General Questions

Hello,

I am unable to bring up the ADSL line if my ZyXEL 660 is setup in Bridge Mode.
(in Routing Mode, the line is ok and i get a dynamic IP w/o problems)
Fortunately I found the post of markb which says that his experience with
ADSL routers in Bridge or half bridge mode is not good (see below).

Now I am trying to find an used Darytek Vigor 100...

Nevertheless I would like to learn, about the advantages or disadvantages
of setting up PPPoE on the modem compared to setting up PPPoE on m0n0wall.


Any feedback/help is appreciated very much. Thank you in advance!

John
 

My personal experience with ADSL routers in Bridge or half bridge mode is not good.  I have spent many hours with different models trying to get it to work, with limited success.   The best solution I found was to get a Dratek Vigor 100. It very simply is a PPPoE - PPPoA dsl modem.  It will let you use the PPPoE settings on the WAN page on Mono and convert it to PPPoA.  When I got one, all I did was change the default IP address and password (Need to do the latter through a telnet session) plug it in and hey presto it work like a charm.
[/quote

Nevertheless I would like to learn, about the advantages or disadvantages
of setting up PPPoE on the modem compared to setting up PPPoE on m0n0wall.

At least for ADSL/VDSL in Switzerland, bridging DSL to Ethernet and then terminating PPPoE on a separate device (m0n0wall, Cisco router, whatever) is very common and shouldn't cause any problems whatsoever. It's also the recommended way of connecting m0n0wall to a DSL line, as it avoids double NAT (m0n0wall is directly in charge of the public IP address assigned by the ISP).

If it didn't work for you, then it was most likely either a configuration mistake, a stuck session on the ISP's side (when switching an ADSL router from full routing mode to bridge only, it sometimes helps to turn everything off and wait a couple of minutes) or perhaps buggy firmware or a broken configuration on the ZyXEL. Usually one then sniffs the traffic between m0n0wall and DSL modem; you should see PPPoE PADI packets from the m0n0wall every few seconds, followed by a PADO from the ISP (via DSL modem), and then the handshake continues from there. If you don't see the PADI from the m0n0wall, then something's wrong with the configuration. If you don't see the PADO from the DSL modem, then it probably doesn't bridge properly.

Good luck,

Manuel

Thank you very much for your help Manuel! I powered off everything, reset die
ZyXEL router/modem to factory values configured it again in bridge mode and
setup DynDNS on M0n0wall.

Now it works :-) :-) without sniffing/analysing (even that would have been very
 interesting from the perspective of learning).


Thank's again!

John 

PS
The reason I never tried to setup DynDNS on m0n0wall was because
I heard, that setting up any additional "service" on a firewall is a big sin...

Hello,

ok, 2 try and more precise:

Since I heard, that setting up any additional "service" on a firewall is a big sin
I always tried to run DynDNS on my bridged modem, but since I was unable
to have it working, I did setup DynDNS on m0n0wall.

Question:
Do you recommend to run Dyn DNS on m0n0wall ?


Thank you very much!

John

I use PPPoE on a Monowall and it works fine.  In fact I think that you may have trouble trying to get it to work on the modem as your external IP is on the Mono box and not the modem.

Thank's for the feedback! Now I start to understand why I couldn't see/find the/any
(assigned) IP on the WAN interface of the modem/bridge :-)

my former non working config was:
- modem/bridge: bridge mode / RFC 1483 / DynDNS
- m0n0: PPPoE

my current/working config is:
- modem/bridge: bridge mode / RFC 1483
- m0n0: PPPoE AND DynDNS


Question:
Will having the externel IP on the m0n0 box (and not on the modem/bridge)
probably be a problem later on?


John