Thursday, September 30, 2010

Router and Bridge

Router and Bridge

At home we're basiscally using five computers, one computer for each one of us. We all need internet access, we don't want anyone to have to use wireless, and it would be nice if we can all see each other's shared data. We have two 4 LAN Port routers, a D-Link 624 (wireless) and a D-Link 604. Those routers have worked very well for us, much better than Linksys routers have worked. We decided to have one router act as a bridge. Since one port from 604 would connect to one port from 624 (making them kind of act as a single router) we would have a total of six LAN ports. I feel it's really common knowledge how to set up a router, but making the other router act as a bridge isn't as clear. These are the steps to do this and they should be pretty adaptable for any routers.

1. Set up the first router as normal.
2. Connect a PC directly to the second router (and not the first router.)
3. Reboot the PC.
4. Log in to the secondrouter (usually defaulted at 192.168.0.1, with User Name = admin and no password).
5. Go to the DHCP menu and disable DHCP by checking "Disabled" for DHCP Server and Static DHCP.
6. Go to the LAN menu and change the IP Address to 192.168.0.99. (It can't conflict with the first router.)
7. Click Apply to save the settings. (You lose the connection to the second router since its IP address changed.)
8. Connect one of the second router's Local (LAN) ports to the first router.