Need Advice...

[Lotus 0]

We are trying to connect a computer from another town to our small Lan here at work. We had tried modem to modem which works but is connecting at 26.4 (Using two 56k v.90 USR Modems. Our server only has a dialup connection to the internet (As that is all that is available at this time in our area)

 

I know we can do this via the internet but I am unsure how where our IP address is always diff each time we connect to the net.

 

Can a VPN be used?

 

Help!!

[BladeRunner 0]

We have a VPN running here at work to allow users to access our Win2k AD domain from anywhere in the world so long as they have an internet connection.

How ours works, firstly it doesn't care what IP address is being used to connect to it, it will accept connections from more or less anywhere.

I have a local group on the domain called VPN users and only members of this group can actually use the VPN, so this minimises the risk of somebody attempting to brute force their way in.

Authentication is done via domain security.

So, anybody attempting to connect via our VPN connection needs the following:

 

Valid username & password for a domain account which is in the "VPN users" local security group.

We are also using NAT, so anybody attempting to connect to the public IP address xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is automatically routed through our VPN server with an internal 10.171.22.xxx address.

 

Once a connection has been formed via VPN the user can do anything as if they were attached locally to the LAN.

Browse servers, log into an Exchange Server, log into an application sat on an SQL server etc and they do so with the security rights you set for them.

[Lotus 0]

When I go to setup a client for VPN it asks for a host name or I.P address. This is where I am confused. If the IP address of the server changes each time it connects to the internet, then how do I know what IP address to have the client connect too?

[BladeRunner 0]

Ah, I misunderstood from your fist mail

I was under the impression that you had a static IP address at one end of things, namely your LAN at work and that the PC attempting to connect was on a dynamic IP setup.

On re-reading your initial post I can see that I must have been asleep or worse, I read what I wanted to read

 

Now that does add a bit of a problem and off the top of my head, a problem that a VPN connection is not going to help with.

With only having a dial-up connection to the Internet, I think your original plan of a direct RAS connection is going to be your only option but you are getting a very slow connection speed.

I've done V90 to V90 dial-up connections (Not Internet, just RAS) before and always been able to connect a lot faster than that, 26.4 is terrible.

 

I shall have to think further on this problem, see if anything else pops into mind.

[ryoko 0]

Try going to www.dns2go.com .

They provide a domain name for you and a client program that will point your server to it anytime. For example if you registered lotus.dns2go.com , your users could enter that into the server ip box for the vpn, and it will always point to your server's dynamic address. There is a free non comercial version to try out, and I think the comercial rates are quite reasonable.

 

-Ry

[Lotus 0]

I just registered a free domain and will give that try either later today or first of the week. Hopefully this will go pretty smooth. Haven't done much with domains, but I guess there is no better way to learn.

 

Thanks

[Lotus 0]

Is this dns2go client considered a host? Or do I still have to set a vpn host up?

[Lotus 0]

Maybe I can get off my butt and try to find the answer myself ... sheeesh -~

[ryoko 0]

The dns2go client will only point your new domain to your server. Hence if you registered lotus.dns2go.com as your domain, and then connect the server to the net while running that client, any other machine in the world should be able to ping lotus.dns2go.com

 

Everything else is left to you. Think of this as a static ip for your server, only using the FQDN instead of an ip.

 

-Ry