Changing LAN connections for controlling Z21 etc.

[melmerby]

Hi all (especially Iain M.)

Attached is a PDF of my current set up using the net for a Z21 (etc) and Train Controller (less the red connection which is presently not there)

I get my internet via a dual output Home Plug, it is fed to a Edimax Access Point (Wireless + LAN hub) and the PC is connected to that.

It all works fine but it doesnt seem to work properly if there is no internet, although that is not needed for the Z21 & TrainController.

 

What I wanted to do was remove the blue connection and use the second LAN from the Homeplug to connect to the second LAN on the PC ( the red connexion)

leaving the hub's direct connection to the PC but not the Internet.

Should that work? Do I need to change any settings?

 

Attached PDF:

Lan set up.pdf

Edited April 26, 2022 by melmerby

[WIMorrison]

Keith

 

i am assuming that your dual output home plug doesn’t actually have 2 separate LANs, what it has are 2 connections to the same LAN.

 

With this being the case the circuit will not work.

 

You will need to disable the DHCP in Edimax router and remove the red cable and it should work. Addresses for the devices will be obtained from the router at the other end of the home plug (there must be one  ) and as long as your home network is 192.168.0.x then it will work. Otherwise you will need to change either the home network to this LAN or change the Z21 address to be on your home network 

 

Iain

 

 

 

 

 

[melmerby]

HI Iain

The red cable is currently not connected. The PC gets it's internet via the hub (blue connection)

 

What I wanted to do is remove the green cable to the hub and connect the red between the PC and the homeplug.

That way the hub would have a connection to the PC but not the homeplug.

(The PC has two independent LANs)

 

The idea was so I could use the PC for a) the 'net without the rest being switched on or b) use the hub/Z21/etc without the homeplug being switched on.

(Whilst still leaving the option to use both.)

 

Is that possible?

 

The railway room is at the bottom of the garden and the home router where the homplug network starts is upstairs at the front of the house.

It's a PITA to get to the railway room and find the corresponding homeplug in the house hasn't been switched on, especially if it's raining!

 

BTW the address range is all 192.168.1.x

 

[KingEdwardII]

Keith,

 

I am finding your description and your diagram somewhat confusing.

 

The physical locations of the various items and the nature of the links between them (numbered 1 to 5 on your diagram) are key, but these are not well described.

 

I am assuming that the Homeplug is being used to provide a network connection in location(s) where connectivity would otherwise not be possible. However, the connection between the Homeplug and the Edimax access point is unclear. There are two generally available types of connection to the router for Homeplug devices - either a WiFi connection (a "Wifi extender"), or a connection made via the electric house wiring ("powerline networking"). For the latter, there is a need for a pair (or more) of Homeplug devices, typically one near the router and one or more near the equipment which needs to connect. This is unclear from your description & diagram - if there are 2 Homeplug devices present, you need to show them both.

 

I am assuming that the Edimax router has the connection to the internet? Via Broadband of some kind? Is this what link number 5 is meant to be? If you can give the model number of the Edimax, this would be helpful.

 

10 hours ago, melmerby said:

it doesnt seem to work properly if there is no internet

Can you say what works and what does not work when there is no internet connection?

 

Having 2 LAN connections to the PC is possible, assuming there are 2 network cards in the PC. These could be on the same network or on separate networks, depending on how you configure the system. However, to provide you with proper advice, the full configuration needs to be described and I don't think that has been done yet, at least as far as I can see.

 

Most modern broadband routers will run WiFi and Ethernet LANs within the home, independent of the broadband connection. Only equipment or programs that require a live internet connection should be affected if the broadband connection is down.

 

Yours,  Mike.

[WIMorrison]

Keith,

 

Apologies for my misunderstanding in my first response.

 

To make this work the way you want you need to have 2 separate LANs and I would recommend that they way to achieve the 2 LANs is to use the Edimax to serve one LAN and the house to serve the other.

 

TO start with, you need to remove the GREEN cable completely.

 

The house is on 192.168.1.x and this is what is available at your HomePlug from the router and home plug at the other end. The RED cable connection provides this network to the PC on LAN2 and you should set the LAN2 NIC to DHCP (or automatic) to get an address on the 192.168.1.x network.

 

You should then set the address of the Edimax router to 192.168.0.1 with a subnet of 255.255.255.0 and enable DHCP from 192.168.0.120 - 192.168.0.254 with the Subnet as 255.255.255.0 and the gateway as 192.168.0.1 in the Edimax configuration. Then set the LAN1 to DHCP (or automatic) and the BLUE cable will provide the PC with an address on the 192.168.0.x network. You must NOT use the WAN connection on the Edimax router, only the 4 LAN ports that are available.

 

You will need to change the Z21 address to 192.168.0.111 (a reset to defaults will do this for you)  and the Lenz 100 to 192.168.0.20. The Multimaus will change networks automatically, however you will need to change the Z21 address in the Multimaus to 192.168.0.111. You will need to change the interface address in TC9 to reflect these changes also.

 

This will enable you to access the internet from the PC via the RED cable and the Z21 and Lenz 100 via the BLUE cable, which I think is what you are trying to do?

 

 

 

Iain

Edited October 4, 2021 by WIMorrison
Added image for clarity

[Michael Hodgson]

It may not be the problem in your case, but Homeplugs don't always do what is expected of them.  I found they worked if they were plugged into the same ring main, but not when plugged into a different one.  I don't know if your layout at the bottom of the garden is on a separate mains circuit (eg to a garage or garden shed) on its own circuit breaker. 

[melmerby]

18 minutes ago, Michael Hodgson said:

It may not be the problem in your case, but Homeplugs don't always do what is expected of them.  I found they worked if they were plugged into the same ring main, but not when plugged into a different one.  I don't know if your layout at the bottom of the garden is on a separate mains circuit (eg to a garage or garden shed) on its own circuit breaker. 

They are off different MCBs on different RCDs in the consumer unit.

The garden room is on it's own MCB, fed by 25m+ of buried SWA cable.

There is another small consumer unit in the garden room with another RCD and the homeplug is plugged into a 4-way distribution block

 

I get a reliable 57Mb/s downloads on the PC in the Garden room, compared with 74Mb/s at the Incoming router, so It's not doing to badly.

[Michael Hodgson]

1 hour ago, melmerby said:

 

I get a reliable 57Mb/s downloads on the PC in the Garden room, compared with 74Mb/s at the Incoming router, so It's not doing to badly.

Glad to hear yours works.  I've got a similar arrangement, but i don't get a reliable signal unless I can run them off a single RCD.  Internet in the railway room isn't important to me but would be useful once in a while - I'll probably try Wifi range extenders from the kitchen to the railway room some time, as the router is at the front of the house and can't easily be relocated to the rear.   

[melmerby]

Hi Iain

Thanks for the info.

If anyones wondering the 5th connection is for a Linux PC that isn't used for the railway, just for downloads, So I assume that would need to included in the re-addressing.

 

BTW the Homeplug claims you can use both sockets at once for different devices, e.g. streaming Netflix on a Smart TV on one whilst using a laptop for e-mail on the other.

They are Dlan 550 Duo + and there are four of them in different parts of the house & garden room, sometime more than one being used for the internet.

 

These are the Edimax manuals:

Edimax EW-7228APn_datasheet.pdf

 

EW-7228APn_Manual_v1.1.pdf

Edited April 21, 2022 by melmerby

[WIMorrison]

Keith,

 

You can use the Homeplug for two different devices at the same time, however both devices will be on the same network, which is not what you are trying to do. Your original diagram would create all sorts of mayhem with multiple paths to different places available all at the same time and networks don't like that

 

The Edimax has 4 ports (2,3,4 and 5) available for you to use on the LAN, the fifth port (1) is for connection to the internet via an XDSL modem.

 

If you want to connect the Linux PC to the internet, then connect it to the (now) spare port on your Homeplug.

[KingEdwardII]

3 hours ago, melmerby said:

the 5th connection is for a Linux PC that isn't used for the railway, just for downloads,

Keith,

 

I am now much clearer on your system and the connections that you want to make.

 

You can follow Iain's suggested configuration above, but you need to understand that this means that nothing that is connected to your Edimax access point can access the internet. On the other hand, the stuff in the railway room will be blissfully unconcerned about the status of the connection to your home router and the internet. Your PC will be able to connect to the internet via its second connection via the Homeplug. You could also connect your Linux PC to the Homeplug, and it would have internet access via your home router. 

10 hours ago, melmerby said:

It's a PITA to get to the railway room and find the corresponding homeplug in the house hasn't been switched on,

A simple way to avoid this is to have the house homeplug permanently on, at least if the home router is powered - I use the simple approach of powering both via a single 4-gang extension lead, so that they are switched on or off at the same time. I tend to leave both on most of the time.

 

You COULD opt for a more complex arrangement, where devices attached to the Edimax unit could also access the internet, if there is a need to do this. This uses the "AP mode" described in the Edimax manual. This is harder to set up since the Edimax router runs its own network (as in Iain's configuration), but is then also connected to your home router via an Ethernet cable from Port 1 via the Homeplug. However, sorting out the network configuration to do this is certainly more complex - only worth doing if you really need this capability. I can describe this in more detail if you need it.

 

Good luck,

 

Yours,  Mike.

 

[WIMorrison]

2 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

Keith,

 

...

 

You COULD opt for a more complex arrangement, where devices attached to the Edimax unit could also access the internet, if there is a need to do this. This uses the "AP mode" described in the Edimax manual. This is harder to set up since the Edimax router runs its own network (as in Iain's configuration), but is then also connected to your home router via an Ethernet cable from Port 1 via the Homeplug. However, sorting out the network configuration to do this is certainly more complex - only worth doing if you really need this capability. I can describe this in more detail if you need it.

 

Good luck,

 

Yours,  Mike.

 

 

The main home router also needs to support static routing if you want a separate network on the Edimax, because whilst you can get out the internet from the Edimax that solution will now allow data from the home network to find the Edimax because it won't know about the other network without a static route. We don't know if the home router supports static routing (most home routers I have seen do not support static routes).

 

I described the simple way to make the Edimax work as an Access Point in my first post however that does not meet Keith's requirement because without access the home router to do the data redirection the PC, Z21, Lenz 100 and Multimaus will not be able to send data to and from each other - plus the DHCP service will be on the home router which must it be available to allow everything to work, and again wasn't Keith's requirement

 

All this means that to meet Keith's requirements we are back again to a PC with multiple NICs and the inbuilt routing abilities that the OS provides

 

[melmerby]

Hi Iain

I've made a start

Edimax unit reset to 192.168.0.1

Z21 reset to 192.168.0.111 (took three attempts before it finally reset, I waited until both red and blue leds were flashing each time!)

The PC sets the two LAN sockets automatically, so didn't need intervention, one is now on "1" and the other on "0"

 

Launched TrainController and set the new address and it connected to the Z21.

 

Haven't done the Lenz LAN yet, will do that tomorrow.

Edited October 5, 2021 by melmerby

[melmerby]

The Lenz addressing is a little unusual as apart from using it's IP address you can also call it by typing "Expressnet" into the browser, so you don't actually need to know the address.

Edited October 5, 2021 by melmerby

[WIMorrison]

I thought (from a dim and distant memory) when I used Lenz, that the Xpressnet call was there simply to get to the configuration interface?

 

You are always better using an IP Address than a name because the IP Address doesn’t need resolving to send data whereas the name has to be resolved to find the IP address for the destination. I would advise that if you know the actual IP address then use that. You can find the address by opening up a command prompt window and typing ‘ping xpressnet’ - that should show you the IP address. It does have a disadvantage that if the address changes then you will need to re-enter the up details.

[melmerby]

Hi iain

I did the Lenz interface & the wireless Maus this morning.

The Lenz I changed by doing a reset as with the Z"! as it defaults to an address in the "0" range

It's now on 192.168.0.200 and Train Controller is now set to that address.

The Maus was the easiest, just go into menu, scroll through to Z21 address and change the 1 to 0 and that's it. Press Exit and it's done.

 

Thanks for your help as always.

[WIMorrison]

[melmerby]

Had a bit of a problem

 

I was getting occasional drop outs of the LAN connection to the Z21.

I'd had odd ones before and thought it was the way it was configured, hence one of the reasons to separate the home network from the railway network.

However it was a whole lot worse tonight with dropouts every few minutes and loss of control by Train Controller.

 

So I swapped out the Edimax unit for the TP-Link one supplied by Roco.

So far steady as a rock