Assigning static IP to server behind router?

[WraithAkaMrak]

OK, I've been searching a little bit on this topic, but wondering if I could get an answer before I go to town. I doubt I need any new hardware, but wouldn't hurt to know in case.

Got a home network with several machines behind a router, hooked up to a DSL modem. We recently got a machine we want to use as a server. I wasn't around when it was being set up.
Apparently it wouldn't work unless they hooked this machine up to a hub that comes before the router. So it goes modem > hub. Hub > server and Hub > router, Router > other machines.
For some reason, Internet seems to really slow down in this configuration. I'm not sure that's the source of the problem, but it seems likely. When I get rid of the hub and put all machines behind router, internet seems normal, but I guess can't access the server that way.

We have a Static IP from our ISP for the server. We have the server machine set up to that IP.
Is there a way to configure the router to use this static IP for that machine, while leaving the others dynamic? So that the other machines are protected, but the server can be reached online?

Several articles talk about setting the static IP of that machine to less than the starting DHCP IP. Yet that's referring to the internal IPs of the LAN, not the external IP to use on the internet to access that machine. I'm a bit new at this, but I'm sure I can get it set up easy enough with the right advice. Thanks in advance.

 

[mikebb]

I would setup everything behind the router, then assign the server a static IP (internal IP, not the static IP assigned by the ISP. Make sure the IP you assign is outside of the DHCP scope of the router.) Then set up port forwarding on the router to send traffic to the server.

 

[scorpioLP]

yes. setup the server with an internal static IP. Use the router to forward ports to the server.

 

[SpunkyJones]

What they said. The thing that is killing your internet is the hub, its just one big collision domain. Now walk slowly to the barrel and place said hub into it and back away.

Friends don't let friends network with hubs!

 

[mboy]

So you have more then 1 public IP from your ISP? If that is the case, then you need a router which will do 1 to 1 NAT and/or 1 that will allow you to map public IP's to to LAN Ip's.

WHat U REALLY need is a router/firewall that has a true DMZ (3rd interface). Have your LAN Ip's behind Nat, WAN connect to your ISP and the DMZ port connected to your server so you have your publicly exposed server still physically seprated from your LAN. That way wenit get's compromised, they will still have to go thru the firewall to get in your LAN. Doing it with a REAL (not SOHO brand DMZ), you can use the public IP or do a 1 to 1 NAT with the DMZ being on a different, private subnet then your LAN.

 

[WraithAkaMrak]

Ah.

So:

- Change the IP on the server to a static IP below the DHCP range.
- Change the router's info to match the static IP, DNS, etc given by the ISP.
- Set up port forwarding to send traffic from port 80 to 80 (HTTP) to the internal static IP of the server.

That sound good so far?


(And yes, I knew hubs weren't terribly efficient, as they broadcast data to everything on the hub, instead of just directly to the right machine. (My simple definition...) But didn't know for sure it was the source of the Internet slowdown. We didn't even have a hub in here until they were working on setting up the server.)

 

[SpunkyJones]

That does sound good, you should be all set once your done.

 

[HKSturboKID]

Originally posted by: SpunkyJones
What they said. The thing that is killing your internet is the hub, its just one big collision domain. Now walk slowly to the barrel and place said hub into it and back away.

Friends don't let friends network with hubs!

couldn't have said it any better myself. Replace the hub with switches. I remember I got a 8 port linksys switch for $40 about 2 years ago.

 

[WraithAkaMrak]

I did everything I listed in my last reply. But putting the Static IP from my ISP into a browser now brings up the login for my router configuration, instead of going to the server.

My Port Forwarding looks ok.
I'm wondering about the Static Route section of router setup.
When I go through the Wizard, it creates one Static Route, with the WAN Gateway IP as Gateway IP, but Destination IP and IP Subnet are both 0.0.0.0. Changing the last two values to the Internal Static IP of the server and 255.255.255.0 stops internet access altogether. I assume this Static Route is the route used to get out to the Internet.

 

[WraithAkaMrak]

Could this be because of loopback connections?

Now, the problem arises when somebody using the "Work Station" computer wants to access the "Web Server" computer. If they try to access the computer via the host name www.example.com, the NAT router will attempt to route this out its WAN interface and then back in. In most cases this will either fail or you'll get the web interface for the router itself because the router just isn't able to do this.

The linked site says how to edit the Hosts file to workaround the loopback issue, but will this work if you're just using IP addresses, with no domain name?

 

[WraithAkaMrak]

Okay, I tried running an analyzer service on the IP address, and it came out with the correct title of the page.

So it was loopback that made me get the router config when trying to access the WAN IP from within the LAN.

So...hopefully everything's good. 🙂