Trying to access secondary 2Wire wireless router

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BiggusDoggus

391 posts

Ultimate Geek

#171074 4-Apr-2015 21:36

Hi

I have set my old 2Wire as a secondary router to be the wifi point for my home, with a Huawai HG630b as my main wired VDSL modem fo my PC.

I want to access the 2Wire to adjust the settings, as I suspect the power level is set pretty low and the channel needs tweaking.

However (and you smart people probably already know where I'm going with this), using http://192.168.1.254 on either my PC, or my laptop using the wireless connection, only brings up the access page for the Huawei.

If I try plugging the 2Wire directly into either my laptop or my PC using the LAN cable it also doesn't work ("this page is not available") - I suspect it's because the 2Wire can't connect to the internet due to it being an ADSL router and I'm now on VDSL, but I could be wrong.

I have also tried http://192.168.1.253, gateway.2wire.net, and some other variations Mr Google found for me, with no joy.

Here are the current settings in the Huawei:

Any advice please, at a level of someone who (very dangerously) knows a little about some thing, if you know what I mean?

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries

richms

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#1277251 4-Apr-2015 21:49

if you disabled DHCP on the 2wire and didnt give it a unique address in the range of the other router, then your best course is a factory reset. take it off the lan, and reconfigure from scratch.

Yes, you can probably install network sniffing tools and find its IP, but the only thing you will need to reset up are the IP, turn off DHCP and whatever wireless settings you want so reset will be easier.

Richard rich.ms

BiggusDoggus

391 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1277271 4-Apr-2015 22:26

richms: if you disabled DHCP on the 2wire and didnt give it a unique address in the range of the other router, then your best course is a factory reset. take it off the lan, and reconfigure from scratch.

Yes, you can probably install network sniffing tools and find its IP, but the only thing you will need to reset up are the IP, turn off DHCP and whatever wireless settings you want so reset will be easier.

Thanks Rich - am I right in assuming that the IP address for the 2Wire could be anything between 64 & 253, and that it changes every 24 hours? So I could, if I had a lot of time on my hands, try every IP address in that range?

It's just I recall it was a bit of a mission getting it set up in the first place, and if I stuff it up I'm going to have a small yet deadly horde of family members skinning me alive.

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries

richms

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#1277274 4-Apr-2015 23:00

The 2 wire will probably not accept an IP by DHCP so it would have been assigned at some point. It doesnt need to be in the range that is accessable from the other router because it just bridges wifi with wired in that config - it doesnt even need an IP interface to function at that, it only has one so you can configure it.

If you want to then install winpcap and windump and you might get a glimpse of something from it as it starts up which shows its IP address. If you know its wired mac address then you can put a filter for that so you dont see every piece of broadcast traffic on the lan. But reset will be easier.

Richard rich.ms

BiggusDoggus

391 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1277280 4-Apr-2015 23:18

richms: The 2 wire will probably not accept an IP by DHCP so it would have been assigned at some point. It doesnt need to be in the range that is accessable from the other router because it just bridges wifi with wired in that config - it doesnt even need an IP interface to function at that, it only has one so you can configure it.

If you want to then install winpcap and windump and you might get a glimpse of something from it as it starts up which shows its IP address. If you know its wired mac address then you can put a filter for that so you dont see every piece of broadcast traffic on the lan. But reset will be easier.

Thanks, so I just turn off the 2Wire, have windump running and pretty much hope something jumps out at me?

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries

richms

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#1277281 4-Apr-2015 23:22

If you plug one PC into its lan ports and reboot the router it will normally do some broadcast stuff while they are booting. You shouldnt even need an IP on the PC to see that come thru, then you can just assign one in that range.

Sometimes appliances do an ARP request on their IP address to check for conflicts etc which will show too. Just not anything that is a 224.x.x.x

Richard rich.ms

BiggusDoggus

391 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1277286 4-Apr-2015 23:39

richms: If you plug one PC into its lan ports and reboot the router it will normally do some broadcast stuff while they are booting. You shouldnt even need an IP on the PC to see that come thru, then you can just assign one in that range.

Sometimes appliances do an ARP request on their IP address to check for conflicts etc which will show too. Just not anything that is a 224.x.x.x

Boom! You were right, it was painful, but playing around with phone on wifi looking at sites at specific times narrowed it down - and I now have the IP address.

Legend - thank you.

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries

BiggusDoggus

391 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1277287 4-Apr-2015 23:43

However, after all that, I can't change the power level to more than 4 (it only has the option from 1 - 4). Any ideas how I can increase the power level please?

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries

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richms

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#1277288 4-Apr-2015 23:52

BiggusDoggus: However, after all that, I can't change the power level to more than 4 (it only has the option from 1 - 4). Any ideas how I can increase the power level please?

Buy something decent. But more power on the router wont help if you are going to phones. You really need more devices around the place rather than more power on one device. Phones have weak output, and if it cant transmit back but can see the AP fine, it will get really really really slow. Often less power is better when you have mainly mobile devices connectin to the AP.

If you can get cat5/6 thru then there are many cheap APs that are pretty good with mobile devices. You dont need a flash multi-stream N or AC device if you just want reliable facebooking and video chat on your phone around the house.

Richard rich.ms

BiggusDoggus

391 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1277290 4-Apr-2015 23:56

richms:
BiggusDoggus: However, after all that, I can't change the power level to more than 4 (it only has the option from 1 - 4). Any ideas how I can increase the power level please?

Buy something decent. But more power on the router wont help if you are going to phones. You really need more devices around the place rather than more power on one device. Phones have weak output, and if it cant transmit back but can see the AP fine, it will get really really really slow. Often less power is better when you have mainly mobile devices connectin to the AP.

If you can get cat5/6 thru then there are many cheap APs that are pretty good with mobile devices. You dont need a flash multi-stream N or AC device if you just want reliable facebooking and video chat on your phone around the house.

Ok, cool - thanks for all your help. Greatly appreciated.

Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries