static private IP addresses?

[jcd]

Hello All,

I'm new to the list and please forgive me for starting off with a newbie question - I started doing searches but didn't even know where to start, so I'll try my question here in hopes of a lead...

I have a Netgear RT311 router for my home LAN and about 14 networked devices behind it (Servers, PC's, network cameras, etc). Each one is, of course, assigned a private IP: 192.168.0.2 ... 14 and so forth.

For many months, adding and removing, powering up/down various devices etc. did not affect the IP assigned to each respective device - thus 192.168.0.2 was ALWAYS 192.168.0.2, regardless of if I unplugged it, etc.

I suffered a lengthy power outage over the weekend, which drained all of my UPS's dry, so in the end, all systems went down.

When things came back up, my router had now re-assigned the private IP addresses and really mixed-up the works. What WAS 192.168.0.2 was now 192.168.0.4, etc.

So I have .asp scripts that pointed to different servers which needed to be changed, all my internal browser bookmarks needed to be updated, and all the port-fowarding rules in the router also need to be amended. A real drag.

So my question is: WHY? Does the router not assign these IP's based on MAC addresses or something? Is there anything I can do to prevent all this "clean-up" work in the future (aside from installing a generator!)?

Many thanks for anything to help me broaden my knowledge!

Jcd

[vothweirdon]

Reason it doesn't base it on the MAC address is it is not set up to (not like a real DHCP server which gives you that plus more options)

If you are running servers or services that require static IP address, assign them static IP address (that way system one will have 192.168.0.4 and system 2 would always have 192.168.0.8 or what ever you assign)

What I do for home networks that I set up, is I assign them static IP's in the 10-20 ranges, usually their main machine is 192.168.1.10 and go from there. Then if they may have people that come over with laptops I leave DHCP running for them. If you have a static IP address then you do not have to worry about port forwarding changing on you if you have that set up also.

Voth

[jcd]

Vothweirdon... thanks for the reply. I understand now that one can manually assign IP addresses AND leave DHCP running, which would (as you stated) solve my quandary. Now I get it that you can have both, and this is what I shall do...

Thanks again for the response.

Jcd

[vothweirdon]

remember to put in your DNS servers on your static machines (since they will no longer get this information from the router)

You should be all set from there out.