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Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 8:23 am
by briane
Greetings,

Here I sit, Monday morning in eastern Zimbabwe. I have spent a weekend slowly getting to know Router OS and it's complexities, and have still failed to achieve my goal.

Briefly, I am looking to extend my wireless network from my office/warehouse to my home and that of my manager. To this end I ordered and received a R433AH routerboard with 3 PCI cards (R52-350) and two R411 based CPE units.

My current Wireless network is a D-Link 624 Router with gateway IP 192.168.0.1

I have set the R433AH with Eth1 as 192.168.0.2 and the WLAN1 as 192.168.0.4 (WLAN2 and WLAN3 are not in use as yet) and created a bridge between the two (bridge1). And my wirless devices detect WLAn1's SSID but cannot connect. I can connect using Winbox to both Eth1 and WLAN1.

I have spent hours on a slow internet connection finding documentation, reading and trying and have now run out of time as the work week has started, and with 18 hour days at work, I am desperately in need of how to setup a simple AP and CPE configuration.

Please note my R433AH is 18m in the air, so RS232 access is not an option, I must work through Eth1 (the POE LAN port). The CPE is lying on my ofice floor at the moment :(

I prefer working through Winbox, but if some kind soul sends me a MAC-Telnet script, I'll load it through the Terminal in Winbox.

Regards
Brian
Mutare
Zimbabwe
skype: brian.ellse

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 8:30 am
by changeip
I have set the R433AH with Eth1 as 192.168.0.2 and the WLAN1 as 192.168.0.4 (WLAN2 and WLAN3 are not in use as yet) and created a bridge between the two (bridge1).
If you are truly bridging eth1 and wlan1, then assign an IP to the bridge, not the individual interfaces. 192.168.0.2/24 and 192.168.0.4/24 cannot live on 2 different interfaces because they are on the same subnet.

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 8:32 am
by changeip
if your just trying to make a wireless bridge then you dont even need to assign IPs at all. Although I would probably start using routed subnets and not all bridged - depends on the end network size really.

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 8:54 am
by briane
Thanks ChangeIP, I have removed the IP for LAN1, but must ask does Eth1 not need to have an IP as it is my primary access.? My current setup is now ETH1 192.168.0.2 and Bridge1 192.168.0.3

I also think my imemdiate problem may be the access permissions on WLAN1. I am not familiar with ARP and such things, as I have always used MAC address filtering on my D-Link to secure my network without WEP/WPA keys etc.

Thanks

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 8:57 am
by changeip
if you bridge eth1 and wlan1 then they are both the same, so the ip assigned to the bridge will work on both wlan1 and eth1. is the dlink going to continue handing out dhcp and be the internet gateway?

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 9:09 am
by briane
Yes, the D-Link will continue to handle DHCP and remain the Internet gateway.

Will remove IP for ETH1, still not sure about the permissions issue on WLAN1 interface. MAC address security would suit me fine, but not sure how to do that only, without invoking all sorts of other security protocols.

Thanks
Brian

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 9:13 am
by briane
Have removed the IP for ETH1, now only have IP set for Bridge1 as 192.168.0.3. Winbox does not connect to this, but Neighbour View does...... Probably an error in my bridge setup. No idea where to go from here....
Edit - 10 minutes later. Changed Bridge IP to 192.168.0.3/24 and now can connect via Winbox, seems that /24 is important :)

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Mon Jan 05, 2009 7:24 pm
by changeip
yes, subnet masks are very important. also make sure if you've entered a network and broadcast value that you clear them so the right values get put into those fields when changing the mask.

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 12:02 pm
by briane
Ok, so now I have the AP working perfectly. A system reset and start from scratch seemed to be my solution. Thanks ChangeIP for you help.

Next problem (last problem). I am struggling to get the CPE configuration correct. I am able to connect to the AP via a little Linksys USB Wireless adapter (using that link now as I write), but cannot work out what I must do to the CPE (a 411 routerboard with a Atherios PCI WLAN card) to get it to connect. It sees the Ap in scan mode, but I am missing something. I have been looking without success for a simple step by step guide to setting up a CPE to connect to the AP.....seems I am looking in the wrong places.

Regards
Brian
Skype: brian.ellse

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Tue Jan 06, 2009 6:44 pm
by changeip
An easy way to connect it to just double click the entry in the scan list. It will configure the SSID and other parameters. Also make sure you have the security-profile matching the APs profile.

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Wed Jan 07, 2009 8:26 am
by briane
Ok, So now I can get the CPE to connect, that really was quite simple :D

But now the AP will not route through to the D-Link. It routes through fine with the Linksys USB adaptor, but not with the Mikrotik CPE. Very Odd.

Heres my basic setup.

Internet via WAN Port on D-Link 624+ router Gateway on the cabled network to this router is 192.168.0.1 DHCP is handled by this router although I also use a static list for some work stations.

AP: Mikrotik Router 433Ah Board with WLAN1 and ETHER1 enabled (ETHER1 192.168.0.2/24 Broadcast 192.168.0.255 and Network 192.168.0.1 (I have no idea what the last 2 are for!)
WLAN1 192.168.1.3/24 Network 192.168.1.1 Broadcast 192.168.1.255

I have BRIDGE1 with ETHER1 and WLAN1 as designated ports.

BRIDGE1 has no set IP

I see various items in the IP ROUTING LIST which i know nothing about.....have no idea what should be here. One is prefixed AS and the other two entries prefixed DAC.

No DHCP client or servers setup on the AP.

Any and all suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Regards
Brian
Skype: brian.ellse

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Wed Jan 07, 2009 12:29 pm
by Equis
Do you need to use wds to get this to work as a bridge?

I am not sure, I have not done a bridge before.

Re: Frustration abounds!

Posted: Thu Jan 08, 2009 9:04 am
by briane
Here is the crunch on this problem. When I connect via a non-Mikrotik device, the AP works perfectly. The moment the Mikrotik CPE (RB411) connects, no throughput to the Internet gateway or the network on the otherside of the AP.

Puzzling the hell out of me.

Brian
Skype: brian.ellse