Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[theboyk]

I'm just wondering if someone could shed some light on the difference between Virtual Servers and Port Forwarding on the DIR-825? I'm transitioning my router setup for a Tomato/MLPPP router to the DIR-825 and I'm a little confused on when you would use "Virtual Servers" and when you would use Port Forwarding? In the past, I've always relied on port forwarding to allow access to specific services on my LAN (ie. VPN, Apple Remote Desktop, etc.), so again, unsure what the Virtual Servers is used for?

From what I can tell, Virtual Servers is for services that require a single port for communication (ie. a basic SSH setup on port 22) while Port Forwarding allows for the setup of services that require multiple ports (ie. VPN on ports 500 [UDP], 1701 [UDP], 1723 [TCP] and 4500 [UDP]). Is that the differences between the two configuration pages? It just seems odd to me to have two separate windows for just this difference? If that's the case, is there any reason I couldn't just use port forwarding, even for services that only require a single port (just to keep everything on the same configuration page, under Port Forwarding)?

And on top of that, when would one want to use Application Rules vs either of the above configuration pages?

Thanks,
Kristin.

[FurryNutz]

I believe that VS acts as a server to forward ports to private internal ports on the LAN side from the WAN side. So you can specify what common incoming ports to allow, and direct those ports and covert them to other specified ports on the LAN side.

PF is used to specify a single or a range of ports going to a single IP address.

Application Rules are some what similar to PF however these are presets that have common ports used by certain applications. Again this only works for a single IP address.

I like to use QoS and define ports used for multiple IP address ranges.

Can review the Help menus on the router for this as well.

If your applying any 3rd party firmware to this router you'll need to refer to there web sites for support and information as this forum is for OEM firmware on these routers.

[TokenOlGuy]

So I'm new to the DIR-825 devices, but I have used both Virtual Servers and Port Forwarding on several hundred routers in the last 10 or 15 years as an on-site contractor for ISPs and the local Clec and Ilec.  The point is, I think there may be something strange about the Port Forwarding in the DIR-825 Hardware Version: B1   Firmware Version: 2.05NA.

I'm currently setting up a pair of these puppy's, using one as the GW router and one, probably the first of several, as a simultaneous dual band AP out on the production floors of a local company.  Everything was normal and as to be expected until I set up WAN access for the security DVR, ports 7000, 80, and 88 for both TCP and UDP.   Bammo, access to the IQMS production management server ceased.  Well you could see it, you could access files stored on it in the Mapped drives, but you could no longer log into it, via wireless or wired.  It would seem that the port forwarding is working in the LAN as well as the WAN.

Anyway, since my job is just to make things work, make a few notes, and get the hell out of the way,  I switched to Virtual Server and no problem...  (I haven't tested the WAN access to the DVR yet, but at least folks can get back on the IQ to see what it is they are supposed to be doing.) 

I just dropped in here to clear up some intermittency I am seeing thru the AP, and saw this posting and thought it might be worthwhile to leave a comment.     While I am at it though, I do appreciate the notes in the 4500 forum about turning a router into an AP.  I had forgotten about turning off the UPnP.  I'll confirm back if I actually get the second 825 into a stable AP mode configuration.  Thanks