Unable to connect Asus router to EE Brightbox/net

Paracelsus · 21 Jan 2017 at 13:33

Hi folks, been pulling my hair out over this all morning, any help appreciated!

I have standard ADSL through an EE Brightbox modem/router, which for the past 2 years I used with an Asus RT-N56U with no issue. Over xmas the Asus router died so I bought an RT-N66U (basically the same but bit better) from a forum member here.

Now, the router appears to work fine, the problem is connecting it to the Brightbox. I'm positive I remember originally putting the Brightbox into 'bridge mode' for the purpose of using it as a dumb modem, however I think a sneaky firmware update and hard reset has removed this option since it now doesn't have it unless using fibre, and I had to hard reset recently so I don't know what the config was.

As far as I understand, all I should need to do is turn off DHCP and NAT (and anything else I don't want like firewall etc) on the Brightbox, put it on the same subnet as the Asus router and happy days.

So I have the Brightbox as 192.168.1.2 on the 192.168.1.xxx subnet, with DHCP off but a reserved IP of 192.168.1.1 for the Asus router. Asus router is plugged in via it's WAN port and it shows as a connected device on the Brightbox status page.

However, the Asus router (192.168.1.1) can't communicate with the Brightbox at all.
It fails to auto-detect internet settings or a WAN IP, which the previous one always did - this is no suprise given the router cannot even ping 192.168.1.2 (Brightbox). I can't fathom why it can't communite with 192.168.1.2 even though the Brightbox itself is somehow communicating with it as it knows it's an attached device.

I've tried combinations of enabled/disabled DHCP, NAT and firewall to no avail, also tried the various connection types on the Asus router inc static IP etc, no luck.

anyone had experience of this kind of issue?

Cheers

Paracelsus · 21 Jan 2017 at 13:49

There is an option for that but it doesn't work either - first and foremost because the router can't even communicate with the brightbox I imagine..
(thought, the EE forums have people saying to do just that and it will work apparently)

I will edit the title actually as it's a bit misleading, as the problem at the moment is that the router won't even talk to the Brightbox, I need to fix that before trying to get on the net

Paracelsus · 21 Jan 2017 at 19:36

bremen1874 you are absolutely correct, doh, THANK YOU!
The Asus router is still not showing the true WAN IP like it used to which is odd (I never had to put in EE account details previously either so it's not like it was ever connecting directly to the net), but it works!

edit: I did have to leave NAT switched on, otherwise I couldn't connect out past the Brightbox.
Hasn't caused any issues however, incoming connections work ok using port forwarding on the Asus.

To think I have a CCNA :rolleyes:

been years since I had to do any practical networking

Paracelsus · 21 Jan 2017 at 22:57

They do an ADSL version of the N66-U, but buying that new would have been almost 3x the price of buying the cable one that popped up on the MM right after my N56-U died.

I also didn't predict any issues given how the older model has been working great for 2 years and wanted basically the same router/interface as before :cool:

Paracelsus · 28 Jul 2017 at 23:31

Hi Omen, I only just saw the alert for this post.

I did get it working in the end. I had to leave DHCP enabled on the Brightbox, with one IP address reservation to the Asus' WAN port. If I didn't leave it enabled, even with the manual reservation, it would stop working 2 weeks later when the initial DHCP lease expired.
I had to leave NAT enabled. Wireless, firewall and uPnP disabled.
I didn't put any WAN connection details into the Asus, so it's just acting like a router.
I also saw some odd behaviour during getting it working, like the MAC address changing on the Asus WAN port...not sure what it was up to there, seems like it's capable of randomly generating software MAC addresses though!

I put the BB LAN IP to 10.1, ASUS WAN IP to 10.2. Then my own subnet on the inside side of the router.

Quite annoying as the BB DEFINITELY had a 'bridge mode' option when I first got it, and it was easy as pie to set up.

It'd be a nicer solution to get rid of it with the Asus ADSL router though, if you want one less box complicating the network/using a power socket and don't mind shelling out for it.