[Preview/Tutorial] My Network Experiment

[m-JeRi]

My Network Experiment

By- Jerin "m-Jeri" Samuel.

 

Hi All...

I been a personal computer user and aficionado from the year 89~90. Yeah I was like 4 or5 then.

Don’t know what I did, but my elder bro used to put a 5.25" Floppy into out huge Commodore 64's

drive and there came a line joining game which I used to play with the joystick that came with

the PC. Still have all those in our store room.

 

From that to 386, 486, P2, P4 and C2D's, Never have i ventured or even thought about networking.

My household always had minimum 2 PC's at any given time for the last 10 or 12 years. First it

was our home PC and my dad's Goliath-ic Compaq Laptop to various devices belonging to me,

my parents and my elder brothers. Then there was this Wi-Fi enabled AV player for the TV.

 

But still all worked ALONE. I never thought about networking them. Nor did my family.

 

Here were the some recurring scenes for years

 

1. Me and My brother fighting over my pc to watch that video i just got or that new track to

listen.

2. Dad scolding me for changing the OS'es every week and not installing the Printer driver.

3. All of us fighting for the main PC for internet. Because first we had the Dial-Up then the

cable modem for a really long time and now the BSNL BB.

4. Even though we had a Wireless AV player, I used my USB drive for that.

 

So When I started seeing dedicated machines for most of the above things said here being made and

used by others, I thought of making myself for one.

 

The biggest inspiration was starchzer's Linux server thread in T-E. But somehow my taste was linux.

I am used to it.

 

So I went about it. Here's how.

 

The Hardware for the server:

 

1. Intel 945GCLF

2. Transcend 1 GB 800 MHz

3. Seagate 500GB

4. Apex MI 100 Case, The perfect case for the build.

 

All were bought seconds from [E]'s Market for a very good price, courtesy Zoheb (toxicdrift),

a great guy and a friend now .

 

The networking Hardware:

 

1. BSNL UT Starcom ADSL2 router/modem (Wi-Fi and 4 Ethernet ports) in Bridge mode.

2. About 10 meters of LAN cable, as my server is in the next room.

 

The software’s used:

 

1. MS windows Home server 2003 ( 30 Days Evaluation version). I used a customized edition.

2. UTorrent installed as service.

3. TST10.exe for the Telnet scripting.

 

At any time I have 2 PC's, 1 Laptop, 1 PS3 in the home network. Tested and all with all these

devices.

 

Some times more laptops and Wi-Fi phones will be added. Need to find a better Wi-Fi router soon.

 

(contd)

[m-JeRi]

The WHS server.

 

This is the core of all the network as you all may know.

 

I choose WHS over Linux because i am used to the MSTSC and UI. That’s all.

I installed the Windows Homer Server Xfiles edition ( 30 days copy) by Drashna.

For more support about this please visit www.wegotserved.com.

 

The installation took about 1.5 hours and all was set. Use the Monitor/LCD,

mouse, KBB for just this one time.

 

I installed the UTorrent as a service. For more please refer the following

link in WGS.:

http://wiki.wegotserved.com/index.php?titl...ows_Home_Server.

 

From open the UTorrent UI from the start menu, set up the settings for port

forwarding and close it and restart. The UTorrent will be running with the

setting enabled.

 

From now on only access the utorrentUI from the webui using the username and

password you earlier gave.

 

Now for the printer sharing.

--> Try to get just the drivers if you can.

--> See if you can get Windows Server 2003 drivers for your printer,

but if you can't, Windows XP drivers should work (though not always).

--> And the printer of course.

Install the printer in the WHS. Select the Printer from Printers and Fax from

start menu and set the sharing properties. Now you can access the printer from

any machine in network.

 

For more please refer the following link in WGS:

http://wiki.wegotserved.com/index.php?titl...ter_on_your_WHS

I think that’s about the stuff needed in the server part.

 

Now remove the Monitor/LCD, mouse, KBB and all except the power cord, Network

cable and the printer's USB cable. Coz its a headless machine.

 

Now your WHS in headless, up and running.

 

(contd)

[m-JeRi]

The Networking.

 

Well, all the machines have to communicate right?

 

So the Modem/router I used is BSNL's UTStarcom WA3002GA.

and 2 network cables. One was 2 meters in length and the other of 10 meters.

 

My Main PC of course have the XXXX.XXXX.XXXX.2 IP address, XXXX.XXXX.XXXX.1

being the gateway address of the router and XXXX.XXXX.XXXX.3 for the server.

 

And I have the PS3 linked to it in Wi-Fi. So its IP was XXXX.XXXX.XXXX.4

That’s all the static IP's and DNS's I had to set for now.

 

Now I had to take care of the BSNL BB's 2 to 8 AM's cycle. My modem is in

Auto dialer mode. Lots of people advised me to go the PPPOE way, which they

said is easier or something. Well I had multiple devices so that was out of

the window.

 

I used Telnet scripting to achieve this. For each modem the script will be

bit different. For mine it was this,

 

192.168.1.1 23
WAIT "Login:"
SEND "admin\m"
WAIT "Password:"
SEND "\madmin\m"
WAIT "Login:"
SEND "admin\m"
WAIT "Password:"
SEND "admin\m"
WAIT
SEND "reboot\m"
WAIT "-> "
SEND "reboot\m"
WAIT

 

And I used TST10.exe to execute my Telnet Scripts. And I created a *.bat file

to run in 1.59AM and 7.55AM.

And a Shutdown system script in my WHS to run in 7.56AM at this point.

So All my networking part is over, including the automated download.

 

(contd)

[m-JeRi]

My Network Devices

 

Now comes the fun part.

I created a WHS and did the networking, now i needed to use all the

devices in the network and use them in a SMART way. So I will tell one

by one:

 

My MAINPC:

Of course this is the workhorse. The one with all the bling and bang.

I connect from this device to the server in 2 ways, one is the old school

and the other is the new way.

 

1. Type "mstsc" in the run prompt and you get the MS remote desktop.

Enter the IP and your set.

2. This is the WHS way. Connect via WHS console. You can pretty much do

anything.

 

Type "http://server:55000/" in your Internet Explorer and you get a

prompt to download a server connector application. Install it and you

will get the WHS console icon in the system bar. Double click, enter

credentials and done.

By default 4 folders, Software, Video, Music, Pictures are shared in

the WHS. it will appear as shortcut in your main PC too after this.

and the shared printer too if done.

Check the pictures.

 

 

p.s.: You have to create a new guest account for this type. So that

nothing critical is done to your WHS. so it’s safe.

 

And use "http://server:portnumber/gui/" to access the UTorrent UI. DO NOT

DOUBLE CLICK FROM THE WHS START MENU AND CHECK. Just use the webui from

now on. You can add the torrents from your PC and it will be downloaded in

the server.

 

Seed box users will understand the concept easily.

 

I can check for printers available and will get the printer I installed and

shared in the WHS earlier.

 

My PS3:

Now I don’t need any third party applications to stream content to this. Just

enable Wi-Fi and you can see the server and you main PC, if turned on in the

Videos, music, pictures strip. All the content in the default shared folders

will be shared into the PS3 via windows media connect. For your main PC you

have to configure the settings.

 

 

 

 

My Dad's laptop:

All the things said about in my MainPC are applicable and done here too.

 

My NAS:

Well the one drive in the WHS is mapped to my network devices in my main PC.

so there is my new NAS. . No need of anything else for my needs.

 

Any other new Temporary devices:

Hopefully my Temporary devices all will be Wi-Fi enabled. So that networking part

was easily done.

 

For them I only see 2 needed features

 

#1: Internet

#2: Printer

 

(contd)

[m-JeRi]

My Final thoughts

 

The main driving idea was to centralize my resources and use all the

media wisely.

 

I had this network for the last one month and testing. So that any quirks

will be found. Already had several mishaps.

 

The biggest was about 6 days ago. An unprecedented download occurred from

8.30 pm to 2.00am. it was about 1.6 GB, I have to pay so much this month

to BSNL. Thinking of taking the 512KBps UL.

 

Electricity is not a main issue NOW, I suppose. It’s an Intel Atom, designed

to be efficient. Only the old chipset makes me nervous. This month will

test it for that too.

 

So finally my dream of a smart home has finally started. Yes only a

start.

 

There are some things in my mind. If I get the time I may indulge myself.

Have some abroad plans coming so let’s see.

 

I have a boat load of people to thank very specially. So let me do that.

 

 

@starchzer from T-E for the inspiring server in Linux article. Read it many

a times. I hope I could do all the things you did. Except for the web server part.

which i plan to, if I go for the UL plan.

 

@toxicdrift, Zoheb for giving me a nice deal on all the hardware. A very

nice guy, had fun dealing with him. Even talked to him several times. Now

hopefully a friend ( Not sounding gay i suppose )

 

@Udayrulz, Well his WHS server was my final push. Really disturbed him

with a lot of PM's. I think at last he began to ignore me. ..

Thanks anyways buddy.

 

@SumitB, A very helpful guy. Can’t mention all the things he did though,

He helped me like a LOT of times. Numerous PM's and all. A great thanks buddy.

 

@FreeRadical, The man. Helped me a lot and introduced me to telnet scripting.

he wanted me to go PPPOE but me went bridge mode. That’s when he told me to

do Telnet.

 

@Shantz, Helped with my idiotic and numerous network related queries. You kept

me going man. Otherwise I would have scrapped the ordeal.

 

 

And lots of others tried to help and nudge me like @stoned, @MarketTantric,

@sarang, @rpm19050, @rahul, @Prash, @monkee.

 

and the apprication of lots of guys like @gmano for ex kept me going.

 

Well it’s with great joy and appreciation to the communities like T-E, [E],

IVG that I say "Mission Accomplished".

 

Jerin

[m-JeRi]

Pictures:

 

 

My Server in action

 

 

The server alone, the case was perfect for the build

 

 

The router on the wall

 

 

 

 

The system icons and the share folder

 

 

The console log in

 

 

The Advanced Admin console( its a Add-in for the WHS )

 

 

The "Show desktop" feature in Advanced Admin console, just like remote Desktop

 

 

The settings in console...