Palm, BT, ICS and more

Ok, where do I start?!

I have a Palm TT3. I have a windows box that is running XP Pro SP1. I have a USB Bluetooth Class 1 (IOGEAR GBU301).

I have gotten the BT USB dongle installed and paired with my T3. (The pairing process just agrees on a "key" so they can connect to each other "securely"). I have disabled the setting to allow just anyone to connect on both devices, and made each other trusted devices. I have tested communication by sending a business card and by hot syncing my palm from the bathroom.

All good up to this point.

Then I thought... hey! It'd be cool if I can surf the web from the bathroom too! :rolleyes:
Bragging rights? Dunno really... just a thought. ALBN would understand. :p

So, I find a decent walk through and I find out that I need to make my PC the "gateway".

To do this, I have to use ICS.

Here is the problem.

I have a router that I use for my gateway. It has an address of 192.168.0.1
I also have a wireless router with the address 192.168.1.1.
I have the two "bridged" so my GF can use her laptop wirelessly for internet.

When you enable ICS, it will automatically make that NIC the "gateway" with the address 192.168.0.1. CONFLICT!
Can't have more than one PC on the same LAN/subnet with the same IP.

How can I force ICS to keep the same IP address that I have assigned it statically?

I have thought about a workaround... which would require me to make some changes to my network. Not too hard, but a pain none the less. If I was to make the router 192.168.2.1 and put a second NIC in my computer and let that be 192.168.0.1 and then bridge the two connections.

Or, can anyone think or know of a way to force ICS to keep the IP I assigned it and not try to take 192.168.0.1?
Is there other software that I can use instead of ICS to accomplish the same thing?

Being that its "wireless"... for security purposes... I really should put it on a different subnet, like I did with my wireless router and create the rules to block access from the BT network to the wired network, etc. I plan on unplugging the BT USB dongle when not in use. I do the same thing for the wireless router.

I could have avoided all this... IF Palm had a 802.11x SD card out!

Did I confuse you yet? Any questions? Comments? Suggestions?

Hmmmm, I think I know what you are asking. Take a peek at this site and DL the doc. It tells you how to set the IP scope of ICS, which in your case, you can set far from the IP address that it keeps grabbing.

Anyway, I hope this helps.

http://duxcw.com/faq/ics/icsconfig.htm

--TH13

Horse,

Thanks for the reply. That doc you refer to is only for Win98. The options they say to go to on 2000 don't allow you to change what the IP is changed to for ICS, nor let you set the DHCP scope. I'm still searching for a way to do this, if anyone has input.

If not... then I suppose I'll just have to change my network around. Not really a big deal, since I've changed most PCs to DHCP already anyhow. That will pose yet another problem... with having two DHCP servers. I use my router as one, which is what I want. Then if the XP box was to dish out an IP and it tells the client to use the XP box as the gateway, and then I shut it down. The client will loose its connection until it renews its IP from the router.

So... it looks like the best way is to just change the network.

Change the router to 192.168.2.1

Put a second NIC in the XP box. Let that be 192.168.0.1 with the second NIC on the 192.168.2.x netowork and bridge the two.

Leave the wireless router 192.168.1.1 route it through 192.168.2.1 for internet.

Then I can create rules to block everything from access except for going to the internet.

Of course, I'll set the appropriate security settings on everything as I had done before.

See! $30 impulse buying will get you into a lot of problems....

LOL, oh well. I *thought* that the doc talked about w2k as well. Rats. See what happens when you get old?!

:)

I came across this Don't know if will help you or not. I hope it does
http://lynx.dac.neu.edu/a/amccombs/
And this also
http://www.homenethelp.com/ics/index.asp

DeadAddict: Thanks for the links. I came across those too. I have come to the conclusion that I'm SOL and going to have to reconfig my network. At least it'll give me something to do this weekend that doesn't involve spending $$. :)

Here is what I have so far... how does it look? To me it looks like it'll work ok.

Sorry that the links didn't help you out and that you have already looked at them but I am sure someone else will get help from it so I think that it wasn't a total waste of time and I hope that you can get it working.
:D