[Info-vax] setting up an alpha in a home network using a linksys router

[John Santos]

In article <4d%cm.10632$U5.138385 at newsb.telia.net>, jan-
erik.soderholm at telia.com says...> 
> David J Dachtera wrote:
> 
> > From that page, note the IPs of the DNS servers that were provided to
> > the LinkSys by your ISP. 
> > 
> > Now, the LinkSys can provide those to your local DHCP clients.
> 
> What benefit does that give compared with providing the IP address
> of the LinkSys itself to the DHCP clients ? If I'm not wrong a
> name resolution of a localy cached host/IP would be a little faster
> against the LinkSys then going all the way to the ISP DNS servers, not ?

Um, maybe because it doesn't work?  At least, my BEFSR41 didn't provide
a DNS server.


> 
> And at least on my Zyxel's that's the default so no additional
> setup.
> 

If it works on your Zyxel, then it must provide a DNS server, unlike
the Linksys.

> > For the
> > Alpha(, VAX, I64, etc. with static IPs) you'll want to set those DNS
> > servers in the configuration of the IP stack on your VMS(, etc.)
> > machine(s).
> 
> My VMS system simply have the IP of the local Zyxel router as DNS server.
> Works just fine, and my ISP can change DNS servers as much as they like,
> the Zyxel takes care of that. So again, what benefit is it to have the
> local VMS systems go directly the whole way to the ISP name servers ?

Because a Linksys isn't a Zyxel and doesn't provide the same services.

BTW, the most recent (as of a couple of years ago) firmware for the
BEFSR41 model 1 is *seriously* broken.  DAGS for my rant, which I've
posted a couple of times on various venues.  I think you can get the
older firmware from somewhere, possibly it is still on the Linksys
site.

When I switched from DSL to FIOS, I didn't really need the Linksys
anymore, but left it in for ease of configuration.  I left it (and
everything else) powered off for 5 weeks last winter (long vacation)
and when I got back, it wouldn't talk to my PC any more.  (It would
talk to everything else, including my Mac, Airport, VAX, Alpha and
old P90 PC, but not my new PC, which had worked fine for about a
year before I went away.)  The PC itself worked fine plugged into
the LAN port on the Airport (with the Airport WAN port plugged into
the Linksys) and when plugged directly into the relatively new
FIOS Actiontec router, so I reconfigured the Actiontec (changed
the LAN to 192.168.5.x instead of 192.168.1.x and a bunch of
other stuff) and dumped the Linksys completely.  Anybody want
one?  Anyway the point of this paragraph is the Actiontec also
has a caching DNS server, so I can point everything on my LAN at
it.  However, it is proxying the notoriously crappy Verizon DNS
servers, so when my VPN to work is up, I point it at our Alpha
which is running TCPware's DNS server.

-- 
John Santos
Evans Griffiths & Hart, Inc.