Completely stumped: VoIP and VPN access

Posts: 5

Greetings --

First time poster here so please bear with me. I've been having trouble logging into my company's VPN remotely since getting the Vonage service/router. First off, let me tell you about my home network. I have a wireless high speed connection coming into the house. Since there's no hardware in the house other than the ethernet cable and a small black connector smaller than a pink pencil eraser block (with an external power transformer/plug for the wall) and the VPN connection worked prior to the Vonage switch, I have no reason to think that is the point of failure. Anyway, that cable comes into the Internet port of the Vonage router and an ethernet cable connects to a Linksys wireless router WRT54G V3 (ethernet port to ethernet port). I am able to connect my work PC to the internet without any trouble, and our home PC is connected to the WRT54G. The phone and home PC work fine as well. But when I try to connect my work PC to my work VPN, the connection is established (had a remote IP address appear when typing "ipconfig" in a cmd window) and immediately shutdown - and I seem to have stumped the world on what's wrong. I've checked the WRT54G's status page and expected the IPs to be populated, but they were all zeros. I wasn't sure if that should be the case, so I tried the "release DHCP" and "renew DHCP" buttons, but nothing changed.

I've spoken to Vonage techs, who tell me that the Vonage router *MUST* be the first box my high speed link connects to, yet a coule folks at work tell me otherwise. I've spoken to my company's IT folks, who had me open ports and forward it specifically to my PC's wireless card IP or the hardwire port's IP. Linksys tech's helped me to change my WRT54G's IP address so that it's in the same IP family as the Vonage router (192.168.15.x). Heck, last night I was able to connect briefly, but after losing my connection a couple hours later, I couldn't get back in after an hour's worth of retries.
DHCP is enabled on the Vonage router, but not on the WRT54G (presumably making it an access point rather than a router). The Linksys folks helped with that.

I've tweaked the voice quality at the Vonage site to reduce bandwidth, though that should have nothing to do with getting on the network, as no BW-hog applications are open. I do not have cross-over cables involved (someone in the office mentioned that, but I don't know what that is or it's purpose).

I'm nearing the end of my rope. I know the VPN worked prior to Vonage and the night time drives to the office are starting to exceed the cost savings of not having a conventional phone line.

I'm sure I'm missing some detail in all that text. Suggestions are very welcome - just understand that I'm pretty new to this networking stuff. Many thanks for your help/suggestions.

++ Paul

Posts: 476 · Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2006 3:24 pm Post subject:

I'm not sure if this will help, but I decided to avoid all these types of issues by just hanging the Vonage adapter (RTP300 in my case) off the back of my existing router. It works fine, I'm currently VPNed in to work, call quality is excellent, all the features work, etc. Basically, I'm using the RTP300 as nothing more than a phone adapter.

Posts: 5 · Posted: Thu Jan 05, 2006 3:51 pm Post subject:

Believe it or not, that's what I had wanted to do from the start! But when I could not get a dialtone out of the box, I contacted Vonage and the tech-guy told me the Vonage router should be the primary access point.....

I'm wondering if I can start all over again and rebuilding this network by doing a reset of each unit - such that the factory defaults get reset. It almost sounds like it'd be worth the effort. Now if I could just get a straight answer on just how to reset each unit....

Thanks!
++ Paul

Posts: 23 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 01, 2005 Posts: 23

paulie68 wrote:

Believe it or not, that's what I had wanted to do from the start! But when I could not get a dialtone out of the box, I contacted Vonage and the tech-guy told me the Vonage router should be the primary access point.....

I'm wondering if I can start all over again and rebuilding this network by doing a reset of each unit - such that the factory defaults get reset. It almost sounds like it'd be worth the effort. Now if I could just get a straight answer on just how to reset each unit....

Thanks!
++ Paul

Vonage tech support told me the same thing. I did just what you're wanting to do. Reset to defaults and started from scratch. Linksys routers have a reset button.. hold it in 30 seconds, then reboot.

Tom

Posts: 10 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 02, 2005 Posts: 10

I had a similiar problem, except my Cisco VPN client just wouldn't connect.

I put the Vonage unit as a client of my router (peer to my PC), powered it off, powered it on (and perhaps the router, too), waited about 3 or 4 minutes, and its been working ever since.

Posts: 19 · Posted: Fri Jan 06, 2006 1:03 pm Post subject:

CLM wrote:

I had a similiar problem, except my Cisco VPN client just wouldn't connect.

I put the Vonage unit as a client of my router (peer to my PC), powered it off, powered it on (and perhaps the router, too), waited about 3 or 4 minutes, and its been working ever since.

I think you guys are on the right track. I have the LInksys PAP2 adaptor, which has no router in it and I send the ethernet out into a Belkin Router and then one LAN connection over to the PAP2 and one over to the Computer. Works great and I am connecting with my VPN.

I will say though that when I cam connected at work it is hogging all of the bandwidth and so I can't use the net on my home computer, so I am also guessing that the phone will start dropping some words. The VPN is just a hog, but you guys probably know how to limit that bandwidth.

Tucker

Posts: 76 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: May 18, 2005 Posts: 76

I agree with the other posters here. Connect the internet line to the WRT54G and hang the Vonage router off the WRT54G. Don't plug anything into the Vonage router. If you have to connect via ethernet, then connect to the WRT54G.

Should work. Which Vonage router do you have. I didn't see that mentioned in your original post.

Posts: 5 · Posted: Sat Jan 07, 2006 3:34 pm Post subject:

The Vonage router is RTP300 - no version is on the label.

I suppose the next question is: do I need to restore default/factory settings - or just flip-flop the routers?

Presently, the WRT54G's IP is 168.192.15.5 and the Vonage router is 168.192.15.1.
I'm not "IP-literate" enough to know if the "entry point" (to be the WRT54G) must
be "dot 1" or not. Furthermore, I do not know if Vonage is specifically and always
sending Voip traffic to the "15.1" address - IOW, it's hardcoded for their network.
Also, will I need to turn off DHCP in the Vonage router - or do I keep it on? The
WRT54G ought to have DHCP enabled (off right now) and I wonder if that will
cause any "headbutting" should they both be enabled. Lastly, do I need to enable
or disable anything else for this proposed config (aka "gotchas").

Thanks to all for reading and responding - and helping me step away from the ledge.

++ Paul

Posts: 23 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Dec 01, 2005 Posts: 23

paulie68 wrote:

The Vonage router is RTP300 - no version is on the label.

I suppose the next question is: do I need to restore default/factory settings - or just flip-flop the routers?

Presently, the WRT54G's IP is 168.192.15.5 and the Vonage router is 168.192.15.1.
I'm not "IP-literate" enough to know if the "entry point" (to be the WRT54G) must
be "dot 1" or not. Furthermore, I do not know if Vonage is specifically and always
sending Voip traffic to the "15.1" address - IOW, it's hardcoded for their network.
Also, will I need to turn off DHCP in the Vonage router - or do I keep it on? The
WRT54G ought to have DHCP enabled (off right now) and I wonder if that will
cause any "headbutting" should they both be enabled. Lastly, do I need to enable
or disable anything else for this proposed config (aka "gotchas").

Thanks to all for reading and responding - and helping me step away from the ledge.

++ Paul

Paul,

I'll try at a few of these. No expert here so others please chime in.

Vonage isn't hard coded for a particular IP.

Turn off DHCP on the RTP300, assuming your WRT54g will be in front of it.

Turn on DHCP on teh WRT54G

Hope that moves you further from the cliff and down the road. Wink

Tom

Posts: 143 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Dec 22, 2005 Posts: 143

Make sure if there are any firewalls in the routers they are disabled. And yes the only way to make your VPN work will be by going through your initial router first.

Are you MAC cloning at all with any of the routers?