Poll: Cable Modem / Proxy setups!!

[OliverP]

Ok, simply put, for those of you with cable modems and a home LAN out there, can you please describe with as much detail your shared connection setups: (I need help! lol.. Cox Roadrunner is nice...but windows sharing sucks and It keeps funking up.. to begin with, I DO have two NICs in my main win98 system...)

1) which proxy software on main system? (and/or other hosts if necessary)

2) hardware configs too

thanks. late.

 

[damac]

im using a homefree kit that I got for around $80 new almost 2 years ago. its a 1mb/sec system that uses 2 nics connected through a phone cord. either direct or through wall outlets. I did it cause long phone cord is easier for us. so my @home cable machine is host and when I boot software loads and other computer sucks of it for internet stuff. I have done file sharing, print sharing, internet access, and lan games and it has been all good! very stable and its worked with many different applications. Its an older product I dont even know if its still around or not.

And setup is easy. nics in each computer install driver from cd, of course have phone cord hooked up. one is host others aren't. it does a network discovery a couple times and a couple reboots to setup a computer. Then software is automatically installed and it ask for win98 cd if needed for network stuff then you can do what you want without stupid settings in any program. It just starts up in the background each bootup and go about your business. the host can see activity on other computers and just close the thing running and other computer will be cutoff but as long as the connection is their like say for the net you can just do whatever. for example I frequently play single player games on my computer and let others use the net in the other room. no apparent pauses or screwups on my side so its pretty slick

 

[OliverP]

any idea the name of that kit? or is it "homefree"?

 

[damac]

I looked around and here is the kit for sale direct from a link from diamonds site. its wierd but its still the same price and a product still being sold?

http://store.s3.com/dr/v2/ec_MAIN.Entry10?SP=10023&PN=1&V1=255179&xid=25971

Its $80 but only $100 for a 10mb kit which I would go for if your gonna spend the money. a kit is for 2 pc's and you get more nics for more computers.

I have no idea if this is a good deal today or has good features for the price but its worked perfect for me. plus maybe you can find it cheaper online with some coupons and stuff.

 

[LickEmSmack]

1) DSL modem from Pac Bell (not sure what kind, uses PPPoE)
2) Pentuim MMX 166 running RH 6.2 with 2 PCI NICs (internal IP=192.168.0.1)
3) Standard IPChain config firewall and route set-up
4) 5 Port Hub
5) Lots of Cat5 all over the house
6) Three Windoze boxen hooked up to use "192.198.0.1" as gateway assigned 192.168.0.X as IP

It's really not that tough if you have an extra box. It might even be cheaper than getting a router, but probably not as safe. You can use any old crappy comp to be the 'router' even an old 486... This setup is the only truly configurable setup I know of. All others are constrained in some fashion.

 

[purplehayes]

When I boot into Linux I share my Cable connection to my other two Windows boxes through the second NIC and a hub.

When I boot into Win98se I share with Sygate 4.0

When I boot into Win2KPro I just use the Internet sharing option in Network Properties.

I wouldn't use WinProxy again. I tried that and I was forever getting the BSOD.

PH

 

[HeinekinMan2]

I have ATT@Home cable modem service. My internet connection rig has two D-Link 10BT NIC's one of which is connected via CAT5 cable to a LANCity cable modem, the other is connected (CAT5) to a Unicom 8-port 10BT minihub. I have another rig and a laptop that connect to the hub.

On my internet connection rig, I am running Ositis Winproxy v3.0 (R1i). This s/w version allows me to share my internet connection with 3 computers and provides firewall protection (http://www.winproxy.com). Very easy setup and has been solid. I constantly test my system using ShieldsUp (http://www.grc.com) and all of my ports are in stealth mode all the time

The NIC that is connected to the cable modem has a static IP adx assigned; I had intermittent problems when using DHCP assignment through ATT@Home...however the other computers attached to the hub are all setup for DHCP assignment of non-routable IP adx's from my main rig.

Heiny

 

[HeinekinMan2]

I forgot to mention...my internet connection rig averages (300-800 KBytes speeds for downloading; yes, I have seen upwards of 6.8 Mbps download speeds, unreal and unheard of for cable, must be my luck!!!). My other computers that share the connection average 100-200 KByte connects...

Heiny

 

[Moving Target]

I use WinProxy 3.0 and think it is a great program. I have had no problems sharing my internet connection with it at home.

 

[OliverP]

does Winproxy work well with gaming? which proxy software is best for linux/98 combined LAN with 98 being the main box? I'd use a linux box with ipchains, but I'm a serious gamer and have had many probs going that route....

hmmm.. maybe ill try that again...

 

[Vinny N]

I've got a plain old Pentium Pro 200, 96mb ram system running 98SE, and Sygate 3.0 to handle connection sharing.

Works like a charm, the Sygate software does DHCP so system configuration is painless. It has a plain text file for editing settings for games/apps if needed. The software already supports all the games that use UDP (Q1,2,3, UO, EQ, etc) and has support for the Blizzard games that go on battle.net. Without any configuration, I could get multiple systems onto Battle.net at once. In Diablo 2, I was even able to get the systems into the same game! (I thought this was impossible) Anyways...Sygate is NAT based, so there is no proxy client to install.

The entire network is 10/100 with various NICs on all the system, all operating at 100mbit currently. The systems all feed into a 5 port switching hub(if I had the $$ I'd replace it with a real switch).

 

[A5]

I'm in the same boat as LickEm, except my router is about to be upgraded from a P100 to a K6/2-400 I got layin around

 

[troubledshooter]

If you have a spare (slow even) Mac lying around, the most powerful software router I've ever seen or heard of can be found at the bottom of this link. It can do IP masquarading, IP forwarding, it can even be set up to be DHCP aware.

I only use 1 NIC in each machine, each machine into a 5 port mini-hub.
1 win98 box
1 win2k box
1 Old Mac G3 (host)
1 iBook
1 cable modem (uplink port)

I'm fairly confident that I could not have set this thing up less securely (or less expensively!), but at the same time, I there is 0 sensitive (well, earth-shatteringly so anyhow) data stored on any of the machines, and if someone decides to hack it, they only get to the host Mac anyhow.

good luck

 

[NucleusWDS]

Using a Windows based PC for running proxy/firewall is CRAP !! ... It'll do the job but it's unstable and insecure.

You've got to use Linux if security and stability is essential. Time to go back to school and learn Linux

 

[LickEmSmack]

Update:

After being away from my linux router on vacation for the last 3 weeks, I returned home to find that the box was still up and routing! No crashs, nothing! Turn on one of the networked boxes and bamn everything works. This is no easy task since my ADSL line uses PPPoE and craps out every 2-3 days... Linux is AWESOME for this task... If you really want to be secure, use BSD tho... he he.