Domain names and DNS

[cecilthecat]

OK all you Teccy GS'ers I need a wee bit of help.

I want to be able to access my home computer remotely via the internet. at the moment I am using BT broadband and am allocated a dynamic IP adddress. If I want to be able to contact my machine how do I do this as I dont think BT will give me a fixed IP address somehow ??
Do I need to register a domain name and have some sort of server running on my machine sending a heartbeat back to a central server telling it what my current IP address is which will then link it to my domain name ?
If so can somebody recommend a good company that will not charge the earth, or is there another way.

Cheers

Simon

 

[boundless]

DNS2Go is the way to go on this one.

Pretty self explanatory. Got a few friends who run it. Works well.

(However... sooner or later you'll get your broadband provider p****d if you serve to much stuff for too long from a domestic subscription account. Most of the broadband ISP's run pretty intelligent traffic analysis software which can tell the difference between serving (not OK) and peer to peer file sharing (just about OK). If in doubt read your small print and/or always be ready to move on to a new ISP if you get the finger one fine day.)

 

[Telford]

What boundless said

Or, you could pay BT another £10 a month for fixed IP (Internet Business Pack)

 

[Blue Sweeper]

DNS2Go is the way to go on this one.

Pretty self explanatory. Got a few friends who run it. Works well.

No no no, why pay for a domain and software? Get one for FREE from DYNDNS and free forwarding to your IP address.

HERE

 

[needlongerlegs]

Questions Questions

Good Morning,

Why do you want to access you home PC,

File access, Web hosting or what?

It makes a difference to what you need.

Simple Access to you pc part time, and retrieve files run program's:-

Get a fixed IP, and a decent Router NetGear 834UK does the job well, get free VNC and you can access all all program's and applications on your Home PC, most ISP's don't mind this sort of access as you not 24/7 and not hosting.

For Reference:-

VNC - http://www.realvnc.com/
ISP - www.f2s.com
Router - http://www.netgear.com/products/details/DG834.php

Hope this helps

Cheers

Graham (Network Nerd) ex Watford too, Leviathan, then Calendonian Arms on a summers evening and then a blast to Chorley Wood Black Hose and Back to Leavseden Road those were the days..

 

[cecilthecat]

Firstly thanks for the replys.

I want to access my PC remotely for my own use, I want to be able to run a remote desktop like VNC, and be able to access and download/Upload the occasional file. I would like to be able to stream some video content from one machine as well, as I have a load of films in WMV format that I would like to be able to access remotely

I have registered a a domain name and have DNS services with DYNDNS, I have also installed on my machine 3Dwatch which reports back my Dynamic IP address.

Now this is where I'm stuck

My setup is:
2 x XP machines connected to a Netgear ADSL wireless router which has a firewall function as well. I can run VNC locally from machine to machine. I have done an IP trace on the domain name and I think it is stopping at my router.

How do I set up access to the 2 machines through the firewall ?

I'm all a bit confused now

 

[shugie]

You need to enable the port mapping function in the router to allow incoming traffic on whichever port VNC uses to be directed to the correct machine.

This does open a hole in the firewall, albeit on that port only, so you might want to consider putting some firewall software on that machine, if you have not already.

Does that help, if not, let me know the Netgear router model and I will see if I can get more off their website - I use Cisco stuff myself.

Shug

 

[cecilthecat]

Shugie

I think it is a Netgear DG834G, would I need to open a different port for each VNC connection as I have 2 machines connected. Or would I just use the domain and machine name in VNC ??

Cheers

Simon

 

[needlongerlegs]

Graham here again

approximate:

1) Open up the web interface for your router
2) go to 'firewall', then go to 'nat'
3) select 'port range mapping'
4) enter the following:

Public Address: 195.137.77.245 (should be your ISP assigned static IP but double check this)
Not sure how you can do this on a DHCP address try the one you've got now and never turn the router off and you'll keep it...

Public Port from: 5800
Public Port to: 5800
Local Address: 10.0.0.2 (or whatever the internal address of the PC with VNC on is)
Local Port from: 5800
Local Port to: 5800
Protocol: TCP

5) Click apply (and probably a reboot for good measure)

 

[shugie]

Shugie

I think it is a Netgear DG834G, would I need to open a different port for each VNC connection as I have 2 machines connected. Or would I just use the domain and machine name in VNC ??

Cheers

Simon

Graham seems to have answered how to conenct one machine, which is all you can do, as the router can only send port 5800 to one internal address. To use 2 machines would make life very complicated as you would have to buy a range of IP addresses.

Can VNC allow you to connect from outside to one machine, and then make a second connection from that to the other internal machine. This works with Timbuctoo.

 

[cecilthecat]

Thanks guys I'll give this a go when I get home. One thing is the IP address that longlegs refered to is the 'Static IP address' from my ISP, but surely I am only getting a dynamically assigned IP address from BT so what would I do there ?

As for running VNC on both machines this is probably not needed as all one of the PC's is just stuffed up with Hard drive's and all of these are mapped to the other machine so I will be able to get my data that way.

One last thing would I be better to assign a local fixed IP address to both machines on the network rather than letting the router assign them itself as it does now ? If so is this easy to do ?

Thanks again for the help, I will let you know how I get on.

Simon

 

[needlongerlegs]

Hi Again, must do some work LOL

Just use VNC on fastest machine to get to the next

Or

Second Public Port number to next machine

Same IP different port nos

XXX.168.1.1:5800 for one

XXX.168.1.1:5801 for other one

As for Dynamic IP Address (DHCP) if you don't turn your router off it will keep hold of its address not good practise But need must

G...

 

[Telford]

Just an idea; as you're using XP, enable remote desktop on them, use mstsc (microsoft terminal services client), which I believe is freely available, to get to one of them through the firewall and the same method to get from the first to the second.

I find it more reliable than VNC and it's a bit more secure - you can also use connected printers and cut and paste across sessions.