Wake on Lan Magic Packet - Sent via WiFi?

Makhaira

Makhaira

Makhaira

Soldato
Joined
23 Nov 2007
Posts
4,994
Location
Lancashire, UK
Ok, heres's one for the network enthusiasts out there.

Over my wired network, WOL works flawlessly to power up my server, which is wired to my router.

If I wake the server from my laptop when the laptop is plugged into the network, it works every time.

As soon as I unplug the laptop, and use the wireless connection, the server won't receive the magic packet at all (I've checked whether it is received by the server or not, and it just plain isn't getting there, at least in any correct form).

Now I realise that you can't wake a machine using WOL if the target machine is connected via WiFi, but I can't for the life of me figure out why I can't send a WOL packet from a WiFi connection?

Any insight would be very gratefully received!
 
How is the laptop getting it's wifi e.g. is it from the same router the server is connected to or a seperate WAP/wrouter? If it's the same, check for things like wifi partitioning in the settings. If different, make sure the MPs aren't traversing the WAN side of a router and thus getting dropped. Does the laptop communicate OK with the server otherwise? Maybe you have another wifi laptop in which case you could run a sniffer to work out how far the MPs get (wifi-wifi, wifi-LAN). Also maybe try playing with the different WoL types in the server NIC options.

I send WoL from wifi laptops all the time.
 
It's the same router. There's no partitioning in there, it's a standard Be Thomson 585v7. Could I ask what program you use to send the magc packets please? I might try some others to see if that's it.
 
"Server Tools" for PC (I'm using XP in case it matters)
"WakeItUp" for Winmob

Both very basic but freeware and suffice for my needs. From memory the first one is no longer made or hosted by the author and the name is too generic to google a link, but I've saved the installer. Just happen to be posting from the only PC of mine that doesn't have it installed. LMK if you want more info.
 
On a related note, does anyone have any cast iron fool proof methods of issuing a remote shutdown command between a server running Win7 Home and a wifi laptop running Win7 Home? I've tried various methods and have always been prevented by the laptop saying I don't have permission to execute the shutdown command, even though both I'm logged in as Admin and both accounts are the same name.
 
Makhaira said:
It's the same router. There's no partitioning in there, it's a standard Be Thomson 585v7. Could I ask what program you use to send the magc packets please? I might try some others to see if that's it.
Click to expand...

I have an Android app on my phone that works fine both over 3g (with the appropriate ports set up) and wifi.

My laptop also wakes up my WHS with no problems on both wifi and wired, but I think that might be slightly different that standard WOL as that requires a lights-out client to be installed on the laptop.

My first thought was that the router might be "forgetting" about the server after a certain amount of time. I had this problem with an o2 router whereby the ARP table was cleared every 15mins so I had to manually add (via telnet as superuser) the server to the ARP table. However this probably isn't the problem as that would stop it working on both wifi and wired...I think.
 
If I use the WOL clients to retrieve the MAC for the server, it sees it just fine. The laptop can also browse the server over wireless just fine once it's up and running. The issue seems to be purely around the actual packet over wifi.

Nice to see you posting anyways Guber, you finished a project yet? :p
 
Bubo said:
On a related note, does anyone have any cast iron fool proof methods of issuing a remote shutdown command between a server running Win7 Home and a wifi laptop running Win7 Home? I've tried various methods and have always been prevented by the laptop saying I don't have permission to execute the shutdown command, even though both I'm logged in as Admin and both accounts are the same name.
Click to expand...

Try psshutdown from Sysinternals [Google it].

Or, since you have Windows 7, you could use Powershell.
 
Makhaira said:
If I use the WOL clients to retrieve the MAC for the server, it sees it just fine. The laptop can also browse the server over wireless just fine once it's up and running. The issue seems to be purely around the actual packet over wifi.
Click to expand...

Install wireshark on a machine on your network and sniff around to see if the magic packet is actually getting trasmitted correctly from your laptop (try in both wired and wireless mode).

That should at least help narrow it down to either the laptop not sending correctly over wifi or the server not recieving properly.

Makhaira said:
Nice to see you posting anyways Guber, you finished a project yet? :p
Click to expand...

As always, I have lots of projects "ongoing".
 
Bubo said:
On a related note, does anyone have any cast iron fool proof methods of issuing a remote shutdown command between a server running Win7 Home and a wifi laptop running Win7 Home? I've tried various methods and have always been prevented by the laptop saying I don't have permission to execute the shutdown command, even though both I'm logged in as Admin and both accounts are the same name.
Click to expand...

You dont have permission to shut down the PC because you are not the admin on the machine you are shutting down, the command will come from the machine and user account it is sent from.

SiriusBs way is probably the easiest but you could RDP into the machine you want to shutdown and use the command shutdown -s -t 0
 
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