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Network connection priority troubles

edited October 2007 in Technology
Here's an odd pickle...

My 'home' (as in dorm room) network is an interesting concoction of salvaged networking gear. I have an old Deskpro running DHCP and Samba servers under Debian, a Digital DecHUB One that's probably about as old as I am, and a La Fonera I nabbed for free that I've loaded with DD-WRT.
The exact flow from component to component in my room is as follows:

WAN <---> Fonera (Serving 192.168.0.x) <--(wireless)--> Laptop <---> DecHUB <---> Deskpro (Serving 10.0.0.x)

Yes, it's roundabout, but it keeps my server off the WAN. I've considered every possible arrangement of equipment, and this is the best setup I've found (Deskpro is too slow to route traffic, Fonera doesn't have a LAN Ethernet jack to serve DHCP addresses, etc). Now, the trouble I'm having isn't related to the equipment itself, but how my laptop is deciding which connection to use.

I'm currently dual-booting Gutsy and Windows XP Pro. Under Gutsy, everything is fine and dandy, I can get at my files and the Internet. When I boot into XP, if I try to use both connections simultaneously, things fall to pieces. I've tried renaming the connections, adjusting their priorities under Network Connections > Advanced > Advanced Settings, readjusting the Fonera to serve 1.0.0.x addresses (I thought it might be alphabetizing the IP addresses), and rebooting a bajillion times. Since I use Gutsy more than XP, it's not a huge problem, except that DC++ adaptations for Linux are... not that great. Without proper access to both networks under XP, I can't connect to the school's internal hub and share my files simultaneously.

It almost seems like XP internally gives priority to physical connections. Any ideas on how to force Windows to get it right?

Comments

  • I guess you could disable the ethernet adapter on your XP, making it use the WiFi always.
  • You have to change the routing table stuff in XP. Don't ask me exactly how.
  • I guess you could disable the ethernet adapter on your XP, making it use the WiFi always.

    Not really an option, it defeats the purpose of keeping the server off the WAN if not even I can get to it.
    You have to change the routing table stuff in XP. Don't ask me exactly how.
    Ugh, I was afraid of that. At least now I know what I'm Googling. Merci!
  • edited October 2007
    Followup, for anyone with these same troubles: I just had to change the metric for eth0 to an arbitrarily large number. I guess Gutsy's just smart enough to automatically raise the metric on any connections that can't actually get out to the world, or remove them from iptables altogether.

    Thanks again guys!
    Post edited by Lusankya on
  • I just had to change the metric for eth0 to an arbitrarily large number.


    Ohh that is actually very smart. How did you do that in XP?
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