BT Infinity no hub

anything I don't mind · 26 Mar 2012 at 16:01

Has anyone tried to cut out the bt home hub or bt business hub and just have the fiber modem going directly in to your own router? I am trying to get it to work with pfsense but for some reason bt keeps giving me the wrong ip address.

I set pfsense (which should be the same as any other router, netgear etc) to pppoe and filled in the login and password. It seems to connect ok but it gets the wrong ip address. Someone has suggest spoofing the bt hubs mac address as bt might have a mac adderss check. I have not tried this yet, has any one else been successful?

Anyone have any information on doing this ?

Cool Breeze · 26 Mar 2012 at 16:14

What router are you using?

I have successfully used a TPlink TL-WR1043ND and am now using a Sitecom X4 N300, the only config needed was as you say set to ppoe and input username and password. worked no issues for me here.

try username [email protected] with anything as the password other than this I can;t see what would be stopping it, oh and reboot the modem.

You have the modem RJ45 connected to the routers WAN port right?

anything I don't mind · 26 Mar 2012 at 16:20

Thanks ill give that a try this evening as well. I can't see why it would not work.

I am using pfsense as the router/firewall.

anything I don't mind · 27 Mar 2012 at 01:32

bt are so annoying.

A few days ago my internet just stopped working, i thought it was my pfsense but it turns out some how BT have disabled the ability to use their router in bridge mode. How i know this is the case.

1) problem happened with a bt business hub with latest firmware. After putting it into bridge mode you need to restart to get it too work but the restart just resets the settings back to the pppoe, non bridge mode.
2) i tried a different business hub router with an older firmware and it behaved in exactly the same way.
3) i reset the modem while the router was in bridge mode and the modem reboot reset the router to non bride mode.

When set up in bridge mode it just goes to a 172 address and does not get IP address if i cut the BS hub out. Now they are forcing me to phone them. This is why i hate bt.

bremen1874 · 27 Mar 2012 at 01:35

With a fibre modem behind it, why would you want to run it bridged?

anything I don't mind · 27 Mar 2012 at 01:56

I don't want to run it bridged I tried to bypass the BT crappo router but that did not work.

I think i have managed. What I did was set up a new an interface on pfsense so that the wan acts as a dhcp client for the bt home hub. Temporary solution until i can figure out how to bypass the hub.

bremen1874 · 27 Mar 2012 at 02:16

Double NATing is never ideal, but it'll work okay.

Isn't it just a matter of connecting the WAN side Ethernet to the fibre modem and then configuring it for pppoe? Back when I was messing with such things pppoe was always an option (even when pppoa wasn't).

anything I don't mind · 27 Mar 2012 at 09:59

Yea i tried that but it does not get an IP address. Sometimes i get lucky and it gets a 172 address.

KIA · 27 Mar 2012 at 11:22

No need to use the hub. Config issue at your end.

anything I don't mind · 27 Mar 2012 at 11:25

I doubt it. Looks like a BT issue.

ci_newman · 27 Mar 2012 at 14:26

groen said:
I doubt it. Looks like a BT issue.

I doubt it. You are aware that there is a MAC learning period on the line, so you can't just swap between the two? There is a time-out of 10-15mins if memory serves me correctly.

bremen1874 · 27 Mar 2012 at 14:55

ci_newman said:
I doubt it. You are aware that there is a MAC learning period on the line, so you can't just swap between the two? There is a time-out of 10-15mins if memory serves me correctly.

On the LAN side of the modem?

kerrgreg · 27 Mar 2012 at 15:59

I am confused I set-up my homehub-less infinity today, no issues attached to my netgear firewall.

not sure if this was conindence or just because the engineer left and I told them i didnt plan on using the BT HH but I got an email saying my broadband was active and my user was [email protected] and password was: **********

Maybe that is the issue you are having if you have not received this user and password.

Gammawolf · 27 Mar 2012 at 16:56

kerrgreg said:
I am confused I set-up my homehub-less infinity today, no issues attached to my netgear firewall.

not sure if this was conindence or just because the engineer left and I told them i didnt plan on using the BT HH but I got an email saying my broadband was active and my user was [email protected] and password was: **********

Maybe that is the issue you are having if you have not received this user and password.

Thats you're logon details for their site, ebilling management etc, it doesn't have anything to do with the line or networking

anything I don't mind · 27 Mar 2012 at 22:27

I used two different business hubs and they both have different mac address and they had the same problem. The one had never been used before. They sent me two hubs because they are crap and couldn't process an order and i used them right after each and switch back and forth between them.

It is possible that the problem is that it is not compatible with pfsense for some reason. It may have some weird ATM type or something. But I thought it was strange that both hubs had the same problem. I don't have another router to try or that would rule out if it is pfsense. But it would still not explain why the hub stopped going in to bridge mode.

bremen1874 · 27 Mar 2012 at 23:23

ignore

KIA · 28 Mar 2012 at 11:42

groen said:
It is possible that the problem is that it is not compatible with pfsense for some reason. It may have some weird ATM type or something. But I thought it was strange that both hubs had the same problem. I don't have another router to try or that would rule out if it is pfsense. But it would still not explain why the hub stopped going in to bridge mode.

Have you tried connecting the modem directly to your PC?

anything I don't mind · 28 Mar 2012 at 15:47

No i have not tried doing that. Are you sure that will work though because i think it needs a router that supports pppoe.

bremen1874 · 28 Mar 2012 at 19:06

groen said:
No i have not tried doing that. Are you sure that will work though because i think it needs a router that supports pppoe.

Routers with Ethernet WAN ports are the obvious choice, but you just need a client that supports PPPoE.

A PC running the pfsense live cd connects directly to my BT supplied fibre modem without any issues. I just needed to go into the web configuration and set the WAN interface to PPPoE.

Windows will also connect directly to the modem with some minor configuration changes. I'd assume that Linux, and most other modern operating systems will work as well.

anything I don't mind · 28 Mar 2012 at 19:49

Thank you for trying out pfsense with a livecd, very much appreciate that.

Did you type in the username and password on the wan interface on pfsense or do any additional configuration like reboot the modem, are you on (fake) static or dynamic ip with bt?