Can't log in to my Home Hub 5!

Undervalued

The WiFi signal from my Virgin router is poor at best, not helped by its position in the front corner of a largish L shaped house.

So, to get better WiFi coverage I bought a cheap BT Home Hub 5 to use as a WiFi signal. I logged in to it, turned off the DHCP and set the address to 192.168.0.254 (or at least that is what I wrote down) and ran a cable to sensible position in the middle of the house. Works a treat. I turned the WiFi off on the Virgin box, so as to only have one signal, but I have not put it in Modem only mode as the network sockets on it are useful in that room. So the Virgin "Super Hub" is still 192.168.0.1

The problem is I cannot log back into the BT HH5 to do any further configuration. trying 192.168.0.254 eventually times out. Who is on my WiFi (on my Mac) and Wireless Network Watcher (on my PC) completely fail to see the BT HH5 yet they see all the wireless devices connected to it.

I have tried disconnecting everything and just plugging a laptop directly into a socket on the HH5 but that doesn't let me log in either.

Am I being stupid? Any suggestions apart from doing a hard reset on the HH5 back to factory settings?

Thanks

arciere

Chances are the BT Hub is just using a dynamic IP.
If you logon to the Virgin router, it should tell you the IP addresses of all the devices connected to it. It probably won't tell you the devices past the BT Hub because that is probably still acting as a router and not a switch. If that fails, try with an IP scan from any of the computers in the network.
In regards to the modem-only option, I don't think you will be able to do that, unless the BT Hub has a WAN port and it's not a modem itself.
Just out of curiosity, is there any reason why you didn't buy just a normal access point?

Undervalued

arciere wrote: »

Chances are the BT Hub is just using a dynamic IP.
If you logon to the Virgin router, it should tell you the IP addresses of all the devices connected to it. It probably won't tell you the devices past the BT Hub because that is probably still acting as a router and not a switch. If that fails, try with an IP scan from any of the computers in the network.
In regards to the modem-only option, I don't think you will be able to do that, unless the BT Hub has a WAN port and it's not a modem itself.
Just out of curiosity, is there any reason why you didn't buy just a normal access point?

Thanks but I have done all of that with no joy!

I've just logged in to the Virgin Box again and I can see everything except the BT HH5. I see the other devices physically plugged in to the Virgin Box and I see various WiFi devices which must be connected to the BT HH5 as the WiFi is off on the Virgin Super Hub.

What do you mean by an IP scan? is that not what programs like "Who is on my WiFi" do?

Before getting the BT HH5 I used another old router in the same way and could see and access that fine! However its WiFi signal was not great.

Why a HH5? It was cheap (a fiver on Gumtree) and I was told they have a strong WiFi signal - which indeed it does. It works perfectly for what I need but I wanted to use its USB port for a network hard disk. Hence needing to get into the setup again.

JJ_Egan

BT hub is not a dynamic IP .
Are you sure the address is not



http://192.168.1.254

arciere

Technically speaking, routers are generally layer-3 devices, while wireless access-points are normally layer 2. It doesn't make a huge difference in a simple setup, it's just that routers are not meant to be wireless access points (it doesn't mean they don't work though!). You should expect less problems and headaches when using a wireless access points rather than a 'converted' router.

That being said, what I meant by IP scan is using software like Angry IP Scanner that basically gives you a list of all devices (wireless or wired) connected to your network. If your BT Hub is there and it's connected, it should show in the list.

If you open a command prompt on a wireless laptop and type the following:

tracert 192.168.0.1

what do you get?

arciere

JJ_Egan wrote: »

BT hub is not a dynamic IP .
Are you sure the address is not



http://192.168.1.254

That's a possibility, but you can't access that, unless your subnet mask is 255.255.0.0 instead of the standard 255.255.255.0

Undervalued

JJ_Egan wrote: »

BT hub is not a dynamic IP .
Are you sure the address is not



http://192.168.1.254

No, that won't connect either I'm afraid!

I have tried quite a few possibilities around the number I wrote down but obviously there are thousands!

Undervalued

arciere wrote: »

That's a possibility, but you can't access that, unless your subnet mask is 255.255.0.0 instead of the standard 255.255.255.0

Sorry but can you explain that please?

According to the settings page on the Virgin I'm 255.255.255.0

arciere

Undervalued wrote: »

No, that won't connect either I'm afraid!

I have tried quite a few possibilities around the number I wrote down but obviously there are thousands!

In order to make that work, you would need to change the IP address of your laptop to something like 192.168.1.100 and subnet mask 255.255.255.0
You are basically trying to connect to a different network, rather than changing the settings on your router, it's easier to make one single computer part of that network.

esuhl

Surely you just need to specify the IP/MAC addresses of the BT Hub in the Virgin router settings...?


You may need to let the BT router pick up any IP withe the Virgin router's DHCP (so that the device appears in the settings), then tell the Virgin router to use 192.168.0.254 for that device... and then re-enter that IP on the BT router.

Undervalued

arciere wrote: »

Technically speaking, routers are generally layer-3 devices, while wireless access-points are normally layer 2. It doesn't make a huge difference in a simple setup, it's just that routers are not meant to be wireless access points (it doesn't mean they don't work though!). You should expect less problems and headaches when using a wireless access points rather than a 'converted' router.

That being said, what I meant by IP scan is using software like Angry IP Scanner that basically gives you a list of all devices (wireless or wired) connected to your network. If your BT Hub is there and it's connected, it should show in the list.

If you open a command prompt on a wireless laptop and type the following:

tracert 192.168.0.1

what do you get?

Will try that shortly and get back to you.

Who is on my WiFi used to have no problem seeing the old router I used before the HH5. I assume Angry IP is a similar program?