CenturyLink ActionTec C1900A not forwarding ports properly...need help

[bhogervorst]

Hi,

Lets start our with my setup and some background, I'm on CenturyLink and I had an internet speed of 7/0.8MBps and I NEEDED to upgrade my speeds. In order to get faster speeds, CenturyLink came to my house and installed a second DSL line, which required a special modem / router combo to combine the two lines speeds, so now I have 20/2MBps speeds which is amazing! That's the background, but here's my problem.

I host a small private Minecraft server for my friends and I. On my old ASUS router, port 25565 was forwarded and the server ran just fine. When I got the ActionTec C1900C router/modem, I set it up then logged in and port forwarded port 25565. This new router has an IPv4 firewall so I also added exceptions in it for port 25565.

But, after acquiring my public IP and loading up Minecraft, my server is not pinging. I tried it on the Server computer itself and localhost pings but not the public IP. So the server works in my LAN but not via my public address.

So I went and downloaded the open-port testing software from https://portforward.com/, and it said my port is open...which makes no sense because not only does my Minecraft server not work, but any other software I tried doesn't work as well on that port or any other ports - AT ALL.

Here's what I have already done which hasn't worked:
- I reset my servers firewall
- I reset my routers firewall
- I tried another port
- I tried other programs, servers, and software on different ports and port 25565
- I Called CenturyLink (they suggested the full restore)
- I tried forwarding port 80 and setting the MC server to it and it started to ping but then said Cannot Connect
- Checked Router firmware, it's up to date

I have a few theories, one is that the Dual DSL lines might be conflicting with the port forwarding, another is that I just might have setup the router and portforwarding wrong. Lastly, I might just have been given a messed up router.

Here's some things I'm going to try:
- Doing a full router restore
- If that doesn't work, CenturyLink will get me a different router...hopefully though, knowing CenturyLink (LOL)

Anyways, I'm stumped and I need help soon!
Thanks in advance for the help, you guys here are great!
- bhogervorst

 

[KiL3MaNjAr0W]

I'd suggest you check this out seems to be an previously experienced issue.
http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/support/server-support/1872913-port-forwarding-will-not-work-no-matter-what-i-do

 

[bhogervorst]

I'd suggest you check this out seems to be an previously experienced issue.
http://www.minecraftforum.net/forums/support/server-support/1872913-port-forwarding-will-not-work-no-matter-what-i-do

Hi KiL3MaNjAr0W,

I viewed that thread, thanks for posting that. Unfortunately, it's just a big mess of old and new posts by people with different problems, I browsed over every post on every page but did not find anything that could help me.

I coincidentally met the same CenturyLink guy who came to my house to install the modem working on a house just down my street so I told him my problem and he handed me another model of the same type to try instead in case I had a faulty one. I have tried that one but it also does not work. At this point, it's not a faulty router as we've seen, so it's down to a few things:
- CenturyLink is messing with me somehow
- My router needs extra configuration
- Something else

Thanks a ton but I suppose it's back to the drawing board again, anybody else have any solutions?
Anyways, have a great day and thanks for your help,
- Benji

 

[KiL3MaNjAr0W]

I don't know if it will help specifically to your minecraft server but when I get some free time this weekend if no one else has been able to help and you haven't figured out your issue I'll do some reading on port forwarding setup and see if I can suggest something.

 

[bhogervorst]

I don't know if it will help specifically to your minecraft server but when I get some free time this weekend if no one else has been able to help and you haven't figured out your issue I'll do some reading on port forwarding setup and see if I can suggest something.

Awesome, thanks a ton for your help!

I'll be around and ready to help work this out!
Thanks,
- Benji

 

[bhogervorst]

Hey all

Back with a solution and quite a simple one! I can't believe I didn't realize before. Let me explain.
So on my old router, if I was running my server inside the LAN, of course I could connect via my LAN address. But I could also google my external IP and connect via that or my domain- it worked just fine then. It took long enough but CenturyLink finally helped me by explaining that with the new Router/Modem combo I have, the protocols do not allow me to ping my server externally using my public IP unless I'm outside of my LAN, which was what I was doing to try and test my server.

So that's the simple solution to my problem. The port forwarding was never really the problem. What bugs me is that this solution is something that I could have simply seen on some forum or website after googling but since nobody has actually posted and explanation I was stuck to figure it out myself. But for those people trying to find the answer, I've struggled and found it for you!

If somebody thinks they might have this same problem, here's something to try. This > https://dinnerbone.com/minecraft/tools/status/ is a link to a handy server checker website by Dinnerbone. That really helped me out a lot because it could ping my address externally when I couldn't.

Anyways, enough blabbering. My problem is solved. I know I didn't get a ton of help here but I hope this thread will be able to help people in the future dealing with crappy CenturyLink and the same problem. Thanks still though, have a nice day.
- bhogervorst

 

[TheFyreNight]

If none of the above fixed it, maybe you are using both a modem and router like in my case where I was using both my centurylink modem and asus router. To fix this in my case I had to turn on bridge mode on centurylink modem and login to ISP on my asus router.

To do this go to advanced tab of centurylink and go to WAN, then in dropdown menu switch from PPPoE to transparent bridge(while here don't forget PPPoE login info for ISP). Afterwards go over to asus router on WAN tab change connection type to PPPoE and below type PPP username and password(this is my isp login) then everything worked. This video I found should do a better job explaining how to turn transparent bridge on: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWy97JLLBGw

 

[bhogervorst]

If none of the above fixed it, maybe you are using both a modem and router like in my case where I was using both my centurylink modem and asus router. To fix this in my case I had to turn on bridge mode on centurylink modem and login to ISP on my asus router.

To do this go to advanced tab of centurylink and go to WAN, then in dropdown menu switch from PPPoE to transparent bridge(while here don't forget PPPoE login info for ISP). Afterwards go over to asus router on WAN tab change connection type to PPPoE and below type PPP username and password(this is my isp login) then everything worked. This video I found should do a better job explaining how to turn transparent bridge on: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWy97JLLBGw

It's funny you mention that.
Like I said in my last post, I have since solved this issue, but I still have my C1900A. The WiFi capability on it recently died, though it still works a wired modem connected to my RT-N56U repeater AP. So I bought an Asus RT-ACRH13 as the new network router and primary AP. My C1900A is a piece of crap but it still works as a modem and that's what it's doing right now. It's so nice to be able to use the Asus control panel as opposed to the CenturyLink one which was awful and didn't work half the time.

The information you provided will be able to help a lot of people, even if my problem was solved, thanks for your help!

B