quick smoothwall Question

[SuperDave1685]

Hey guys. I seached the forums here, but I couldn't find quite the right answer I was looking for. I have a question about setting up a Smoothwall box. From what I can gather, the setup goes like this:

Cable Modem ---> Smoothwall Box (w/ 2 or more NICs) --->Hub (or Router)---> PC(s)

My question is, instead of using a router to connect the Smoothwall box to the PCs, could I just do this instead? :

Cable Modem ---> Smoothwall Box (w/ 2 or more NICs) --->PC(s)

Connecting the Smoothwall Box straight to the PCs...

Thanks guys!!

 

[jajmon]

It is not supported. 2 nics is the minimum, one red (Internet) and one green (internal LAN) Do you have a switch/hub or router?

 

[SuperDave1685]

I don't think u understand my question.... I have 3 NICs here to put into the Smoothwall box. yes I do have a router..

 

[jajmon]

Ok - I do understand your question. You can use a 3rd nic, this is called the orange nic in smoothwall, the DMZ, where you would possibly put a server, it is on a different IP network, and basically unprotected. Install the smoothwall and configure it for dhcp on the green network. Configure your router as just a switch. This means, turning off the dhcp function on the router, and possibly, most likely changing the LAN address of the router. The default LAN (green) address of the smoothy is 192.168.0.1 and many routers default to that address. Connect a dhcp enabled pc to the router, just the router and pc. Connect to the routers admin page via a browser, turn off the dhcp server option, and change the LAN ip to maybe 192.168.0.2, save the config. You have just configured the router to just be a switch. Now plug the green smoothy cable into a LAN port on the router as well as the other 2 pc's. You are set.

 

[TalRW]

Here I'm gonna throw up a good example of what you want.

You most likely want to use one of these network setups:
This is a basic network, all wired connections just internet and LAN

This setup will allow you to host servers as well as a wireless network if you use your router as a AP

This setup will allow your wireless devices to be on the orange interface protecting any wired PC's from being hacked should someone get onto your wireless network

This setup has your wireless connection in the LAN and the servers on the DMZ

And this last diagram has wireless, LAN (workstation PC's) and a DMZ with servers

Pick what best suits your needs and if you have any more questions feel free to ask

 

[vtec96]

Here I'm gonna throw up a good example of what you want.

You most likely want to use one of these network setups:
This is a basic network, all wired connections just internet and LAN

This setup will allow you to host servers as well as a wireless network if you use your router as a AP
Pick what best suits your needs and if you have any more questions feel free to ask

Ok, I am also trying to setup Smoothwall, and wanted to know if I can setup a modified vers of the first diagram....Instead of hooking smoothy directly up to the modem, can I go from modem, router(NAT), THEN to the smoothy, then switches to PC's? This way I will have the NAT taking care of most of the incomming protection, with smoothy doing everything else?

 

[four4875]

i think the OP's question still isnt answered. he wants to eliminate the hub, he wants basically 2 NICs to be on the same green interface, so he can then use a crosover cable to hookthe smoothwall's NIC directly to the NIC of the computers. he has 2 computers to hook to the smoothwall, and wants to do so with a total of 3 nics on the smoothy, 1 red and 2 green. no oranges or blues wanted, just 2 interfaces to act as green. kinda like a 2 port router.

vtec, i believe that smoothwall does all the NATing that youll need ,and i thought NAT was only used with multiple public IPs... ? at work we have a smoothwall in place (actually 2 different ones) that both do NAT for their network, each one gets a block of 255 IPs to take care of. they all run fine and have a set address patern, where if DHCP gives the lan device the addy of 192.168.2.43, the ip will be X.X.X.43 on the outside world. pretty convenient, if you're doing osmetihng on a server its easy to tell which ip on the outside world you have.

I just dont see what the point in having the standalone router dvice do all the work when you have a much more powerful smoothwall box runnign behind it, and it seems as if the router is usually the weak point (crashing) when having many connections.

 

[everclock]

Have you taken a look at m0n0wall before?

It is similar to smoothwall, but is FreeBSD based.

http://www.m0n0.ch/wall/

 

[klingens]

Yes you can connect them. But you will need an additional NIC for every PC you want to connect. Basically you want to use your Smoothwall as a router and as a switch.

A normal smoothwall has 2 NICs: one for the cablemodem, the other for the LAN side. You will have to have at least 3 NICs: 1 for the cablemodem again and a NIC for every PC you connect to, Each of those internal NICs needs to be in its own subnet (192.168.1.1, 192.168.2.1, 192.168.3.1, etc) that's all

 

[four4875]

so each computer on there would then not be able to file share and whatnot between each other... sounds like a hub or switch is the best way to go

 

[klingens]

Wrong. Samba/VNC/etc works just fine here.

 

[SuperDave1685]

Ok sooo... heres the setup I have....


Modem---(red)---> Smoothwall PC-----(green)---> Router (i.e. hub)-----> PC


But when I go to configure the network after I install Smoothwall, it claims that I have only one NIC installed (the green one). But during setup, it probed for them and found both of them? I didn't have my modem connected to the smoothy cause my wife was on the other computer.... Does the red NIC needed to be hooked up before I start setuping it up? It tells me "error: You only have one interface configured.... you do not have a red configured... " blah blah blah.... Any suggesetions on how to get it up and running properly? Damn I'm really a noob at this lol...Thanks guys!


BTW.... I'm assuming that I need both NIC's wired in order for the setup process to go smoothly, right?

 

[sandrock]

You need to go into setup mode of your smoothwall, Choose the Network Configuration section, and then Drivers and card assignments. When installing smoothwall, it will recognize both of your NIC's, but only assign one NIC as your green NIC. Go into the Drivers and card assignments, it will tell you there is an unclaimed NIC, and assign that NIC as your red NIC.