Cable Modem -> Smoothwall -> AirPort Extreme ???

[ginster]

Forgive me if I'm asking a stupid question. I've searched around and I either can't find an answer or I don't recognize the answer because I'm not yet used to Apple-speak (read: apple newbie). I just bought a PowerBook and AirPort Extreme Base Station. The PowerBook is on order, but I've been playing with the AirPort with my existing XP laptop while I wait ...

This is my setup: I have a Smoothwall (firewall) box as a firewall with two network cards, the external WAN interface which is connected to my Toshiba cable modem, and an internal LAN which was connected to a Linksys wireless-b. I'm trying to replace the Linksys wireless-b with my new AirPort Extreme. In the existing setup, the LAN NIC on the Smoothwall box is assigned a static IP addy, and the Linksys is set up to use this addy as it's WAN IP and has it's own static IP address. The client machines obtain their IP from the Linksys through DHCP.

Here's what I did: I wrote down all the IP addresses and DNS, etc, etc settings from my Linksys. I plugged in the AirPort and wired it up with the cable from my Smoothwall LAN NIC going into the WAN port on the AirPort. Then using the AirPort Admin software on my XP machine (wirelessly), I looked for the corresponding settings. I was expecting the setup to be a little different from my Linksys, but not quite to the extent it is. I tried every setting every which way I could think of, but the only way my XP laptop would obtain an IP address was through the default settings on the AirPort. After making the changes I thought were necessary, I was never able to connect to the AirPort through the admin utility again (although, it did show up in the list).

So this is probably not a good question to ask, but can anyone point me somewhere or give me a high-level overview of how to get this setup working? I think my main problem is simply that I don't understand what exactly all the fields in the Admin utility mean, and since I've been Windows-assimilated for pretty much my whole life I'm not making sense of them. I've read all the setup guides on apple.com and I think they would help me if they just went into a little bit more detail. Is what I'm trying to do possible? Or do I need to just use the AirPort as a bridge and figure out how to get my Smoothwall to be the DHCP server?

Thanks!

matt.

 

[ginster]

I'm going to try and rephrase this question because I fear it was very unclear the first time.

Here is my setup:
Internet --> Cable Modem --> (DHCP)firewall(192.168.0.1) --> wireless router

My old wireless router (a Linksys wireless-b) was the DHCP server for the client machines, giving out addresses 192.168.1.2-200. This was it's configuration:

IP Address: 192.168.1.1
WAN Address: 192.168.0.2
Gateway Address: 192.168.0.1

My new wireless router is a new AirPort Extreme Base Station. I'm using the configuration values from the Linksys to set up the APEx BS using the Admin Utility, but I can't for the life of me figure out what maps to what since the terminology in the Admin Utility are different than the Linsys browser based admin page. Example: What does "Router address" refer to in the Internet tab of the Admin Utility?

Any and all help is greatly appreciated ... I've spent 2 evenings on this now and it's getting frustrating

Thanks!

 

[viejagloria]

hey ginster,

my advice to you is to unplug your cable modem for a few minutes, power it on and to select the "Using DHCP" option by Configure in the Airport Configuration App. the AEBS should automatically configure it .

do make sure that either the AEBS or the firewall is set up for DHCP, but not both. it tends to get a little cranky fighting with other hardware/software for supremacy . if you want the AEBS to be bridged, go to the network tab and deselect "Distribute IP addresses".