Network problems - DI -804 and XP Pro.

A friend who's a techie explained to me that I had to turn of the firewalls on both computers to get everything working. It was one of those "Why didn't I think of that?" moments.

Thanks a bunch for explaining what the backwards cable ment, it helps explain a few things I've been puzzled about.

Now if I can figure out how to set up the firewalls where they won't interfear with the connections...

Thanks again!

Start your favorite browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, whatever) and type "192.168.0.1" (without the quotes) into the URL address bar (the same place you would type in www.xyz.com to go to that web page). That should take you to the router's configuration pages.

dw

I've tried that several times. It doesn't work. :-/

It's beginning to sound like you have some firewall software going, whether the native Windoze XP stuff or some other commercial security package which is blocking access between the two devices, or your Internet Explorer trusted zone doesn't include the D-Link's address. If the firewall, you might disable it for a few minutes now just to get the D-Link configured, but your next priority will be to organize the software firewall's permissions to allow easier access to this device in the future.

dw

Windows Firewall and the software firewall are off when I try it. I'll try the security settings on IE and see what that does... and let you know.

Thanks for all the help

Nope still a no go. It still won't work.::Sighs:: This is gettting annoying.

You may need to work this one through one step at a time. Set the router near the computer where you can watch each of them carefully. Turn them both off and be sure the ethernet cable from the router to the computer is firmly plugged into the respective jacks. You don't need the router connected to the cable modem at this time - we aren't trying to get out to the internet, we are just trying to get into the router. Turn the router on first. Let it fully initialize. Now turn the computer on and let it boot. Observe the LEDs on both the computer and the router for the link. Do both devices give a green light for a good connection? During the computer boot sequence, you may have noticed the activity LED blinking too as the operating system requested an IP address from the router. If the physical link seems ok, go to control panel/network connections properties and right click on the connectoid for your network device. Look in the status tab to see if it properly acquired an IP address from the router (it should be in the 192.168.0.x range - if the address reported for the network connection is 169.something, your system did not properly acquire an address from the router). If you have a good address, check that the default gateway listed is 192.168.0.1. If so, there is no reason I can think of that you couldn't get into the router's setup page. If you are not getting a good address, then you need to determine why the router isn't talking to the computer. If you are getting an address other than 192.168.0.x or 169.something, let us know what that address is.

dw

It's not picking up a port number what so ever. The light's for the port will show up, and the link light will blink maybe two or three times the entire time windows is starting. Act (activity?) Won't turn on at all.

There's a little switch on the back called uplink - Normal... Would that make any diffrece? It was switched to Uplink when i first started working with it, and the lights for the frist WAN port wouldn't turn on at all. I had to switch it to normal before they would. and the lights for port 1 still won't come on when the router has the switch in uplink. ( I didn't think of this till last night.)

Ok, we are now back to flirting with the original issue - crossover cables. The purpose of a crossover cable is to interconnect two network devices without any sort of intelligent switching. This can occur between two computers (just plug the crossover cable into the two NICs, no switch or router needed, and the two computers will be networked - but only with each other). It also is used to cascade a series of switches to expand the number of available ports in a network, where the last port on the first switch is "uplinked" to the first port on the next switch. Switch manufacturers, however, came up with the brilliant idea of building the crossed wiring (remember the orange and green pairs...) right into an extra jack on the back of the switch and labeling it "uplink." That's what happened on the WAN port with the "uplink" switch - in one position, it turns a regular cable into a crossover while in the other position it leaves the wiring in the port as straight through. Depending on the requirements of the DSL modem, you can use a straight cable and just flick the toggle one way or the other until it works. (Or you could really throw a loop by using a crossover cable and then "uncross" it by setting the toggle the other way...)

The same thing may be happening on the LAN ports. Typically, the "uplink" port is in parallel with whichever numbered LAN port is right next to it - sometimes LAN port 1, sometimes at the other end of the row on LAN port 4. You cannot use the uplink port and its companion port simultaneously. If you need to use the uplink port to daisy chain another switch, then you can use only LAN ports 2, 3, and 4 for local computers (or if the uplink is beside port 4, you can use 1, 2, and 3 only...). Even then, you may need to fiddle a bit with a crossover vs. straight jumper to cascade the switches. The latest models of switch resolve this with some intelligent sensing built into the device and it will set itself to crossed or uncrossed based on the response it gets from the device at the other end of the cable, but on earlier models you need to either figure it out correctly yourself or avoid the problem altogether by never using the LAN port that has the companion uplink. In your case, with only two computers, just use ports 2 and 3. Now it doesn't matter what the polarity is for the uplink and its companion, or whether that is port 1 or port 4.

dw

Dad took the router back to the store to have the guy test it. It turned out that the router was bad. Or at least the guy couldn't get it to work wile we were there.

Thank you a bunch for all the help! I hate to have took up so much of your time when It turned out to be what I thought it was in the first place ( My Father wouldn't listen to me and take it to be checked. He refused to till all the options where covered.)

Thanks again!!!

Stancy, Just a couple notes on your original post (I just did read the whole string). You stated that on computer was in another building 150 yards away from the other. First 100BaseT Ethernet connections are only spec'd to work for 100meters. Second running ethernet wire between two buildings is inviting loosing the equipment on both ends to a lightning strike. To go between buildings you need to run fiber optics or use some kind of media converter designed for that. Do a search for Ethernet Media Converters to find something. Good Luck.
Glenn

Thanks for the tips... I said 150 yards... It's probably quite a bit less, I'm not a good judge of distances over about 20 feet, an I may have miss heard. I haven't any control over that end of things anyway. I was just assigned to get the router and network working. The guy may have said 150 ft. :: sighs::

As far as running the cable outside, none of th eequipment will be connected to the cable if there's a storm. If there's even a chance of one the equipment gets disconnected from the outside line. But like I said, I don't have any control over it. ::shrugs::

I will keep your suggestions in mind for any future projects where I have more say in what kind of set up is used.