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Laptops on WAN with Static IP

All of my workstations on my WAN are 10.60.24.x Each branch has it's own router and so each branch has it's own segment, mask and gateway.

I have 2 users that want to use a laptop and get connectivity from each branch. How can I setup their windows 7 laptops so that the user will not have to carry a list of addresses and change them manually each time they goto a new branch?

I already tried seting up multiple addresses for the IPv4 interface in the advanced setting. This does not work. It never fails over to the alternate addresses.

CompProbSolv

Do you not have DHCP set up at each branch? This would be the most common way to deal with it.

MutualBill

ASKER

No DHCP anywhere. All workstations and devices are using static IP.

MutualBill

ASKER

Example:

Home office uses 10.60.24.x with mask 255.255.255.128 and gate of 10.60.24.1

Branch 2 uses 10.60.24.x with mask of 10.60.24.224 and a gate of 10.60.24.129

dallensworth

The easiest way to do this would be to use DHCP and if you require static addresses then use DHCP reservations or Static DHCP where you tie a unique IP address to that machines MAC address so that each time they go to that office they will get that address handed to them from DHCP.

CompProbSolv

Even when I have all devices on a network set up with static IPs, I will set up DHCP for at least a few addresses on the router or (my preference) on the server. More commonly, I will set up all workstations with DHCP but put reservations in for each one on the DHCP server so they always get the same address.

Is there an objection to setting up DHCP? It is usually fairly easy. If you are concerned about unauthorized users connecting, you could limit it to known MAC addresses.

MutualBill

ASKER

I will explore the DHCP option. But Static was recomended because without a valid address it makes it that much harder for someone to plug a foreign device into my network to interogate my system.

I prefer to leave it off and have my laptops be intelligent enough to recognize which router they are behind and act accordingly or at least present the user with selectable options. (Network Profiles)

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dallensworth

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MutualBill

ASKER

That sounds like what I want. Googling for specifics...

CompProbSolv

If security is the issue, consider the following (assumes Windows Server, but would be similar with anything else):

Set a scope of 10.60.24.1-.127
Exclude 10.60.24.1-.125
Reserve 10.60.24.126 for the first laptop (you will specify its MAC address; will have to reserve two addresses if it can connect wired or wireless)
Reserve 10.60.24.127 for the second laptop (same comment)

That should prevent anyone from getting a DHCP-issued IP address unless they have either of the specified MAC addresses. Of course, those addresses could be cloned but I would expect that to be less likely than successfully guessing at an appropriate IP address.

If you want to add more reservations later, change the exclusion to allow for them, then add the reservations.

MutualBill

ASKER

For lack of a better soloution without compromising security...I went with a 3rd party tool that stores different network profiles for the user to select. It is called TCP Profiles Manager.

It's not quite the seemless solution I was hopeing for...But I think the users can manage this pretty easily.

Thanks for all your suggestions and help.