. Don't know much about AOL except they do seem to use some constantly dynamic IP range which AFAIK is not adjustable by the user.

You could try connecting through a proxy. I use 'Dave Proxy' when necessary, I would just have concerns about any critical personal info passing through these guys.

[MarcJF]

I'm told it's the local range i need to change, any ideas how to do that?

[BOAC]

I cannot understand why 'standard' network internal IPs can cause a problem. Do you have access to the router control panel? If so, check that the IP for your laptop is in the 'admitted' box.

[MarcJF]

I use AOL, but the range used is in the same range as my work server - but they do not use AOL. Can't recall how to get the range, my techie guy got me to "run cmd" but i can't remember the command which came after. Do you know if the AOL local range has any scope to move, else i fear it's goiny to mean me ending up with two broadband connections.

[timmcat]

OK - presuming that your Netgear router manager is the same as mine...

Type 192.168.0.1 into your browser. At the prompt, User is 'admin;, password is 'password'.

On the left panel, click on 'LAN IP set up'

Change the IP address in the top box to, say, 192.168.2.1

A bit further down, change the 'starting IP address' to 192.168.2.10, and the 'ending IP address' to 192.168.2.254.

Click apply. See how that goes. Don't forget that to get back to the router page you'll now need to type 192.168.2.1 in your browser.

[MarcJF]

Nope, that didn't work, just lost my broadband connection completely. Looks like im going to have to go the second isp / router way. If i ditch AOL can i still access email via the home page? And who would you recommend as an ISP - I'll have a search as I'm sure there's a thread on this too.

[BOAC]

You should not have lost b/band! How do you connect to the router? WIFI or cable? Can you still access the router even if not b/band?

[MarcJF]

My desktop and work laptop are both hard wired into the router. I had to reset values from another connection and reboot both to get back up and running.

[BOAC]

OK - back to basics and yr post #5

LAPTOP
Let's assume Windows XP? You have not said. However, you need to get to Start/Run and type cmd in the box and enter. After the > in the black screen (you should then get) type the following ipconfig /all (*NB space before /all)

Look for 'ethernet' or 'RJ45' or something in the text that comes back and tell us what the 'IP address' (6th line down) is and also 'default gateway'. These are what your laptop and router are using. Can you also say if DHCP and autoconfig are enabled?

You have not mentioned the desktop before. Does that work with the router?

If not, do the same again on that and post back.

"I had to reset values from another connection and reboot both to get back up and running." - what does that mean you actually did?

[MarcJF]

ok, Laptop is on XP, IP address is 192.168.0.230. Default gateway is blank. DHCP is using 192.168.0.1 and autoconfig is not enabled.

Desktop is on same router, running Vista and works fine.

Laptop connects to broadband, opens outlook but won't synch with work server, and i'm told it's because the work server is using the same range and that i need to change my local range.

When I amended the IP values as suggested i lost broadband connection to both laptop and desktop. As i could not get back online, i used another laptop and neighbours network to put the values back to what they were, restarted and both got broadband back.

Reason I'm reluctant to ditch AOL is that i've used the same email address for many years, but i hate AOL. If I could switch to sky but still keep my AOL email i would, i think it would solve many problems.

[BOAC]

OK - presumably your company has set that IP for the laptop. I'd start by going into the router (under LAN settings on my router - not Netgear) and making sure the IP range goes up to 230 (254 is normal).

Any one else?

Edit to add: I'm puzzled as to why Marc's Default Gateway' is blank - any ideas?

[Saab Dastard]

IP address is 192.168.0.230. Default gateway is blank. DHCP is using 192.168.0.1 and autoconfig is not enabled.

Marc, that's nonsense. it couldn't possibly work with that configuration. Either you have read or written it down incorrectly or it explains why nothing works!

I strongly recommend that you get your work IT people to sort it out for you (it is a work laptop, isn't it?).

They should have access to a broadband internet connection (independent of the main company internet connection) that they could test your laptop on.

The only thing you have control over is the IP address range of your home network - that is the private address space (192.168.X.X) used by the laptop, desktop and router to communicate between themselves.

The AOL router (Netgear?) will have a Public IP address assigned to it by AOL. This is probably dynamic and you have no control over it.

Any communication (packet) from your desktop or laptop must pass through the router (default gateway) where it is NATed (Network Address Translation) to use the AOL-assigned Public IP address to traverse the public internet. Private IP addresses (e.g. 192.168.X.X) CANNOT traverse the public internet.

The fact that you are using an SSL tunnel creates the situation where the packets from your PC seem to arrive at the Sonic Wall concentrator at work with your home IP network address due to the encryption and encapsulation.

If your work people advise you to change your private home network, do you understand how to do this?

The simplest thing is to set your home router internal address to 192.168.X.1, and to assign IP addresses in the range 192.168.X.2-5 (assuming 4 devices - if more expand the range), where X is a different number to your work internal range). RTFM ;)

Then configure your laptop and desktop to obtain IP addresses and DNS via DHCP.

The internal address of the router will be 192.168.X.1, the clients will be allocated say 192.168.X.2 and 192.168.X.3, the default gateway for the clients is 192.168.X.1 and the subnet mask for all devices is 255.255.255.0.

The DNS entries should automatically be provided by the router (picked up from AOL), or else the router will act as a DNS forwarder and the clients will use the 192.168.X.1 address for DNS also.

All this is pretty basic stuff, and will be covered in your router help and Windows Network Connections.

If your work use fixed addresses (must be very small if so!!), leave the laptop as DHCP and just set up an alternate fixed address for work which will be used whenever it can't contact a DHCP server.

SD