ip configuration addresses Railmaster/elink

[Smithy58]

just trying to set up the pc, and hand held,  fromthe instruction it states the ip address of the pc/master terminal should be 192.168.0.1 with the slave device 192.168.0.2  while this seems straight forward, the problem ihave is my router is designated 192.168.0.1 and it will not allow me to assign it a lower no, i.e. 0,    does the railmaster need to be 1 or can i set it to 192.168.0.40 with the slave being set at 192.168.0.41?

Any sugggestions welcome, also how would one change/set the ip address?

 

Thanks in advance

Colin

[Nick_]

Yes .40 and .41 will work fine. It is just important that both the PC and the handheld have a fixed IP address rather than a dynamically assigned one.

the exact method to set a fixed ip address on th PC depends on the version of windows your using. similarly depends on the operating system on the handheld 

[Smithy58]

Yes .40 and .41 will work fine. It is just important that both the PC and the handheld have a fixed IP address rather than a dynamically assigned one.

the exact method to set a fixed ip address on th PC depends on the version of windows your using. similarly depends on the operating system on the handheld 

Nick,

Thanks for the quick respone, will try this and hopefully it will work.

 

 

 

[Chrissaf]

Depending upon the capabilities of the router. It can be possible to still use dynamic IP address allocation (DHCP Dynamic Host Control Protocol), but force the router to ALWAYS allocate the same address to a specific device (MAC Media Access Control) address. This supports the need for a device to have a known fixed address, but without having to play about with the configuration settings on each individually attached device. As you can do it centrally at the router. Useful in the commercial world for things such as network attached printers.

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I have a BT HomeHub 5 and it supports this type of configuration as do many other ISP router brands. In the BT HomeHub 5, this configuration setting is in the 'advanced settings' - 'home network' - 'devices' tab.

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I concur with Nick .40 & .41 will be fine. I'm surprised that the Hornby guide suggested 192.168.0.1 as this is more often than not used by ISPs for the domestic broadband router address.

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In case you are not sure how to access your router settings. Just type 192.168.0.1 in your browser 'go to address' field (the one where you would normally type the www........ internet address). That should take you to your router front page. You will then normally need to input a router administration password (see label on router) to get into the configuration pages. Hope this helps.

[HornbyRailMasterSupport]

Just to clarify, it doesn't state in the RailMaster guide that the IP should be or must be 192.168.0.1.  These are stated as examples just to demonstrate a typical numbering system.  Your router may be set up with a different IP address numbering system, which you should follow.

[Chrissaf]

Addendum to my earlier post. For others reading this thread that might want to configure static DHCP allocated addresses by the router, and in light of the HRMS comment. Colin stated his router IP address was 192.168.0.1 this address can not be guaranteed to be the same on ALL Broadband routers. My (UK) BT HomeHub 5 for example is 192.168.0.254

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You will need to consult your Broadband router documentation provided by your ISP to obtain the correct router IP address for your particular installation. Sometimes it will be written on the router label.

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Sometimes, the IP address of the router is hidden behind a text based name. For example my BT HomeHub 5 router that has my IP address 192.168.0.254 can alternatively be logged into using "http://bthomehub.home/". My router internally has a 'look-up' table that converts 'text names' to 'IP addresses' to resolve them. So be aware that your router documentation may state a text name rather than an IP address for logging in purposes.

[HornbyRailMasterSupport]

In our experience, routers in the UK tend to have IP address of either of the following:-

192.168.0.1192.168.0.254192.168.1.1192.168.1.254

All routers we have seen have DHCP enabled by default and therefore allocate IP addresses to any device on the network that does not have a static IP address.  It is best practice in any installation, to have fixed (static) IP addresses on all network-connected equipment.  This makes diagnosing problems so much easier.  You can allocate a static address manually on all IP connected hardware from PCs to radios and then apply a small sticker with the address on it to remind you what it is.  This also helps with network security if you then implement IP address filtering on your router (although some routers do not support this feature and this has nothing to do with the successful setting up of RailMaster on an IP network).

The domain part of an IP address is the first three blocks of numbers, so in those shown above the domains would be 192.168.0 and 192.168.1.  You can then have up to 255 unique IP addresses on the same domain range (e.g. 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.255) which translates to 255 different devices on your network.

You should always set a static IP address on the PC running RailMaster, so the networked PCs and hand-helds can find it first time, every time.

If you are going to allow your router to allocate IP addresses to other equipment dynamically (e.g. people visiting with phones/tablets) then you should restrict the range of IP addresses which can be allocated on your router to say just five numbers, e.g. 192.168.1.240 to 192.168.0.244 and of course ensure that you have set no static IP addresses of other equipment on your network within this range.

IP addressing can be a bit of a minefield however if you go through it methodically (there's plenty of help on the Internet) you will end up with a stable and reliable wired/wireless network.

[Augustus Caesar]

In our experience, routers in the UK tend to have IP address of either of the following:-

192.168.0.1192.168.0.254192.168.1.1192.168.1.254

All routers we have seen have DHCP enabled by default and therefore allocate IP addresses to any device on the network that does not have a static IP address.  It is best practice in any installation, to have fixed (static) IP addresses on all network-connected equipment.  This makes diagnosing problems so much easier.  You can allocate a static address manually on all IP connected hardware from PCs to radios and then apply a small sticker with the address on it to remind you what it is.  This also helps with network security if you then implement IP address filtering on your router (although some routers do not support this feature and this has nothing to do with the successful setting up of RailMaster on an IP network).

The domain part of an IP address is the first three blocks of numbers, so in those shown above the domains would be 192.168.0 and 192.168.1.  You can then have up to 255 unique IP addresses on the same domain range (e.g. 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.255) which translates to 255 different devices on your network.

You should always set a static IP address on the PC running RailMaster, so the networked PCs and hand-helds can find it first time, every time.

If you are going to allow your router to allocate IP addresses to other equipment dynamically (e.g. people visiting with phones/tablets) then you should restrict the range of IP addresses which can be allocated on your router to say just five numbers, e.g. 192.168.1.240 to 192.168.0.244 and of course ensure that you have set no static IP addresses of other equipment on your network within this range.

IP addressing can be a bit of a minefield however if you go through it methodically (there's plenty of help on the Internet) you will end up with a stable and reliable wired/wireless network.

 

Some of the information you give re IP addresses is incorrect. You say you can effectively have 255 devices on a network. You may only have up to 253. Usually the first address of 192.168.1.0 is a network address that is already pre-allocated to the network (and cannot be used) and 192.168.1.1 is the gateway address for the network and router and 192.168.1.255 is a broadcast address and cannot be used at all. So, effectively, you can ONLY use the range 192.168.1.2 to 192.168.1.254 inclusively. There is one exception in that if you use a server you would normally allocate 192.168.1.2 to the server and DHCP on the router would then be turned off as the server should always allocate the addresses which would then be from 192.168.1.3 to 192.168.1.254. The subnet is always 255.255.255.0 with this network range.

 

So, I offer that up as a minor correction there.

 

As an addition to Chrissaf's posts...

 

Most modern day routers will allow you to allocate fixed IP addresses to any equipment that has a network card with a MAC address attached to it. When fixing addresses on your Windows Local Area Connection Properties dialogue box it is always prudent to allocate the same in the router so when DHCP is left enabled it can offer IP addresses to other ‘guest’ equipment on the network therefore rendering allocating IP ranges unnecessary. For example, if you allocate a fixed IP to the computer running RailMaster of 192.168.1.2 (the first available address in a network usually) and then match that in the router and tie that address to the computer’s network card via its MAC number/address then EVERY time you turn on your equipment that PC will always be allocated 192.168.1.2. If no other equipment has access to the router or network normally then someone comes and wants a connection, say, with a mobile phone then DHCP will still be switched on and will automatically assign the next available IP address which would be 192.168.1.3 to that phone as .2 would be always in use regardless of whether that PC is switched on or not. Without fixing the IP via a MAC number/address in the router and fixing it on Windows then when the PC is off and someone with that phone wants to use the connection as above then .2 is allocated to the phone. Then turn on the PC and you will be presented with a message that there is a clash on your network as the IP is already in use and the PC is demanding that address it was allocated by fixing it in Windows. So always try and allocate the fixed IP within the router AND Windows so clashes do not occur and in this scenario DHCP can be left on within the router so dynamic IP’s can be allocated to other equipment as necessary without any hassle. The router will NEVER allocate the fixed IP set within it to another piece of equipment on that same network.

 

The above also goes for routers that occasionally have the network range which begins 192.168.0.1 or 10.0.0.1.

 

If you have a router that has a default IP of 192.168.1.254, like some BT hubs, you can edit this address within the router and for good reason. Change it to 192.168.1.1 and you can work with the examples I give above and with others available around the Internet - it is simply far less confusing.

 

Note: Although I mention a network address of 192.168.1.1 it also highly likely that YOUR router may have the slightly different address of 192.168.0.1 or another totally different set of numbers like 10.0.0.1. These are your IP addresses in order to access the router settings usually via your browser. That same number is always going to be the router's gateway address to connect to the outside world and therefore you CANNOT allocate it to anything connected to your network. Your router could have a setting inside where you can set this at an IP range you are confortable with... however, you are restricted to these ranges mentioned under the vast majority of cases.

 

The above information and a longer and fuller description of how to setup fixed IP’s will be available on my website for RailMaster and a note of this will be made in the locked post ‘RailMaster Help Site’ shortly. The settings for each router are different but I will use a BT Hub, a Netgear (Sky) router and a Draytek router to show how these work.