Linksys 4 port a linky situation....

[Lomax]

Oookayy! Ive been at this for a while and I ain't a happy camper yet. Lol.

Picked up a Linksys 4 port router BEFSR41 and the thing works great for my normal duties.. e-mail , browsing, uploads, downloads, icq, roger wilco etc. But now I figure ok lets try this puppy out for what I really want to do with it.. a bit of gaming.

So I fire up my fav flight sim and I already know which ports to allow for the game and boom nothing.. nada ..nicht , nein no joy! Crap! So here i'm thinking it must be a user input error stoopid me!

So i double check my forwarding rules ..2934 - 2935 using both tcp and udp and try it again.. same sit ..no joy! Crap. and double crap... this is gonna be work.

I open the server with the game on it into the DMZ entry for the router setup and start looking at the logs... still nothing ..the ports are being forwarded but the game is not connecting. So tell me what am I doing wrong here.

Without the cable modem in the wan port I can connect fine between the 4 port hubish setup. I add the modem, disable dhcp, move my test server off the router, fire up the ole isdn on the test box and try to connect to the cable/router connected server and nothing... the ports are being opened but no joy on even seeing another soul in my chat lobby. Am I missing something here! DHCP is turned off... my provider only wants a mac address .. i cloned one of the nic cards addy into the router and I get a lease ..yes its a dynamic ip.. hate it but what can ya say...

Any suggestions or ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Specs:

Win98SE
PIII 1gig (no overclocking it aint worth the trouble)
Linky 4 porter firmware 1.37 even tried up to 1.39
768meg PC133 memory
Vodoo 5500 AGP video
SB Live 5.1
Surfboard SB3100 cable modem
25 gig IBM Deskstar HD
ABit MB

Game - Falcon 4.0 (awesome flight sim btw)

Believe me I've tried just about everything... hey even a get another router comment would be a help!!!

TIA

Lomax

[GRIM]

Seek Here (http://gameadmins.com/guides/linksys/linksys.htm)

[Lomax]

GRIM,

Thanks fro the fast reply ... not only did I go through your setup procs with a fine toothed comb I was gettign incoming requests from the other system but no outgoing requests.

At thsi point I cannot even get the game to work across the internal lan. Something is definitely amiss here.

I'm viewing the snmp data and nothing is coming out or in for the LAN side of the router. I'm getting all kinds of snmp data from the WAN but its http mail etc. Heck I can even VPN to my work without fiddling with a thing. ... I've even opened up forwarding to all the ports known to RFC1700 0-65535 for the gaming server and still jack spit! Lol

If there is any other trick or how to on this please let me know.

P.S. Iv'e already been to "practicallynetwroked", "speedguide" and "DSLreports" nothing out there on this type of problem.

Ive tried DHCP, Static addressing, and DMZ and still the same ....

Doh! It's gotta be soemthing quite simple!!


Lomax

[GRIM]

Hmmmmmm! thinking:confused:

[Lomax]

It definitely helps if you use the same versions of the game for testing..... I did a sanity check and noted that I was not using the same versions for the local lan test!!!! Damn! :(

Soon as I confirmed both systems were running the same versions the local lan connection worked like a charm. Now I'm stuck with the connections timing out... they see each other at least, but nothing is coming through consistently for the required ports 2934 and 2935...

I gave the game server system a static ip and set it outside in the DMZ. The remote system is using a ISDN connection to the WAN address of the cable modem. I can see my test player but cannot chat or get any player information via the point and click routines of the game.

I can even host a game up there, but it gets stuck collecting data and then they dont see each other, and I get a lot of "player left" "player returned" messages which calls for a closing and reopening of the game.

I'm really close but there must be something i'm missing here. The same results happen no matter what version of the firmware i've tried. So far im still with 1.37 but went as high as 1.39 for testing.

Whooboy i'm so close I can taste it! :rotfl:

Ive collected a bit of SNMP data to confirm my findings .. for the game it seems that the 2935 port is not being opened fast or long enough whereas the 2934 port seems to be on steriods.

Thanks again for listening ...it helps me think! :D

[scrotus]

its monday so forgive any stupiduty.

I see you have put the server in the DMZ, but have you tried assigning static IPs to the internal machines, i.e. 192.168.1.xx?

I run a lot of online games myself and I had to do this. Also, in counter-strike, I had to add my clent port to my launch shortcuts, ie 27005 to make sure I didn't get dropped after a few minutes.

Have you tried adding that outgoing port to your launch for an online game?

I need more coffee.

[cyberskye]

Not sure that it is related, but are you using port forwarding and putting tha machine in the DMZ? The DMZ host is already getting all ports at that ip forwarded (definition of DMZ). The router is pretty flakey when it comes to this sort of thing anyway. I understand that the current firmaware updates are for game compatibility, not new features.


Skye

[Lomax]

Thanks for the tips all....

I havent looked at it again today but I will later this evening. The game hosts fine via the inboard hub ..however, its when I try to connect from the outside things get flakey.

Scrotus... yeah it was getting pretty late for me too... :sleep: Currently the gaming server does have a static IP. Also I do have to give the game the correct internal ip address to talk out on ..so far so good. The problem seems to be that the connection doesn't respond to the "i guess you would call it the client since the gaming box is hosting" client consistently. Oooo :eek: but I havent tried adding the ports to the startup for the game at the shortcut... good point I'll look into that pronto! :p Not even sure if its an option to start the game.

Cyberskye ... yes I have tried it both ways and with the same results. The forwarding is off, if the box is put into the DMZ and on when it is not, but still no joy.

Just for kicks I let the router assing the ip (DHCP) and I also but not at the same time, manually assigned the ip (nonDHCP) and still no connectability or chat capability in the lobby. I can see but cannot touch ..

From what I can remember, from the wee hours of researching this, forwarding takes precendence over DMZ. I dare not even try the SPI feature ..the game isn't that sophisticated in the networking department..

Thanks for the tips .. i'm still at it ... oh .. One other shot is to try another game to see if it is working and if so then I can definitely say it's not the hardware but a software issue... sounds like a plan? :p

[Lomax]

Well I got it working .. went to the bare minimums and bam it was working .. I gotta remember that under this new firmware 1.39 SPI takes precedence over everything else .. hey I'm even noticing a very realistic speed improvement!

Thanks all for your help and support!!!!!!!!:D

[striderf1]

I have this router too and I gave up on gaming a longggg time ago, its just not going to happen for me. I hope you have more luck than I did

[striderf1]

did you say you used the firmware up to 1.39??? I'm using 1.38.1 that I got from someone from the hardforums, but I was unaware that the firmware went any higher than the beta that I'm using. Did you find 1.39 any better? more stable, less stable? Fill me in, I have some problems with my router still (file transfers don't work in AIM or ICQ) and I would like the problems fixed

[Lomax]

Yes,

There is a firmware version 139.. check out this link..... http://www.practicallynetworked.com/support/linksys_router_help_pg2.htm#Firmware

ICQ filetransfers should work fine I just received a 3.5 meg file the other night. Let me know if I can be of any help!!!!!!!!:D