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I recently moved into an apartment with internet included in my rent. This was a boon at first, but now I'm feeling limited. To get devices connected (wired or wireless), I have to whitelist the MAC addresses on mycampusnet.com. This is annoying (considering I'm well over the 10 device limit including my roommate's stuff), but what's really driving me mad is that I don't seem to have any semblance of a "local" network.
I've relied heavily on static IPs and port forwarding in the past (accessing NAS and remote desktop) and (as far as I can understand), that functionality is nonexistent without my router set up. Also, as my wired and wireless devices don't always seem to make it onto the same subnet, I'm unable to use any of my iDevices with my Apple TV (I can, however, mirror to no less than four strangers' Apple TVs at any moment, which is a whole other level of discomforting).
I've talked to the head of the apartment complex and she told me that they personally don't have any issue with my using a router, but the provider (CampusConnect) does not currently allow it. Apparently, enough people have put in complaints/requests about the restriction (the apartments are for graduate students and University staff, many of which need to set up things like VPNs for work reasons) to open up some sort of ticket to get the functionality in place, but all the calls I've made to get status updates have been a waste of time.
My question is: If I plugged my router into the apartment network, what would happen? I've been told already that personal routers would "interfere with the wireless" and that they would shut my port down if I used one, but is that a legitimate thing or just something made up that sounds real to keep the average Joe from pushing it further?
I'm guessing there's some way of configuring my router to keep it from disrupting the rest of the network, but it's not something they want to tell me for obvious reasons. Am I right? And if so, what are the chances that they'd notice the difference in traffic or whatever and shut off my port?
noisetank
Posted 2014-08-19T03:39:27.230
Reputation: 31
(considering I'm well over the 10 device limit including my roommate's stuff), – Xavierjazz – 2014-08-19T03:40:04.957
There are limited channels available for wifi when trying to get the most out of the bandwidth available. This needs to be carefully managed where there are lots of wifi routers to limit overlaps. So it is dependent on the density of wireless routers as to the legitimacy of what they said about interference. – Paul – 2014-08-19T04:00:03.113
1If you turned the wifi on your router off and went the wired route for some of your devices that would not conflict. – cybernard – 2014-08-19T04:32:43.790
if two devices are on a network doing DHCP in the same 'section' then I suppose that'd conflict. – barlop – 2014-08-19T04:44:49.197
@cybernard: Turning off wifi wouldn't solve my issue with devices being on different subnets, though (Apple TV + iPhone) – noisetank – 2014-08-19T23:26:22.630
@barlop: If I turned off DHCP on my router and only assigned static IPs, would that cause any trouble? – noisetank – 2014-08-19T23:28:27.667
@noisetank I doubt it'd cause any trouble if you turned off DHCP and if you're not doing NAT yourself then make sure nobody else is using your IPs. U are limited to the subnet assigned to you though. If you used NAT you could create your own subnets but limited to addresses like 192.168 or 10.0.0. – barlop – 2014-08-20T09:41:27.143
@noisetank Either way(you using NAT or not), would it work in getting around any restriction currently in place.. i'm not that familiar with setting up VPNs but if it's port forwarding you require, then I suppose it'd be the equivalent problem of setting up a web server. plugging your own router in won't help as the port forwarding has to be done by the internet facing router(there may be additional port forwardings eg if you did NAT and plugged yours in but still if any port forwarding had to be done it'd have to be done on that internet facing router. – barlop – 2014-08-20T09:42:52.660
@barlop Yeah, I don't have high hopes for port forwarding...at minimum, I'm hoping for three things: 1) To have my devices isolated from the larger community network (so I can't see a bunch of strangers' machines on my local network and they can't see mine), 2) To keep my wired and wireless devices on the same subnet (so Apple TV and iDevices can find each other) and 3) To set my NAS to have a static local IP (so I can use its web interface and map it to my other local devices)
Getting remote access to my computer seems impossible as it stands, but I would like better local management. – noisetank – 2014-08-21T15:18:26.913
@noisetank I suppose you want NAT then(e.g. not wanting other peoples comps on your LAN).. You can remote access your machine. Your situation is a standard one where you are behind a router you cannot control. The solution is a reverse ssh tunnel. The way it works is you make an outgoing connection from the comp you want to view(CompA), to some computer(CompB). Then to view CompA, you go to CompB or a compC, and connect to CompB and it will send that connection to a server on CompA. – barlop – 2014-08-21T15:58:53.510
@noisetank So.. the way it works then is you have the connection from CompA to CompB.(CompB must not behind a router you cannot control, because CompA has to be able to make a connection to CompB) CompA is able to make an outgoing connection to CompB. then a remote desktop like connection e.g. VNC, or whatever, is made to CompA indirectly, by connection to CompB. And the VNC connection is smuggled through the existing connection made between CompA and CompB. So you have a connection tunneled(smuggled) into a connection. – barlop – 2014-08-21T16:01:01.003