Topic: Telstra ADSL with 4-port Self-Install kit (PPPoA) Help/Mini

[Tom Docking]

I've just finished setting up my ADSL connection with Telstra BigPond using their Self-Install kit (so that I didn't have to listen to the whinging about "We don't support Linux!")

I expected things to go pretty easily - though the first thing I noticed was that they sent an Alcatel Speed Touch Pro 4port modem. It does not support PPPoE, so PPPoA was the next best option. However, Telstra being Telstra, there was no information around as to how to setup the box. As such, I documented my experience so that others could do it a lot easier!

I had been trying to set up the box as though it was PPPoE - I had, of course, asked for the PPPoE modem. Oh well. As it was PPPoA, it was -supposed- to be easier; all of the config is done in the box.

The Telstra CD that comes with the modem does all of the setup of the box for you. It is Windows  only, and only works if you have a network card set for DHCP. As none of the boxes I had available at the time fit this bill, I had to source one. This is what is known as a PITA (Pain In The Arse!)

Of course, Telstra's helpdesk was lovely and helpful. They gave absolutely no details whatsoever. As such, many people would find themselves in the same boat as I was. Eventually I got a windows box to see what setting changes it made to the Windows box so that I could duplicate them. The answer was; none.


The default IP (out of the box) is 10.0.0.138. You can log on to this address using telnet or a web browser. You can then put in the necessary changes using any OS!


Initial Setup: Nothing seems to have changed from factory defaults. IP and Subnet are still "none"

System Setup: Nothing seems to have changed. Personally, I added a password here as I don't like the idea of it being 'open.'

Phonebook: It cleared all of the other ones and put in the following entry:

   Name   = Bigpond
   VPI      = 8
   VCI      = 35
   Type    = PPP
   Usage  = Configured
   Action  = -

Dial in: Cleared

Routing: I found the following entries:

Interface                   Address              Netmask   Type   Transl
BigPond      144.137.212.66     255.255.0.0   Auto   pat
Eth0      10.0.0.138              255.0.0.0   Extra   None
loop      127.0.0.1              255.0.0.0   Auto   None

Pretty self explanatory really; Obviously the BigPond route must be added by DHCP.


PPP: 1 entry only (others cleared if there were any)
   
Name      Encap      Mode   State          Status
BigPond      vc-mux      always-on   up   On

CIP Interfaces: Was totally empty

PPTP Connections: Totally Empty

Bride: Totally Empty

DHCP: Auto (which is the default)

DNS: Still at factory defaults

From the above, it appears that the important entries are the phone book, routing and PPP entries. Anyone telnetting in should be able to enter in the same details without having to go to the extent that I did (and get a Windows box).

From here, I then hooked it up to a second network card on my e-smith box. I shook my head when I noted that it recommends cascading hubs if you need more than the 4 ports that come with it. Like anyone with any sense wants to leave their whole network open like that -and- limit themselves to a 10M/bit backbone (if you use the inbuilt ports, that is).

I chose my second card (which happens to be a RealTek 8029(AS) I had lying around because it played havoc with the network prior to moving to 100Mbit. Hey, I only need 10Mbit anyway, why waste a good card?) as the external interface and to use "DHCP sending the Ethernet address."

That's it. I rebooted and it all worked brilliantly. To test, I downloaded a 7 Mb Trance file from MP3.com. 1 minute, 10 seconds. I'm in heaven! Now it actually seems worth contemplating downloading the E-Smith 5.1 ISO. After doing every version (including updates) since 3.0 on a 56K modem, I was loathe to do so again. Now I'll do it while I make my coffee!


I hope this is of help to any poor souls who find themselves in the same predicament. It is actually -really- easy to set up. Once you have the information. It is getting that that seems to be the Holy Grail!

Cheers,

Tom

[Stuart]

I can't help on this one but if you were to put this message up on Forum at www.whirlpool.net.au you should get some more specific help. I know the guys here are great but whirlpool deals with many Telstra and Australian Broadband issues.

The guys a whirlpool are all broadband enthusists and should be able to give you the help you need.

Hope you find what you need

Regards,

Stuart.

[Tom Docking]

Thanks Stuart, but I don't need any help!  

(Some would say that I am beyond help. Who am I to argue?)

Anyway - if you re-read my message, you'll note that it is a "mini-howto" to setup one of those Alcatel ADSL modems that Telstra throws at you for a self-install. I noted what the Windows boxes do to set them up, so that people can make the same changes themselves via Telnet from their E-Smith boxes.

Cheers,

Tom

[John Gray]

Hello Tom

Excuse my ignorance, but did Telstra give you a fixed ip address?

What plan are you on?

Thanks

John

[Tom Veitch]

What Do you need to know

[John Gray]

Do you have a fixed ip address from Telstra, Tom?

[Tom Veitch]

nope they wont give you one

you need to connect to telstra direct to get a fixed and they will charge you heaps as thy like to rip off the australian internet users

[Tom Docking]

That's right.

Telstra uses a Dynamic IP Address that is changed at random intervals (usually a matter of days.)

Thus, a Dynamic DNS service is necessary if you want to run a server behind it. Of course, as the 4-port modems they supply are running NAT, you need to define an internal IP address for your E-Smith boxen (not DHCP) and forward either by ports or all external requests to the address of your E-Smith box.

I do not have the exact commands in front of me at this time, however I do have them at my office computer; I will post them ASAP.

Of course, Telstra's license does not allow you to run a server behind their connection... La De Da.

Cheers,

Doc

[Craig]

Tom

I have to setup an SME 5.1.2 boxen for a mate at his house. He currently  has ADSL with Telstra and a standard Alcatel modem with only 1 ethernet port. I assume that what you have described in your post will still work for me.

If you have any further info please post. I will let you know how I get on.

Regards
Craig

[Tom Docking]

G'day Craig,

> I have to setup an SME 5.1.2 boxen for a mate at his house.
> He currently  has ADSL with Telstra and a standard Alcatel
> modem with only 1 ethernet port. I assume that what you have
> described in your post will still work for me.

I'm not sure if you need to do it as I showed above. As far as I know, the 1-port Alcatel supports PPPoE, in which case the (wonderful) E-Smith configuration screens will do all of the hard work for you.

*** Don't forget to add @bigpond.net to your username, otherwise Telstra's Access Servers won't play ball...


Check out the manual of the Alcatel modem and see if it does PPPoE or PPPoA (or check their website if you don't have the manual. www.alcatel.com or www.speedtouchdsl.com)

If it does PPPoE - you have an absolute cake-walk like I was expecting.
If it does PPPoA - you'll have to telnet in and do it like I did.

Re PPPoA: Of course, if he's already got it setup under Windows (Assuming from your message that he is already using it), then the hard work is done. Just do the "DHCP by Ethernet Address" bit, and Bob should be your Mother's brother.

If you have any strife, let me know.

Cheers,

Tom

[Duncan]

Alex, if you read this i had to ask.

Tom, could you let me know if the sync light on your modem is solid or whether it flashes.

One of our customers is having a problem and telstra seems to think that there is a problem at their end. Of course they are not sure.

Regards Duncan

[Tom Docking]

G'day Duncan,

> Tom, could you let me know if the sync light on your modem is
> solid or whether it flashes.

The Line Sync light should be on Solid. It will only flash when you first turn it on...

Things to check
     * If you have multiple lines, make sure that it is on the correct line. That goes for both the client end and Telstra's end!
     * Is the line going through a PABX / Commander (like) system?
     * Try it without any line filters plugged in... Introduce one thing at a time.

Is it definitely the Sync LED and not the Alarm/Power LED? If it is the latter, that usually means that the 4th DIP Switch has been turned on, which reverts it to factory defaults...


The reason that the Sync LED comes up is if the modem cannot make a DSLAM connection to your provider.

Nine times out of ten, it can be solved by unplugging the modem (power) and also the data (line) connection from the socket. Wait 30 seconds, plug the data back in and then the power.

Another thing to test is how well the line is working... You could unplug the ADSL line and plug in a standard phone. If you get dial tone (without having to press 0 or 1 for an outside line) then that is good. If not, perhaps your line has had the richard, or you are through a PABX and didn't know it.


Lastly, perhaps try that nasty Windows-only setup disk to set up the modem. Once done, it should be able to be plugged into your E-Smith box with no problems.

Hope this helps.

Cheers,

Tom

[Duncan]

Thanks for your reply Tom. We sort of suspected that the led should be solid and i posted just make 100% sure before calling Telstra.

They are coming around this week to sort it out.

Regards Duncan.

[Barry Rogers]

Tom,

I have read and followed all you and others have written, and now our ADSL modem works fine. It was actually simple really...

I have a problem though...
I am using DynDNS as the dynamic IP provider for our Domain. Access to the WWW is OK. Emails out are OK. 2 problems we have are...
1 - emails in, never arrive,
2 - when I go to our Website, I get the 10.0.0.138 web page of the Alcatel Pro ADSL modem, which is actually a welcome.html file, not our 'www.ourwebsite.com/index.html' file. As there is a password on the modem, I get a login screen from it. The URL shown in the browser however shows the correct address for our Website, but it is resolving to the modem...!?!

I know this is a simple config problem, but I do not know where to look! What are the settings, and where do I modify them to correct this?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[Tom Docking]

G'day Barry,


> I have read and followed all you and others have written, and
> now our ADSL modem works fine. It was actually simple really...

That is what I hoped for... I'm glad that you found it useful.


> I have a problem though...
> I am using DynDNS as the dynamic IP provider for our Domain.
> Access to the WWW is OK. Emails out are OK. 2 problems we
> have are...
> 1 - emails in, never arrive,
> 2 - when I go to our Website, I get the 10.0.0.138 web page
> of the Alcatel Pro ADSL modem, which is actually a
> welcome.html file, not our 'www.ourwebsite.com/index.html'
> file. As there is a password on the modem, I get a login
> screen from it. The URL shown in the browser however shows
> the correct address for our Website, but it is resolving to
> the modem...!?!

Right-e-o, a fairly easy one. You need to use either NAT or PAT (sometimes referred to as NA(P)T) to forward the external ports.

You need to telnet to the router, e.g. telnet 10.0.0.138 23 to gain access to the CLI level. There should be some details about this in the NAT section of your manual.

Example 1:

nat create protocol=tcp inside_addr=10.0.0.1 inside_port=80 outside_addr=0 outside_port=80

This will forward all port 80 requests from the outside world to a machine with IP 10.0.0.1 on your internal network.


Example 2:

nat defserver addr 10.0.0.1

This will forward ALL ports from the outside world to a single machine with IP 10.0.0.1 on your internal network. This can be hazardous, of course...


I set up my E-Smith box as 10.0.0.1 on the interface for the Alcatel ADSL modem, and forwarded the appropriate ports to this address. The result; perfect and seamless forwarding to the http server and mail servers...


N.B. *** You will not be able to test this forwarding from your internal network! This will only be visible from an outside internet connection. Therefore you will either need to use a dial-up account to log into your web server or send emails, or get someone else to do the same.

If you like, drop me an email and I'll do it for you.

Cheers,

Tom