Cannot create a static IP address

[Elliot B.]

According to this guide, I should have two DNS servers when I enter the 'IPConfig /all' command.

However, I only get one, which is 192.168.0.1.

This makes it difficult when having to enter a 'Preferred DNS server' and 'Alternate DNS server' in the 'Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) Properties' dialogue box.

Any ideas?

[s0nic69]

i might not understand ur question... ur trying to give urself a static? and when u specify static under network connections under tcp/ip its asking u for the ip, preferred dns, alternative dns, and gateway? You dont have to type in a secondary dns server, just leave it blank. just the primary is required.

in addition, as far as i have seen, with home routers provided by ur isp, you only get 1 dns from your router. but the router has 2 confugured to it. so it might look like your only using 1 dns, but ur actually using 2.

Edited May 6, 2009 by s0nic69

[Matt]

such information should be provided to you by your ISP when assigned a static IP address. if you are using a router in your network, you shouldnt be bothered with assigning specific IP addresses to your computer, unless you are assigning specific network ip addresses.

i guess explain what exactly you are trying to do.

[TAZMINATOR]

I am not sure what you meant but I try my best:

Make sure your IP is static. If you are not sure, contact your internet provider about it. Otherwise you have dynamic IP which changes IP from time to time that won't work. Some providers charge a fee for static. If you can't afford a static IP, then there are several sites to choose one from and get an hostname for your IP for free. Also, the DNS software will update an IP periodically.

Are you trying to setup some type of server? If so, you don't need to enter static IP in, just open the ports or forward the ports in the router/firewall if you plan to host your site to public. Otherwise, you host your site or share files locally.

[|Rapture|]

We'd need to see your TCP/IP settings to see if anything is wrong. I'm guessing you are using a combined modem/router which is picking up DNS servers automatically from your ISP. If that's the case you don't need to worry about what IPCONFIG shows unless you are having problems.

[Elliot B.]

I'm trying to open a port for uTorrent, and the guide I am using on portforward.com is telling me to use a static IP address.

[saturnslullaby]

Is this more in tune of what you're looking for?

If so, then do the following:

Start Orb>Type "Network" in the 'Start Search' field.

Click the Network and Sharing Center.

Click "View Status" next to your LAN Connection [in your case the Realtek NIC]

On the Local Area Connection Status window that just opened, click Properties button

Double Click Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4)

and there you have it.

If you want to make changes then just select the "Use the following DNS Servers addresses" radio button

hope that helps

[Elliot B.]

Is this more in tune of what you're looking for?

If so, then do the following:

Start Orb>Type "Network" in the 'Start Search' field.

Click the Network and Sharing Center.

Click "View Status" next to your LAN Connection [in your case the Realtek NIC]

On the Local Area Connection Status window that just opened, click Properties button

Double Click Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4)

and there you have it.

If you want to make changes then just select the "Use the following DNS Servers addresses" radio button

hope that helps

What? No. The guide tells me I should have two DNS servers listed in the CMD, which I don't - I have one (which isn't a proper one anyway, it's a local one (which is wrong)).

[s0nic69]

i think what u want to do is this

login to ur router

under network, u should be able to set a static range, pull an ip from that range, and use it on ur computer. when giving urself the static ip, when it asks u for dns, just give it the same one that ipconfig /all shows u. u dont need to enter a alternative dns.

or if ur router supports just using the hostname, then u dont need to give urself a static.

look at the firewall options on ur router and just open the ports for that ip.hostname

hope that makes sence.

[|Rapture|]

What? No.

What? Yes. You do what Saturn says and you can configure a static IP for your machine. Then you forward to whatever IP you pick for your computer.

You can ignore ipconfig, you don't need it for what you are doing.

[Elliot B.]

What? Yes. You do what Saturn says and you can configure a static IP for your machine. Then you forward to whatever IP you pick for your computer.

You can ignore ipconfig, you don't need it for what you are doing.

Ok, so I can make up an IP in that dialogue (I'll use 123.456.789.0 to keep it simple). What do I put as my subnet mask, default gateway and preferred DNS server?

[saturnslullaby]

What? No. The guide tells me I should have two DNS servers listed in the CMD, which I don't - I have one (which isn't a proper one anyway, it's a local one (which is wrong)).

Whoa... just trying to help.

AFAIK - The reason you're only showing one DNS is because of the router. The router gets the TWO DNS ip's from a ISP and when you connect with your computer to the router Windows will just simply use the the router as a DNS which, as mentioned before, gets the DNS server ips from the ISP.

Now the reason i showed you the screen shot is because in the TCPIP props. you CAN enter the same IP's that your router gets from the ISP into those fields manually. Which is technically hardcoding OR assigning a Statis DNS IP.

IF you connect your PC DIRECTLY to the modem, THEN you could see the TWO dns addresses you're looking for. But i doubt that is the way you want to do it. So never mind that.

[Elliot B.]

Whoa... just trying to help.

AFAIK - The reason you're only showing one DNS is because of the router. The router gets the TWO DNS ip's from a ISP and when you connect with your computer to the router Windows will just simply use the the router as a DNS which, as mentioned before, gets the DNS server ips from the ISP.

Now the reason i showed you the screen shot is because in the TCPIP props. you CAN enter the same IP's that your router gets from the ISP into those fields manually. Which is technically hardcoding OR assigning a Statis DNS IP.

IF you connect your PC DIRECTLY to the modem, THEN you could see the TWO dns addresses you're looking for. But i doubt that is the way you want to do it. So never mind that.

I'm connecting via. a D-Link DIR-301, which I presumed WAS the modem :s

[saturnslullaby]

I'm connecting via. a D-Link DIR-301, which I presumed WAS the modem :s

Perhaps... i have no idea if it actually is a modem or not, but based on my quick google search that unit is ONLY a 4 port wireless G router.

[|Rapture|]

Ok, so I can make up an IP in that dialogue (I'll use 123.456.789.0 to keep it simple). What do I put as my subnet mask, default gateway and preferred DNS server?

Subnet: 255.255.255.0

Gateway: 192.168.0.1

Set your IP to 192.168.0.100, it's what your router is assigning already so may as well use that. You can leave your DNS on dynamic.

[Elliot B.]

Subnet: 255.255.255.0

Gateway: 192.168.0.1

Set your IP to 192.168.0.100, it's what your router is assigning already so may as well use that. You can leave your DNS on dynamic.

Last time I did that, others that were connected to the router couldn't connect any more.

[GreenMartian]

Last time I did that, others that were connected to the router couldn't connect any more.

Did you change *anything* on the router, or are you saying changing your PC configs screw up the other machines?

[|Rapture|]

Last time I did that, others that were connected to the router couldn't connect any more.

The other way is to leave the settings on your PC on dynamic and have the router assign the IP instead. Most will let you give certain devices an IP out of a set range, usually by MAC address. If you do it properly, it shouldnt affect any other device on your network.

Time to dig out your documentation.

[Mike]

Last time I did that, others that were connected to the router couldn't connect any more.

Find out what range your router gives IPs from and then use one in the same subnet (192.168.0.x) but is outside the range. Also, the second DNS server setting is optional and can be ignored as you're using the router to provide DNS.

[Bgnn32]

What? No. The guide tells me I should have two DNS servers listed in the CMD, which I don't - I have one (which isn't a proper one anyway, it's a local one (which is wrong)).

It isn't wrong, your router is handling DNS requests, just set your primary to your routers IP and leave the secondary blank.

[Fred Derf Veteran]

I'm trying to open a port for uTorrent, and the guide I am using on portforward.com is telling me to use a static IP address.

They are probably wrong.

You ISP either gives you a public static or a public dynamic IP address and you probably don't have any control over that. Your router (assuming you have one) assigns you a private dynamic IP address unless you go out of your way to give yourself a private static IP address. Either way, it doesn't really matter. Your router will keep assigning you the same private dynamic IP address unless you go and do something funny like upgrade your network card or leave your computer powered off for more than a week.

I would question whether your guide has a clue.

What you need to do is configure your router to forward traffic from a specific port that hits your public IP address to a specific port on your computer (often the same port). You can do this by using the web interface to your router and by following the manual that came with your router.

The premiere expert on these matters is Budman.

p.s. You can also ignore anything they have to say about DNS servers.

[Bgnn32]

They are probably wrong.

You ISP either gives you a public static or a public dynamic IP address and you probably don't have any control over that. Your router (assuming you have one) assigns you a private dynamic IP address unless you go out of your way to give yourself a private static IP address. Either way, it doesn't really matter. Your router will keep assigning you the same private dynamic IP address unless you go and do something funny like upgrade your network card or leave your computer powered off for more than a week.

I would question whether your guide has a clue.

Worst advice ever, don't listen to this guy at all.

This isn't rocket science, pick an IP address outside of your DHCP range and not in use on your network and make sure you have the correct subnet mask and gateway, and DNS server (you only need 1 and it looks like that would be the IP of your router). Assign it and you are good to go.

[Colin-uk Veteran]

Just use the existing settings from ipconfig in your network config dialog.

you may need to enter this as static information in your router if that doesnt work.

leave the DNS servers to obtain automatically, you shouldnt need to change those if your just forwarding a port.

the actual port forwarding is also done on your routers interface.

Your router will keep assigning you the same private dynamic IP address unless you go and do something funny like upgrade your network card or leave your computer powered off for more than a week.

I think it will only do that if you have a DHCP reservation set in place on the router.

[+BudMan MVC]

Yeah fred is pretty much right on the button here.. Yes the guide points you to giving your machine a static IP, but as mentioned that is not really a requirement to forward traffic.

The problem without doing it, is if your machine for whatever reason gets a different IP from your router - your forward will no longer work.. But it is in no way a requirement to do port forwarding. But yes I would suggest it, since it is quite possible for your machine to change IPs if using dhcp for many different reasons. But sure its common for the machine to always get the same one if you do not have multiple machines and or they are always turned on and off in the same order --- depending on how long your dhcp leases are, etc.. Again but that is beyond the scope of your question.

That being said, it really is quite easy to do -- and I would not concern yourself with their example showing multiple dns entries.. Most users do not have this -- since they just point to their router (their gateway) which then forwards traffic to whatever dns your ISP handed it, etc. But this is beyond the scope of your question.

You need only a couple of bits of info to setup a static on your PC. What your routers IP is (your gateway), what your going to use for dns? Your isp servers directly, your router or say opendns? Common to use your router. the other vital info is what IPs does your router hand out for dhcp. Quite often this is 100 to 150. You would NEVER want to give your machine a static IP in this range -- since your router can hand out these IPs to other machines - if it does you will have issues ;) You can find this by looking at your router Web UI, somewhere it will state IPs it can hand out using dhcp. If you only have one machine and it always gets say .100 or .101, etc.. then its pretty safe to assume it starts at .100

So lets look at a standard example. What I would suggest is you put your machine to dhcp for both its IP and its dns.. Now reboot and take a look at what you got from your routers dhcp server.

example - I have highlighted the import info here

C:\>ipconfig /all

Windows IP Configuration

Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . : computername

Primary Dns Suffix . . . . . . . :

Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . : Hybrid

IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . . : No

DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . :

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :

Description . . . . . . . . . . . : Broadcom NetXtreme 57xx Gigabit Controller

Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-18-8B-DC-AE-F1

Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes

Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes

IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.100

Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0 <-- I have never seen a home router out of the box using anything but 24 bits.

Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1

DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1

DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1

Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . : Wednesday, May 06, 2009 8:58:02 AM

Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . : Thursday, May 07, 2009 8:58:02 AM

From the above axample you know what to set your dns too and what to set your gateway to and what your netmask should be.. Like I said I have never seen a soho router use anything other than 255.255.255.0 out of the box. All that this is saying is the first 3 octets in your IP number is your network, and the last octet is the host. So your network in this example is 192.168.1 and your host is 100

So all you need to know know is what IP to use as your static.. You will need to use an IP that is outside the range of address your router can hand out for dhcp.. So again as a common example this is 100 to 150, but you really should look on your routers UI to know for sure.. So lets say it uses .100 to .150

You need to make your machine something other than the .1 (your router) and not .100 to .150 and less than .255 (broadcast) an not the same as any other static Ips on your local network.. So normally .99 is a good number. So you should use the following numbers for your static machine.

IP 192.168.1.99

netmask 255.255.255.0

gateway 192.168.1.1 <-- Routers IP

dns 192.168.1.1 <--- Routers IP

If when you looked at your ipconfig /all it showed other IPs for your dns, then use those instead of the routers IP.

Your done -- your computer is no using a static IP, should of taken you all of about 30 seconds to set it up.

You would then on your router forward the port you want to use for utorrent to the 192.168.1.99 address.

Now that being said if it doesn't work -- its quite possible your behind a double nat.. If your having issues with port forwards, ie UPnP doesn't work etc.. UPnP would remove the need for a static IP and or forwarding ports -- since it would automatically tell your router to forward the port needed for the application to the IP address of the machine. To use that - it needs to be enabled on your router, and in the case of utorrent for example it has to be turned on in the client as well.

But using a normal forward is much better option IMHO.

Another option to using static IP is to setup what is called a dhcp reservation, or sometimes it could be called a "static" in your router UI. This is just a method to tell the dhcp server to always give teh same IP address to a specific machine based on the mac address.. You can get this info from that ipconfig /all command as well -- its the Physical Address. If you use this -- your router will always give say .120 to your computer and will not give it to any other machine, etc.. So then you could setup your foward to point to the .120 address

If after you have setup a static and setup your forwards your still having issues -- please give the make and model numbers of both your "modem" and your router. And is there any other equipment between your machine the router, or the router and the mdoem, etc. If you are on a dsl connection -- I would bet a VERY LARGE sum of money that your so called "modem" is really a modem/router combo and is doing NAT, etc.. And yes doing port forwarding behind a double nat can be an issue.

Edited May 6, 2009 by BudMan