Remote Desktop doesn't work from inside my local town

[Redgie]

Right I've asked about this before but I think I've narrowed it down a bit better.

I have a DynDNS account set up to allow me to remote into my home server from anywhere, which is great when I'm in work / on jobs in case I need to access files, settings, downloads etc. Now this used to work perfectly every time, open RDP, remote into the hostname and connects straight away.

Now though, if I try it from inside my local town from a normal ADSL broadband, it only works 5% of the time, usually around midday. However, if I try from my sisters house in my local town, who uses fibre optic broadband (Virgin) it works 100% of the time.

Also, if I try to remote in from outside of my local town, as far or as close as I want, it works 100% of the time.

What on earth is causing this problem? I've been in touch with o2 who refuse to acknowledge a problem, and it does work a small percentage of the time. But as I only ever work in my local town, I can never use RDP!

Please help OcUK gods

EDIT: Router is a Netgear DG834GT with DGTeam firmware on (The latest) and has no blocked addresses on it.

 

[Redgie]

Thanks for the info, that's a much better theory than anything I've had so far!

As for how often does my IP chance, not particularly often, hard to put a timescale on it because it is so random but in the past it's remained the same for months at a time?

The ISP at my work and home are both o2, would it be worth changing both routers to use openDNS to see if that makes a difference?

 

[Redgie]

I will it set it to log when I get home in half an hour or so and see what I get, thanks

Interestingly, sometimes I can RDP into work from home...

 

[Redgie]

I attempted a RDP from work just now, I then remoted in via 3G on my phone to check the logs, there is nothing in there from my work at all, which I can only assume means it's not even getting to the router?

 

[Redgie]

Daft question, are you sure the machine is 100% on? and hasn't gone to sleep?

What I do is no-ip (same as dyndns) into my router, send a wake packet to my machine, then I connect to it

Is it RDP enabled on the receiving router? Sometimes you have to enable the ports to allow it through..

I can remote in using my phone or a collegues home server, I can definitely say the router is correctly configured and the server is certainly on.

 

[Redgie]

assuming you use gmail, you can get recently used IP addresses from the "last activity" link and use that.

edit: you could probably get the IP by logging into your dyndns account as well but it's been years since i've used that.

Why would I need my IP? That doesn't allow me to RDP in either.

Do you have a VPN you can use to try and connect ?

Sounds like some sort of routing problem?

I haven't set up a VPN but I doubt I'd be able to due to the connection problems. I have tried VNC to make sure it's not just RDP and VNC doesn't work either.

 

[Redgie]

Ahh I see, that would help but it's not really a solution as much as it is an alternate route. I'm looking to (If I can) find out why this is happening and sort it. Thank you though

 

[Redgie]

What's the TTL on DYNDNS set to for the sub domain you use?

"TTL value is 60 seconds. Edit TTL..." from DynDNS

Can you ping your IP?

No, the router isn't set to respond to ping requests though.

I'd assume it's something in O2's routing?

This is exactly what I think, but the guys at o2 are only helpful to a certain point, once you get to their routing system they tell me they can't help because it's technically working.

Also, does your RDP pc have OPEN NAT? added to DMZ?

It's not no, as I understand this means in front of the firewall? If so, I'd rather keep it behind it permanently, though I don't mind testing it.

Trace Routes
From my Laptop:

Tracing route to Dyn.DNS.com Address [IP.IP.IP.IP]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 2 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 * * * Request timed out.
3 * * * Request timed out.
4 * * * Request timed out.
5 * * * Request timed out.
6 * * * Request timed out.
7 * * * Request timed out.
8 * * * Request timed out.
9 * * * Request timed out.
10 * * * Request timed out.
11 * * * Request timed out.
12 * * * Request timed out.
13 * * * Request timed out.
14 * * * Request timed out.
15 * * * Request timed out.
16 * * * Request timed out.
17 * * * Request timed out.
18 * * * Request timed out.
19 * * * Request timed out.
20 * * * Request timed out.
21 * * * Request timed out.
22 * * * Request timed out.
23 * * * Request timed out.
24 * * * Request timed out.
25 * * * Request timed out.
26 * * * Request timed out.
27 * IP-IP-IP-IP.zone6.bethere.co.uk [IP.IP.IP.IP] reports: Destinat
ion host unreachable.

Trace complete.

From my collegues home (Virgin Fibre Optic outside of my town)

Tracing route to Dyn.DNS.com Address [IP.IP.IP.IP]

over a maximum of 30 hops:



1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.10.1

2 5 ms 5 ms 5 ms 10.5.148.1

3 6 ms 7 ms 6 ms live-geam-1a-ge235.network.virginmedia.net [81.97.114.37]

4 9 ms 7 ms 11 ms know-core-1a-pc111.network.virginmedia.net [81.97.112.81]

5 9 ms 9 ms 9 ms leed-bb-1a-ae1-0.network.virginmedia.net [195.182.178.145]

6 8 ms 9 ms 79 ms manc-bb-1b-as3-0.network.virginmedia.net [213.105.175.142]

7 16 ms 15 ms 17 ms tele-ic-3-ae0-0.network.virginmedia.net [212.43.163.70]

8 16 ms 15 ms 15 ms linx-gw2.betherenow.co.uk [195.66.226.232]

9 * * * Request timed out.

10 * * * Request timed out.

11 * * * Request timed out.

12 * * * Request timed out.

13 * * * Request timed out.

14 * * * Request timed out.

15 * * * Request timed out.

16 * * * Request timed out.

17 * * * Request timed out.

18 * * * Request timed out.

19 * * * Request timed out.

20 * * * Request timed out.

21 * * * Request timed out.

22 * * * Request timed out.

23 * * * Request timed out.

24 * * * Request timed out.

25 * * * Request timed out.

26 * * * Request timed out.

27 * * * Request timed out.

28 * * * Request timed out.

29 * * * Request timed out.

30 * * * Request timed out.



Trace complete.

 

[Redgie]

Thanks! I'm looking through the think broadband topic now but don't have an account with Be to look through the Be forum one

 

[Redgie]

YAY! Thanks so much, I checked through that topic and enabled "Force broadcast ARP on WAN link" and it's now working!

Apparently this may not be a permanent solution but hey, it's something!