[ale] poll: WRT54G 3rd-party firmware for wireless bridge

[Brian MacLeod]

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I

On 7/11/10 6:41 PM, Ed Cashin wrote:

> In other words,
> 
>   Comcast cable => modem => Airport Extreme => cloud
>   cloud => MacBooks, Tivo, etc.
>   cloud => WRT54G => (cat 6) debian PC, HP network laser printer
> 


I have done similar (I had the TiVos as the clients connected to DD-WRT
compatible routers (WRT's, Buffalos) to bridge to my wireless network.

DD-WRT has two modes that will do this: Client, and Client Bridge.
Client is okay, because your router now acts as an additional NAT
connection in your chain (devices connected to it get different IPs than
the wireless network).  Client Bridge works better because you don't add
another NAT layer, but the set up tends to be a little more intricate,
and prone to "crap, I hit the reset before I set that last setting"
business.

But when it works, it's nice and smooth.

The EASIEST way of doing it:

Connect via network cable to the router you wish to use as a bridge.

Flash with a stable version of DD-WRT for your router.  After setting
the password, I found it infinitely more useful to do the Wireless Scan
in Advanced (I believe) and find and join the already working network
that way (*PARTICULARLY IF YOU ARE USING WPA2*, and I hope you are).  It
will set the device to a client mode, and bring you to the wireless
configuration screen, where you MIGHT have to change the client mode to
the correct one, as well as enter any WPA keys.  Hit Save.  NOT APPLY.

If you bungle, you need to reset to factory.

Go to "Setup", and set any parameters you wish for the router.  I would
HIGHLY suggest setting its IP to something appropriate to your wireless
network, but will not be used by DHCP (usually xx.yy.zz.2 is a good
choice), and set time server and such.  Again, hit SAVE, NOT apply.

If you bungle, you need to reset to factory.

Now, in Advanced, turn ON the remote management web interface.  Yes,
this seems counterintuitive, until you realize the "external" network on
this device is your internal wireless network.  Once you do that, you
can hit Save or apply, and using the port and IP address assignment on
your own network (once these setting are applied), you can make any
other changes you may need to the router from your own network.

Oh, and another tidbit: if you are using this setup and are using WPA2
(please!), turn on SSID broadcast. If you don't, should the main
wireless bow out for some reason, you'll likely have to invoke a manual
reboot of the bridging router. I know this goes counter to some folks'
security advice, but, reality is that if _they_ are in sniffing range,
they can figure out the SSID eventually anyway in relatively short order.


I suffered through reading the materials [1] that folks have read about
setting up wireless bridging, and ultimately boiled down their steps and
suggestions to this repeatable set of steps (re-engineered my
network/moved it a couple of times).


Hope this helps.

Brian


[1] http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Client_Bridged






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