3 routers / 1 switch. I have questions

[TNGW1500SE]

I have 3 routers.

#1 router: Hooked to the cable modem, IP 192.168.1.1. Has some devices hooked to it like my google phone & My Verizon extender, Amazon Firestick. Just my devices that I don't care if they are behind a VPN or those that can't be (like the firestick). I call this my "Dot 1" router.

#2 router: This is my VPN router. Hooks to router one LAN port with Cat 7 cable. Router IP is set to 192.168.2.1 ("dot 2"). All my VPN devices get a IP from this router like 192.168.2."whatever". I call this my "dot 2" router.

Then a 8 port non-POE network switch plugs into router 2 and all the wired PC's plug into it so everything gets a "dot 2" VPN address.

Router #3: Just hooks to the switch and is an access point in my garage. It has a IP of 192.168.2.2 so I can find it on the network. All devices are on it (including WiFi) are on the VPN network.

It all worked great until the power went off yesterday. Then some of my PC's that are plugged into the switch got a IP of 192.168.1.whatever. That's my non-VPN router address. Could the network switch assign that address? I don't understand how it happened. The WIFi cards in those PC's are disabled so those machines didn't hook to the WiFi on the "dot 1" router. No roueter broadcasts the same SSID. How could I end up getting those "Dot 1" IP's assigned when those machines are all pluged into a "dot 2" network? There's no router set in bridge mode. Any ideas?

PS: Adding a 4th soon so I have WiFi down at my gate for a wireless IP camera. It will hook to the Garage access point router and be a wired connection 100 feet away from the garage. Then it can WiFi the rest of the way to the gate. I hope! It's a long way. To far for a Ethernet cable.

[TNGW1500SE]

opnspaces wrote:
Interesting solve, glad you found something. I'm assuming you want to keep Connectivity installed on the PC which is why you aren't deleting it.

Funny (morbidly) thought on your system in the event of an untimely demise. I've had the same thoughts about me and my system and even went so far as to draft RTF documents (in case word isn't available but want pictures) in appropriately named folders. But truth be told, if something happens to me, my brother who was a network engineer for years would probably just rip it all out and re-flash one router to serve wifi and connect to the cable modem. The rest of the stuff would go right in the trash. It's like nobody appreciates the care and coolness that we build at home.

LOL! My son knows how to do electrical so all my switches, addressable LED's, sonoffs and networks would be thrown away. Comcast would bring in their modem / router and she could search matchmaker.com all she wanted to.

[opnspaces]

Interesting solve, glad you found something. I'm assuming you want to keep Connectivity installed on the PC which is why you aren't deleting it.

Funny (morbidly) thought on your system in the event of an untimely demise. I've had the same thoughts about me and my system and even went so far as to draft RTF documents (in case word isn't available but want pictures) in appropriately named folders. But truth be told, if something happens to me, my brother who was a network engineer for years would probably just rip it all out and re-flash one router to serve wifi and connect to the cable modem. The rest of the stuff would go right in the trash. It's like nobody appreciates the care and coolness that we build at home.

[TNGW1500SE]

I THINK I SOLVED IT!!!

Fingers are still crosses but I found I have a program called connectify on my PC in the house. It allows connections to the PC as an access point. It was set to start with windows so when the PC boots up, that program starts. It sees the WiFi adapter is disabled and it turns the adapter on. Then that PC would log onto the non-VPN router. I think "forgetting" those WiFi networks will solve the issue. It must have grabbed an IP off that dot 1 router.

Thanks for the help!!!!

PS: I have a love / hate relationship with my PC's!!!

[TNGW1500SE]

opnspaces wrote:
This is foreign to me as I live where a long driveway is maybe 50'

My gate is about half way down my driveway so it's about 500 foot from the garage. To far for Ethernet but a router mounted on the side of the garage can reach it with WiFi.

There is a cat5 ran down there already. I buried it. It's used for a analog camera (through baluns) and one of the twisted pairs is used to open the gate from the house. Another set signals the house if a car is detected. The video quality isn't great. That's one reason I want WiFi down there. There is 110 volt A/C power down at the gate so power isn't a problem. I've tried powerline Ethernet and it didn't work. Not sure why. I tried it on both bars in the panel. No luck. I'd really like a 1080 network camera down there.

[TNGW1500SE]

RLS7201 wrote:
I would suggest router 3 have a static IP address of 192.168.3.1. Router 2 could issue a IP of 192.168.2.1. See the conflict?

Richard

If I switch that to a 3, wouldn't I be disconnecting attached PC(s)from the homegroup? That router is mainly for the PC in the RV. I download videos to it's harddrive from the house when surfing at home. It's set as an access only so I'd think it can't assign IP's.

[TNGW1500SE]

Routers "Dot 1 & 2": TP-link AC1750 running the latest factory firmware. Both have WiFi's (2.4 & 5) on but 4 different SSID's.

Garage (router 3) is a ASUS RT-N12 N300 (firmware never updated). Set as access point only. IP set to 192.168.2.2. & that address is reserved in Dot 2. No wired devices in garage. Just a cat 5e feed into LAN port. It's mainly for my RV PC to use to get on the network. I load videos to the RV PC harddrive from the house. That way when we go someplace we have videos to watch.

WIRING:

Cable Modem cat 7 to router "Dot 1" WAN

Router 2 "VPN router" uses Cat7 from it's WAN to LAN port on dot 1.

Router 3 (Access point) uses cat 5e from one of its LAN port to switch then to on to router 2's LAN port from unmanaged switch

Today, I've turned the power off again as a test. Everything booted right up the way I expected it to. I don't know what happened the last time when the power failed due to a storm. Maybe I had one of the WiFi adapters enabled and a PC grabbed a IP from Dot 1.

I've went into network settings and "forgot" all the passwords to the WiFi's on dot 1. That way even if the WiFi adapter gets enabled somehow, those PC's can't get on to dot 1 without a password.

Might be nice if dot 2 would wait for dot 1 to boot up before doing so itself. I could put a delay relay on the low voltage line powering dot 2 but what I'm doing is already over most peoples head. If something happens to me, my wife will have to marry a computer geek so she can get on facebook. 🙂

[Chris_Bryant]

opnspaces wrote:
You might have better luck , but I have tried running my firewall and cable modem of a standard grade UPS (APC) but it doesn't work so well.

Consumer grade UPS's are not continuous battery backup but just route the utility power straight through to the devices and also keep the battery charged up. If there is a power interruption the UPS quickly switches to the battery and relies on the capacitors of the PC's power supply to keep the PC alive long enough for the switchover to occur. I think the capacitors in the small devices like a router are just not sufficient to keep the router alive while the UPS switches over.

I’ve run nothing but consumer grade APC UPS’s for years and never ha an issue with any equipment plugged into them, routers, switches, voip boxes, a/v system.
I replace batteries every few years, and they do fail occasionally, but over all good.

[opnspaces]

TNGW1500SE wrote:

PS: Adding a 4th soon so I have WiFi down at my gate for a wireless IP camera. It will hook to the Garage access point router and be a wired connection 100 feet away from the garage. Then it can WiFi the rest of the way to the gate. I hope! It's a long way. To far for a Ethernet cable.

This is foreign to me as I live where a long driveway is maybe 50'. 🙂 But Cat 5,6,7 all have a 100M range 330 ft. Is the gate further away from the garage than that?

Personally I dislike WIFI for a variety or reasons so I try to go hard wire wherever I can. If you're talking about running cat 7 to a place 100 ft away from the garage (call that place driveway 1) and then going wireless from driveway 1 to the gate; Can you instead go CAT 7 from driveway 1 to the gate cam and just run a simple $20 DLink switch at driveway 1 as a signal booster?

[opnspaces]

You might have better luck , but I have tried running my firewall and cable modem of a standard grade UPS (APC) but it doesn't work so well.

Consumer grade UPS's are not continuous battery backup but just route the utility power straight through to the devices and also keep the battery charged up. If there is a power interruption the UPS quickly switches to the battery and relies on the capacitors of the PC's power supply to keep the PC alive long enough for the switchover to occur. I think the capacitors in the small devices like a router are just not sufficient to keep the router alive while the UPS switches over.

[opnspaces]

I'm not an expert on this stuff, but I am curious as I find computer issues kind of fun. In thinking about what you found, it seems like dot 2 router allowed a pass through from dot 1 to the PC's behind dot2 which to me is a bit concerning. The first question I would ask would be is dot 2 running the latest firmware?

I know you didn't give makes and models of equipment, and really it's probably not all that important. But is dot 2 a standard consumer grade router like a linksys or Dlink running the standard firmware or DDWRT? Or are you running something more configurable like an Edgerouter or Mikrotik?

If running consumer grade I'm assuming you are plugging the LAN port of dot 1 into the WAN port of dot 2. If not running through the WAN port how are you preventing DHCP from getting to the dot 2 computers? If wired dot 1 LAN to dot 2 LAN then potentially the only thing keeping dot 1 from serving DHCP is the luck of the draw as the computers boot up.

Here's a test that takes a bit to setup but might be interesting.

Use 1 or more PC's on dot 2
configure static IP's to the dot 1 network like maybe

computer 1
Ip: 192.168.1.157
Subnet: 255.255.255.0
Gateway: 102.168.1.1

computer 2
Ip: 192.168.1.158
Subnet: 255.255.255.0
Gateway: 102.168.1.1

computer 3
Ip: 192.168.1.159
Subnet: 255.255.255.0
Gateway: 102.168.1.1

All three should lose internet connectivity.

now on each PC run a continuous ping to dot 1
ping -t 192.168.1.1

Reboot dot 2. Once dot 2 is up and running stop the pings (CTRL C). Scroll up on the PC screens and see if at any time during the reboot of dot 2 do any of the computers get a successful reply on the ping to dot 1?

I see what RLS7201 is suggesting and I'm trying to wrap my head around if it's a problem or not as I have the same basic setup at my house of a router in the garage with an IP on my local LAN. But like I was asking about above; My garage router is using the WAN port so that shouldn't be a problem, but it's DHCP range is .3 not .2 for anything downstream.

[RLS7201]

I would suggest router 3 have a static IP address of 192.168.3.1. Router 2 could issue a IP of 192.168.2.1. See the conflict?

Richard

[TNGW1500SE]

opnspaces wrote:
.......If rebooting the affected devices restores them to the 2.1 subnet, then yeah your only answer is in going through the logs of the various routers and see who assigned the IP.

A reboot is what fixed it. After reboot, everybody got their dot 2 back. I found the problem by doing a cmd ipconfig. The PC I did that on is hooked to the switch and not the garage. That PC has the WiFi adapter disabled too.

I'm wondering if this will always be an issue if power fails. Maybe routers 2 & 3 would be happier if router one was up and running before they booted. I could power router one off the battery backup to keep it alive.

[opnspaces]

The answer is simple. The power outage caused a device on your network that was configured to not serve DHCP to lose it's configuration and revert back to factory. The harder problem is figuring out who lost their config. You can start looking through the logs on the various devices. You will most likely find the answer there. But there's no fun in looking through logs.


If you're just mildly curious you could try a test. Do an ipconfig/release and renew or reboot something that erroneously has a 1.1 address and see if it still gets a 1.1 address. If the 1.1 address persists then unplug the Cat7 cable between router #1 and router #2. now do another ipconfig release/renew and see if you still get a 1.1 keep removing items that can possibly feed DCHP, don't forget the garage access point (my suspect by the way) until you finally disconnect the one feeding the erroneous IP's.

Edit to add... If rebooting the affected devices restores them to the 2.1 subnet, then yeah your only answer is in going through the logs of the various routers and see who assigned the IP.