Router behind T3200M

[rzanatta]

I have a little bit of a unique situation.  My townhouse layout doesn't allow for any type of new wiring.  Telus recently installed fiber to my unit.  I have the following:

TV in basement

TV and multiple media devices (in entertainment unit) in living room on main floor.

TV in master bedroom on third floor.

Computer room on 4th floor den/bedroom.

The only wiring throughout the home, to all locations, is coax.

Telus recently installed fiber to the living room.

The ONT is beside entertainment unit in living room.  T3200M is in intertainment unit.  ONT goes via CAT5 to T3200M.

Telus installed MOCA adapter from T3200M to wall cable jack via coax.

PVR in living room is plugged into T3200M

In basement and master bedroom, MOCA adapters connected to cable wall jacks, and ethernet cables go to set top boxes.

In computer room, MOCA adapter connected to wall jack and CAT5 goes to ASUS 87U router.

In living room, also have another ASUS router, 86U.

Multiple WiFI devices roam the unit.

In the computer room, the 87U is configured in access point mode.  This allows the WiFi and ethernet ports of the router to be active; DHCP comes from T3200M.  Router gets address from IP address fine from T3200M, and any computers or WiFI devices connected to 87U get IP address fine.  Problem with 87U in access point mode is that it can't do much else.

As you may or may not see, the TV set top boxes and the upstair computer are on the same physical cable via MOCA.

Now I want to use my 86U in the living room in router mode so that I can use it as a VPN server as well as access a drive hung off of it for media and storage.

I've tried connecting the 86U to the T3200M via ethernet (ethernet port to ethenet port), with some success.  When this is done:

T3200M ip address is 192.168.1.254

86U ip address is 192.186.1.1

87U ip address is 192.168.1.2

Devices connected to the 87U can get out to the Internet, and can see the media/storage share on the 86U.  This is good.

Devices connected to the 86U can connect to the Internet, and can see the media/storage share on the 86U.  This is good.

I can port forware RDP from T3200H to a specific computer hanging off of 87U, and a remote connection to that computer works.

I enabled PPTP VPN server on 86U, but cannot connect to it remotely.  On the T3200M I've port forwarded PPTP port and GRE to the 86U.

On the 87U, it can successfully sync with the time servers (such as pool.ntp.org).  On the 86U it cannot.  Ping from 86U fails immediately because DNS resolution fails.

I've tried 86U WAN port to T3200M, but couldn't get that to work.

OK, pretty long winded.  Anyways, is there any way that:

a) keep my set top boxes connected via MOCA,

b) have those setup top boxes work for both TV channels and all Internet connectivity (such as Youtube channel) the STB supports,

c) keep my computer in the computer room connected via MOCA,

d) any internal devices see each other (i.e. Windows PC can see another Windows machine or 86U storage/media device, or smart TV see media/storage device),

e) run VPN server so that remote device (laptop, smartphone, etc.) can connect in from remote location and have access to all devices on LAN?

I've read up a fair bit on this, including bridging the T3200M, but I can't seem to get the gist of how to set things up.  It seems to me that it would helpful if the T3200M would allow user defined routes.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[NFtoBC]

Might you find it better to run an external VPN and file server, or is there a specific need to access a particular device?

[rzanatta]

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by an external VPN.

I'd like to remotely be in the network so I can access any device for various tasks such as file access, device WOL, etc.

[jrueger]

Couple of thoughts:

1. Perhaps having the 86U configured as a PPTP VPN server precludes it from functioning in any other mode - i.e. it is looking for the other end of the VPN connection (another PPTP VPN server) and because it can't find it everything else fails - DNS, NNTP, etc (i.e. it has no path to the internet or the T3200M for that matter).

2. Perhaps in addition to port forwarding on the T3200M you also have to allow PPTP VPN inbound on the T3200M firewall - by default it blocks them inbound.

3. Bridging port 1 on the T3200M won't work for your current physical connection of the MOCA adapters because it in effect creates two different networks, each with it's own WAN IP.  You can't create any routes on the T3200M and so you wouldn't have any way to route traffic from the T3200 network to the Bridged Port 1 network - thus you wouldn't be able to connect devices on the 86U to devices on the 87U.

Given the fact that you have only one physical connection to each location (room) because of the coax wiring the only way I can see to make things work is to physically separate your home network (the 86U and the 87U) from the T3200M network.  You could try the following:

- connect T3200M Port 1 to the 86U WAN and enable Bridging on the T3200M so you have two different physical networks with two separate WAN IP addresses

- connect the 86U to the 87U via MOCA so the 87U and its connected devices are on the same network as the 86U and its devices

- the other OptikTV boxes would connect to the T3200M via its 5G wifi network (you can turn off the 3200M 2.4G wifi) - you have to do this because the 86U is using the only coax connection at the T3200M location

- configure the 86U as your primary home network router and leave the T3200M in its default state to handle just the OptikTV traffic

This should give you the unfettered ability to configure a PPTP VPN etc and allow remote access to your home network using the 86U.  I'm not sure which of the 86U or the 87U is the more powerful device and better suited to be your primary router connected to Port 1 Bridged on the T3200M.