Connecting to my network - OK to use global static IP?

[dave77]

Because of it's location in my house, the only network feed going near my HD TiVo is the one going to my HTPC, which is connected to the internet (and other computers) through a gigabit switch to a DSL modem, and I have multiple static IPs. I'll need another small gigabit switch along with the USB ethernet adapter to connect it and still have the HTPC connected via gigabit.

The other options would be a wireless ethernet bridge along with the USB adapter (too slow and unreliable, it's far from my wireless router), or a gigabit router that could be set up to switch gigabit to the HTPC and act as a router for the TiVo (I couldn't find any consumer level product that does this, it would take a gigabit switch plus a 10/100 router plus the USB adapter). Or run yet another long ethernet cable across the house, past doorways and around corners, hidden under the edge of the carpet (I'd rather not).

Unless anyone has other ideas, the cheapest and easiest solution appears to be the gigabit switch plus USB adapter (I'm leaning towards the Netgear GS105 switch and the Netgear FA120 USB adapter). This will leave the TiVo exposed directly to the internet without a router/firewall. I assume it's not hard to set up the TiVo to use a static IP instead of DHCP. Has anyone experienced security problems doing this?

- Dave

[tortio]

My advice is get a router to sit between your LAN and the DSL modem. The gigabit throughput will not buy you anything on the upstream to your provide. I'm not sure why'd you'd need a gigabit router. I imagine you could just put a regular router into your gigabit switch; it should handle 10/100/1000 and plug your tivo into it that.

I may not be reading your setup correctly. It sounds complicated, but I would think you'd want to avoid having your tivo directly on the Internet. But then again, if you have an HTPC and are using gigabit throughout, then you are probably savy enough to know all of this and the solution you propose is probably the best, since you would know your setup the best.

Oh no, now I've done it. I've gone cross-eyed. 8P

[dave77]

I do have a 10/100 router, and I could put it between the DSL modem and the gigabit switch, but that configuration wouldn't allow me to assign the external static IPs to any computers behind the router (it's not that sophisticated a router, although it will do port forwarding). One of them is a server that I need to have external access to, and it needs to be connected with a gigabit connection to a couple other computer including the HTPC (it has a 1.2 TB RAID and acts as an internal file server, as well as a web server). So those computers have static IPs and sit directly on the web thru the switch, which has worked fine for me for years. I have other computers behind the router (which is connected to the switch and uses one of the static IPs), and I use it's wireless for laptops. You're right that my DSL internet connection is the slowest of them all and doesn't need to go through the gigabit switch for speed purposes.

I need a second gigabit switch regardless because I have only one cat6 cable going to the area with the HTPC and TiVo. However, if I could find a cheap consumer level full gigabit router (both WAN and LAN side) I could use that instead as long as I decide it's OK to have the HTPC behind a router, but I think full gigabit routers are still rather expensive.

If it's really important to have the TiVo behind a router I could simply put another cheap one between the secondary gigabit switch and the USB adapter. To keep it simpler I'd rather not. I was wondering if anyone knows of security problems people have had with TiVos directly connected to the internet, and also if anyone had other ideas for network configurations that might work for me that I hadn't thought of (although I'm not sure I want to go to the trouble of reconfiguring my network at this time - you're right about it being a bit complicated).

- Dave

[Yog-Sothoth]

Using a second ethernet card (in the HTPC) and a crossover cable, you can connect your TiVo directly to your HTPC. I have my XBox connected directly to my HTPC (for Xlink and XBConnect). I don't see that you have multiple TiVos, so this should work just fine. Make sure Internet Connection Sharing is enabled in Windows (that also enables the DHCP server). Your TiVo will probably receive the IP address of 192.168.0.2.

Instead of having to open the case of your HTPC, use the same type of USB-ethernet adapter you're using with your TiVo.

[tortio]

That is a great idea!

[dave77]

Thanks, I like that idea! I had thought something like that should be possible but I don't have much experience with network sharing and hadn't though of using another USB adapter, so I didn't think it would be that easy. Do you know for sure if that setup would work for the TiVo with 2 USB adapters and a crossover cable?

Also, how would I connect to it from another computer besides the HTPC? I know it would be able to get out to the internet, but how would I get in to it? It won't be on my internal network, it would be the only thing connected to a separate network created by the HTPC, right? Now I'm beginning to remember why I abandoned the connection sharing idea in the first place. I want to be able to telnet and ftp to it from other computers. Any ideas on how to set that up? (I may be missing something simple, I'm no networking expert)

- Dave

[Yog-Sothoth]

To connect to the box from the internet, you would need to open the ports needed in Windows' firewall and send them to the IP of the TiVo (80 for TiVoWebPlus and 21 for FTP). Connections to the IP of your HTPC will be directed to your TiVo.

http://www.practicallynetworked.com/sharing/xp_ics/

[dave77]

Thanks. I didn't see anything about port forwarding in that article, but I did find it in this one: http://www.informit.com/articles/article.asp?p=22668&seqNum=3
The article is for W2K, but after poking around I found those settings in XP. The thing about using port forwarding is that I could no longer use those ports with the HTPC. I don't currently use them, but I may want to later. I guess I could just change my configuration to use a switch and a router if it comes up.

I'm still curious if anyone knows about specific problems with putting a TiVo directly on the internet with a static IP. If not, I'm tempted to just go with a switch, since it wouldn't cost much more than another USB adapter and would be easier to set up.

Is it possible to configure FTP and TiVoWebPlus to use different ports on the TiVo? That would help with security if I assigned it a static IP address, or allow those ports to remain usable by the HTPC if I use connection sharing. I realize that I would have to specify those nonstandard ports when getting in to the TiVo through a browser or FTP client.

- Dave

[Yog-Sothoth]

Is it possible to configure FTP and TiVoWebPlus to use different ports on the TiVo?

For TiVoWebPlus, you can edit "tivoweb.cfg" from within Hackman (Commands Page button > Preferences > Edit a file). My main TiVo uses port 8888.