Question Using a router as the internet source to another router.

[RASelkirk]

Hi All,

I am in an area with numerous lengthy power failures. Even though we have a Generac, whenever the power is out, so goes our Spectrum cable. And hurricane season is here! In the past, I've fumbled around setting up my existing router (Netgear R7000) in bridge mode with my phone as a hotspot, but many features are disabled in bridge and the last time I reverted to normal ops, I ended up doing a hard reset.

The plan is to find a new modem (call it new) that has built-in USB phone tethering, of which there are several. Pipe my spectrum cable modem to new's WAN port and a phone to new's USB port. Then, run a Cat5 cable from a LAN port on new to ?? port on R7000. At this point, I've seen conflicting info on which port to use on R7000, one site says WAN, others say LAN. Pretty sure it will matter. Now that it's hooked up, continue using my R7000 as the IP distribution point with new strictly serving up the internet in whatever flavor is up and running. I had a nice "map" made up but I guess I'm too new to upload a pic...

From reading other 'net articles, I can do this but they all state the first (new) router must be the one that assigns IP's. As you can see, it has built-in phone tethering with auto rollover. My R7000 is set up and working fine. I do not want to loose or remove any of it's settings, all 25+ IPs are hard-coded and took forever to get right. I'm hoping I can wire as above, put my existing router in (permanent) bridge or repeater mode, and have it work.

Essentially, I want nothing to change on my R7000 except the source of the internet, which needs to come from new router.

Looking for advice / assistance!

Russ

 

[bill001g]

automatic switch over does not always work that well. Most device are pretty stupid and since the ethernet port stays up on your spectrum modem it might not switch over. It all depends if it can detect the internet is out.

It might be easier in the long run to move whatever configuration you have done on the netgear router to the new router. It is best if you only have one router.

If you are going to keep the netgear you first have to be careful both routers are not using the same lan ip subnet. After that you just plug your netgear WAN port into a LAN port on the new router. You must use the wan port if you plan to use any feature on the netgear. Most features are disabled if you do not run the device in router mode.

Your new problem is you now have 2 levels of NAT in the path. This generally is only a issue if you are doing port forwarding for a server or have a game console that uses UPnP. You can fix most issues but it get very complex to setup at times.

 

[RASelkirk]

automatic switch over does not always work that well. Most device are pretty stupid and since the ethernet port stays up on your spectrum modem it might not switch over. It all depends if it can detect the internet is out.

Good to know. Since we don't plan on leaving unless there's a Cat 4 or better, I can just pull the e'net cable from the modem if it doesn't switch over.

It might be easier in the long run to move whatever configuration you have done on the netgear router to the new router. It is best if you only have one router.

I'm starting to think about this, just dreading all the new configuring to be done...

If you are going to keep the netgear you first have to be careful both routers are not using the same lan ip subnet. After that you just plug your netgear WAN port into a LAN port on the new router. You must use the wan port if you plan to use any feature on the netgear. Most features are disabled if you do not run the device in router mode.

The R7000 subnet is the usual 255.255.255.0 that most routers are set at. So I just set the new one at something different like 255.255.255.1 within the same 192.168.1.xxx IP range? Sounds like the only reconfig on the R7000 would be the main internet setup page?

Internet IP Address
 x Get Dynamically from ISP
   Use Static IP Address
IP Address 
IP Subnet Mask 
Gateway IP Address
 
Domain Name Server (DNS) Address
 x Get Automatically from ISP
   Use These DNS Servers
Primary DNS 
Secondary DNS

Your new problem is you now have 2 levels of NAT in the path. This generally is only a issue if you are doing port forwarding for a server or have a game console that uses UPnP. You can fix most issues but it get very complex to setup at times.

I don't have any of that nor do I anticipate adding anything like this.

Thanks!

 

[bill001g]

The mask is only partially related to the subnet. The WAN setting and mask etc on the main router do not matter.
The key thing is you can not have both routers using say 192.168.1.x change one to say 192.168.2.x

 

[RASelkirk]

OK, thanks. If I sound a bit lazy it's age speaking. At 70, I'm likely older than most on here and while the technology can be challenging, it's my (lack of) patience that usually gets in the way. Since I'll end up buying a new router just to get the tethering and rollover features, I'll try it with two first. If that get's too frustrating, I'll dump the R7000. To my old logic, keeping things the same as possible is best...

Russ