Connecting old router to telus modem through static IP (?)

[john10]

Hi,

I'm trying to configure an old router in order to have faster internet access upstairs but I'm running into some issues. 

Backstory: I've connected the ethernet cable to the WAN port of my T3200M modem to the WAN port of my BEFSR81 v1 router, then another ethernet cable for one of the LAN ports of my router directly to my desktop ethernet port. The router was from the early 2000's so it originally came with a CD that I've now lost (also not available for downloading anymore as well as any firmware upgrades related to the BEFSR81 router). I opened up chrome and went into 192.168.1.1 to try and setup the router manually. 

Setting up router manually: After logging in through admin, at the setup page, I initially filled up the host name and domain name as telus, and left the LAN ip address as default. For the WAN ip address, I originally left it as "obtain ip address automatically". There was a "pppoe" option close to the bottom which was basically obsolete since everything was DHCP nowadays so I left the option at "disabled".

Problem: After clicking apply, there was still no internet connection. I hopped into my laptop, connected it directly to my modem's wifi, and opened up cmd and typed "ipconfig /all" and I went back to my desktop and changed from "obtain ip address automatically" to "specify IP address".

Initial Solution: I filled up the text boxes by copying info from my cmd's ipconfig to setup configuration:

IP address : (IPv4 address from ipconfig)

Subnet Mask : (Subnet mask from ipconfig)

Default Gateway : (Default Gateway from ipconfig)

DNS: (2 DNS addresses from ipconfig)

When I hit apply, I was able to connect to the internet, but I vaguely remember that static IPs are reserved for businesses only for telus, but since I was able to connect to the internet through home service account, does this mean I wasn't actually using static IP connection? (this is my first time configuring a router so I really don't know what I'm doing) If I had continued using that setup, would I be paying extra if I was accidentally using static IP? If not, can I keep using a static IP connection on the router if the modem is dynamically changing IP ? Thank you for anyone that read this post.

[xray · Accepted solution]

Do not connect the old router to the WAN port of the T3200M, connect it to a LAN port.

I don't think your BEFSR81can be configured as a wireless access point so your only option is to set it up on a separate subnet like 192.168.0.1 which means you probably need to reconfigure it from the default 192.168.1.1 BEFORE you connect it to the T3200M.

Note that with this configuration devices on the BEFSR81 will be able to see devices on the T3200M but not the other way around.

[JohnMina]

Hi xray, 

I have t2200h modem and old router, will it the same process for connecting? If change please share it in details thanks

[Nighthawk]

Same process. Connect the router's WAN port to one of the LAN ports on the T2200.

[xray]

Solution is generic, should work with any 2 routers. Just make sure the 2 routers aren't trying to use the same subnet.

There is a caveat for this configuration in that gaming and devices that require remote access won't work when connected to the upstream router without doing a bit of extra configuring (static IP's and port forwarding).