trying to ssh to a machine at home

[Clement]

So for say the gateway setup. I'd need to port forward everything to the wrt that i want open. so ssh, vpn pptp, and anything else i use?

Keep the bell as dns, dhcp, and gateway. so the bell is the wrt's gateway. wireless should be off the wrt. setup wrt as a dhcp relay. anything im missing?

should i use tomato or dd-wrt. ive heard good things on both

You can run wireless on the WRT if you wish, may not make sense if they are beside each other though.

If you can on the Bell, restrict access as much as you can, if you wish.

I've only many years experience with DD-WRT. Its always worked, so I've never switched.

Here:
http://blog.fourfridays.com/2009/03/01/ddwrt-vs-tomato/
Is an account of a real world reason why a person wanted tomato over ddwrt.

There are other features, to which you will have to make the choice yourself. Just make sure you do the proper research and make sure your router is supported, and how to correctly flash it.

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices

http://www.polarcloud.com/tomatofaq#what_will_this_run_on

 

[Hybrid_theory]

You can run wireless on the WRT if you wish, may not make sense if they are beside each other though.

If you can on the Bell, restrict access as much as you can, if you wish.

I've only many years experience with DD-WRT. Its always worked, so I've never switched.

Here:
http://blog.fourfridays.com/2009/03/01/ddwrt-vs-tomato/
Is an account of a real world reason why a person wanted tomato over ddwrt.

There are other features, to which you will have to make the choice yourself. Just make sure you do the proper research and make sure your router is supported, and how to correctly flash it.

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices

http://www.polarcloud.com/tomatofaq#what_will_this_run_on

well my thought to run wireless on the wrt and turn it off on the bell is for the reason of just keeping bell as the gateway, and makes less complication for sharing between desktop and laptop.

 

[Clement]

well my thought to run wireless on the wrt and turn it off on the bell is for the reason of just keeping bell as the gateway, and makes less complication for sharing between desktop and laptop.

Less complication is good!

 

[Hybrid_theory]

alright just wondering how to deal with the bell router now. For setting port forwards on it, you specify an application to a machine from a drop down list (IP). should i just leave them on there.

just not sure basically where to make this more secure.

ive wired everything to the wrt. and the wrt to the bell.

 

[Clement]

alright just wondering how to deal with the bell router now. For setting port forwards on it, you specify an application to a machine from a drop down list (IP). should i just leave them on there.

just not sure basically where to make this more secure.

ive wired everything to the wrt. and the wrt to the bell.

Only leave the applications/ports that you are using, nothing else. (the wrt router should auto configure the port fowards for you so long as everything else is kosher-check the configuration after you start your server application)

AFAIK you may have to configure your own application/ports, then that's about it for the bell and that is it for security on them, aside from keeping the firewall enabled (Some settings in Firewall->Advanced will help). Make sure you don't have any applications/ports open that aren't necessary.

You can check the advanced settings tab but AFAIK the 2wire routers do not even support something as simple as VPN tunnelling (you may have to check this yourself, not 100% on this)

If you need a more secure setup, you will have to have the bell replaced with either a better router with the features that you want, or a router that you can flash yourself (you may* have to check your ISP's policies to make sure can if you do are renting the router).

Let me just remind you this is all just to get you up and running.

AFAIK you are severely limited by that Bell 2wire router.

This setup will work until you get your current gateway replaced with a 'real' one. You may or may not choose to do so (its really upto you and your needs).

You may also want to look into the suggestions by other users in this thread.

 

[Hybrid_theory]

well realized my tomato was wired to the bell just on a switch port, so it wasnt blocking anything. but after connecting it to the wan port i could not get it sending packets over it. DHCP leases from the bell couldnt reach my computers, and my computers couldnt ping the .1 address of the bell. Even setting a static IP and a gateway of .2 didnt work.

So decided to go back to just the bell. In terms of security, an open port is an open port. It would be open between both devices, so dont see the reason to go through a large headache to get this to work... unless its something simple i missed.

 

[Clement]

well realized my tomato was wired to the bell just on a switch port, so it wasnt blocking anything. but after connecting it to the wan port i could not get it sending packets over it. DHCP leases from the bell couldnt reach my computers, and my computers couldnt ping the .1 address of the bell. Even setting a static IP and a gateway of .2 didnt work.

So decided to go back to just the bell. In terms of security, an open port is an open port. It would be open between both devices, so dont see the reason to go through a large headache to get this to work... unless its something simple i missed.

On a ddwrt router, you would enable DHCP forwarding on the first setup page.

I do not know if you can or how to enable DHCP forwarding on tomato.