Please HELP!!

[cruisedirector]

I have never set up a server before so I am a little confused... or maybe alot! Any way... here is the situation..

WE have a DSL Cable modem and provider

We have a LinkSys DSL router?

We have a windows 2000 server

I want to set up the server... but don't know what addresses to use so that the server controls the ip addresses not the link sys router. Does this make sense? I want my users to log into our server, get their ip address, then be able to access the internet from there! How do I do this? I am not sure which numbers I should use for WINS. Do I enable netbios over tcpip on the server?

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thank you.

 

[kixtart]

This would take hours to tell you about. I'd suggest stoping by Borders Book store and picking up a Win2000 Server book. You need DHCP to hand out IP's, but you need to know all you component IP addresses to start with (not client machines obviously). If your Win2000 server is running active directory, then you are running DNS and don't need WINS (unless your client machines are Win9x). Where are you located?

Kixtart

 

[kmcferrin]

Reason for using the Win2K server as your DHCP server instead of the LinkSys device.

1. You control the scopes and can make the IP addresses whatever you want.

2. You control the lease terms and can push additional settings via DHCP (Gateway, WINS, DNS, NetBIOS info, time servers/offsets, etc). It is much more configurable.

3. You can review the leases and see which PC has which IP address. This is useful if you run into problems with people abusing the Internet connection and you need to see which PC had which IP address at which time. It's all stored in the logs.

4. Dynamic DNS registration! How are your PCs going to be able to see each other? Clunky NetBIOS or streamlined DNS? Make your Win2K server the domain's DNS server and all of your PCs will know the IPs of other machines on the network.

5. You can use your Win2K server as a DNS server with Win2K DHCP, the LinkSys makes you use it to forward DNS requests to your ISP. Make your Win2K server your DNS server and you'll probably see faster name resolution with cached hosts than you would using your ISPs. I noticed a huge difference when I did that. Not to mention, you'll be able to restrict sites by creating records in that point to 127.0.0.1 I've used this to block common advertising servers, as well as other sites that users shouldn't be accessing.

6. Win2K DHCP works well. The DHCP services provided by some of the SOHO NAT devices out now is fairly dodgy. I've had clientss who have inexplicably lost connections from their workstations that couldn't be resolved in any manner other than bouncing the NAT device. Once I moved DHCP to a proper server, the problem is gone.

7. If you DO go with the Windows Internet Connection Sharing option (which I advise against, as it's fairly unnecessary when you already have a NAT device on hand), the server will HAVE to pass out IP addresses.

Don't get my wrong, if you have a small home network with 2 or 3 PCs that you want to share the internet connection with, these NAT devices are great. But if you've got a business and have already shelled out the cash for Win2K Server, you might as well actually make use of it.