[TriLUG] "IP Passthrough" and AT&T 1-Wire

[Brian McCullough]

On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 11:58:54AM -0400, Alan Porter wrote:
> 
> Sorry... I don't know anything about the new 1-wire DSL
> modems. But I'll take this opportunity to hijack your thread.
> 
> A while back, I locked myself out of my "tired" Westel modem,
> and so I called AT&T support. I was amazed at how competent
> the support guy was... he did not freak out when I mentioned
> Linux, and he started talking to me like a real geek.

That's refreshing.  That's one reason why I was an Intrex Internet
customer for quite a while, both before and after Aaron left town. ( Of
course, they also had some "bad" ones, so I learned extension numbers
other than the "regular" Tech Support line. )



> He suggested that if my router could handle it, I should turn
> off the Westel's IP passthru, and instead, run it in "bridged mode".
> He said they just seemed to work better that way. I am not sure
> what that was supposed to mean.
> 
> So I switched my Tomato router to do PPPoE, and I set the
> Westel modem to do nothing but do dumb bridging of ethernet
> to ADSL.

That's an interesting thought.  My issue is a ( 25? ) year-old house
with the original telephone wiring, among other things.  When the tech
came out, he plugged into the box on the outside of the house and
measured between 3.5 and 4 Mbps with a "very good" noise factor.
Inside, where the modem is attached, he was just barely 3, with an
"adequate" noise value.  Aside from rewiring things ( which is in the
plan ), his suggestion was replacing the box with one that he had on his
truck.



> I assume if I need to get into the Westel modem for some reason,
> I will need to reset it to factory defaults, since it no longer has
> an IP address???

I would expect so.  In most cases, "bridging" makes the box's innards
inaccessable.


Brian