TL;DR Hooked up my own router to my ISP’s modem/router and it’s worked fine for years, but now I need some ports open and it’s giving me trouble. Can’t put the ISP’s modem/router in bridge mode due to their limitations. Any workarounds?
The details:
I want to preface this by saying that I consider myself “technically savvy,” in the sense that I can follow a guide to do things like jailbreaking a phone or installing software on a remote machine, and can usually Google my way out of any hiccups I come across the way. However, I have no formal, technical knowledge and anything networking-related has always given me a headache. I humbly come to you for guidance.
My ISP provides a dingy Huawei modem/router (model HG8145V5; heretofore referred to as the modem for clarity). When I moved here a few years ago and got their service, I hooked up my Netgear mesh router (an Orbi RBR50, which for clarity I will refer to as the router, and its two RBS50 satellites), turned off the WiFi on the Huawei modem to prevent signal interference, hooked everything in my network to the Orbi router, and called it a day. Everything worked just fine: streaming, videoconferences, online gaming. Apple Home accessories, Philips Hue lights, and my home alarm system were accessible in and out of my home. Even my Mac Mini running Plex was accessible outside my network. Zero complaints.
Black Friday rolls around and I see a discount on a NAS machine I had been eyeing (a Synology DS224+, the NAS for clarity) plus a couple of HDDs. I also snagged a simple, unmanaged 5-port network switch (a Linksys SE3005V2) since my router’s ports were already fully used and I’d need a couple more for the NAS.
My setup is as follows:
Fiber optic —> Huawei modem/router —> Orbi router —> Network switch —> NAS
I get the NAS up and running, but when I go check to see if the Plex install in it can be accessed from outside the network, it tells me for a few seconds (up to a minute) that it is, before flipping back to a red X and telling me its not accessible; taking my phone off WiFi and trying to access my library while on cellular confirms that it is indeed not accessible:
I do a little testing on the Synology settings and indeed it detects that I am behind two routers, which may impact remote access to the NAS:
And so begins my descent down the Bridge Mode rabbit hole. I log into my modem, only to find that the option to put it in bridge mode is greyed out:
Some googling later and I come across a couple of reddit threads asking how to put my same ISP's modem in bridge mode, and all answers seem to indicate that they flash the modems with a custom ROM; logging in with the root user cannot change this option (screenshot above was taken as root user), and trying to log in as a "superadmin" user (telecomadmin) no longer works as of a couple of years ago.
I see a few solutions and workaround on these threads, which I start trying. Here's what I got so far:
1. Setting the Orbi router to AP mode rather than router mode. I do it, the router reboots as part of the process, and I can see on my modem that all the stuff connected to the router now has the modem's internal IP address range (192.168.100.x) rather than the Orbi router's internal IP address range (192.168.1.x). However, Plex and the NAS are still giving me those errors, despite the ports for Plex and the NAS's remote access showing up on the modem's UPnP list. (BIG NOTE: I realize now that I didn't power cycle the modem at this point. Maybe I should have done that!).
2. Next, I see a solution that said to assign a fixed IP address to my router, add that IP to the modem's DMZ, and turn the modem's DHCP service off. I go ahead and do all that, nothing seems to happen, I power cycle the modem and the router... and I lose internet access. Not only that, now I can't even go into the modem's settings by putting in its internal IP address. Hooking my laptop directly to it via ethernet is not working either. I yet again curse the luck I have with anything networking related. I find the rest button, stick a pin in it, and nothing happens. I google and see that I need to hold it for 10 seconds. I do that and nothing happens. I google some more and see that it's actually 30 seconds. I do that and the modem's lights go out, then it reboots. Then nothing happens, still not working. I google some more and it turns out it's actually 200 seconds you need to press the reset button for to factory reset it. I do that, and finally get internet access, but I'm back on square one.
I called it a night at this point, thankful that I least I still have internet access, and decided to consult with you. There were a couple more solutions I saw online, but I wanted to ask before I try something that messes my internet up again:
1. One solution said to do something a little differently from my attempt #2: turn off the DHCP on the router, rather than on the modem.
2. I also read something about basically forwarding the ports from my modem to my router and kinda bridging the whole thing together, so that way ports were accessible from outside my network by being directed by my modem to my router to my NAS.
3. I saw some other stuff about putting the router in the DMZ.
4. I could just try what I did on my attempt #1 but actually power cycling everything this time.
5. Maybe I could just connect my NAS directly to the modem, rather than the router? But would devices connected to the router be able to see it or access it?
Unfortunately, everything I found online about people calling my ISP to request having the modem put in bridge mode resulted in them being unsuccessful, and switching ISPs is not an option. I also don't know if the network switch is funking things up. So what's the move here? Any and all help is truly appreciated!
The details:
I want to preface this by saying that I consider myself “technically savvy,” in the sense that I can follow a guide to do things like jailbreaking a phone or installing software on a remote machine, and can usually Google my way out of any hiccups I come across the way. However, I have no formal, technical knowledge and anything networking-related has always given me a headache. I humbly come to you for guidance.
My ISP provides a dingy Huawei modem/router (model HG8145V5; heretofore referred to as the modem for clarity). When I moved here a few years ago and got their service, I hooked up my Netgear mesh router (an Orbi RBR50, which for clarity I will refer to as the router, and its two RBS50 satellites), turned off the WiFi on the Huawei modem to prevent signal interference, hooked everything in my network to the Orbi router, and called it a day. Everything worked just fine: streaming, videoconferences, online gaming. Apple Home accessories, Philips Hue lights, and my home alarm system were accessible in and out of my home. Even my Mac Mini running Plex was accessible outside my network. Zero complaints.
Black Friday rolls around and I see a discount on a NAS machine I had been eyeing (a Synology DS224+, the NAS for clarity) plus a couple of HDDs. I also snagged a simple, unmanaged 5-port network switch (a Linksys SE3005V2) since my router’s ports were already fully used and I’d need a couple more for the NAS.
My setup is as follows:
Fiber optic —> Huawei modem/router —> Orbi router —> Network switch —> NAS
I get the NAS up and running, but when I go check to see if the Plex install in it can be accessed from outside the network, it tells me for a few seconds (up to a minute) that it is, before flipping back to a red X and telling me its not accessible; taking my phone off WiFi and trying to access my library while on cellular confirms that it is indeed not accessible:
I do a little testing on the Synology settings and indeed it detects that I am behind two routers, which may impact remote access to the NAS:
And so begins my descent down the Bridge Mode rabbit hole. I log into my modem, only to find that the option to put it in bridge mode is greyed out:
Some googling later and I come across a couple of reddit threads asking how to put my same ISP's modem in bridge mode, and all answers seem to indicate that they flash the modems with a custom ROM; logging in with the root user cannot change this option (screenshot above was taken as root user), and trying to log in as a "superadmin" user (telecomadmin) no longer works as of a couple of years ago.
I see a few solutions and workaround on these threads, which I start trying. Here's what I got so far:
1. Setting the Orbi router to AP mode rather than router mode. I do it, the router reboots as part of the process, and I can see on my modem that all the stuff connected to the router now has the modem's internal IP address range (192.168.100.x) rather than the Orbi router's internal IP address range (192.168.1.x). However, Plex and the NAS are still giving me those errors, despite the ports for Plex and the NAS's remote access showing up on the modem's UPnP list. (BIG NOTE: I realize now that I didn't power cycle the modem at this point. Maybe I should have done that!).
2. Next, I see a solution that said to assign a fixed IP address to my router, add that IP to the modem's DMZ, and turn the modem's DHCP service off. I go ahead and do all that, nothing seems to happen, I power cycle the modem and the router... and I lose internet access. Not only that, now I can't even go into the modem's settings by putting in its internal IP address. Hooking my laptop directly to it via ethernet is not working either. I yet again curse the luck I have with anything networking related. I find the rest button, stick a pin in it, and nothing happens. I google and see that I need to hold it for 10 seconds. I do that and nothing happens. I google some more and see that it's actually 30 seconds. I do that and the modem's lights go out, then it reboots. Then nothing happens, still not working. I google some more and it turns out it's actually 200 seconds you need to press the reset button for to factory reset it. I do that, and finally get internet access, but I'm back on square one.
I called it a night at this point, thankful that I least I still have internet access, and decided to consult with you. There were a couple more solutions I saw online, but I wanted to ask before I try something that messes my internet up again:
1. One solution said to do something a little differently from my attempt #2: turn off the DHCP on the router, rather than on the modem.
2. I also read something about basically forwarding the ports from my modem to my router and kinda bridging the whole thing together, so that way ports were accessible from outside my network by being directed by my modem to my router to my NAS.
3. I saw some other stuff about putting the router in the DMZ.
4. I could just try what I did on my attempt #1 but actually power cycling everything this time.
5. Maybe I could just connect my NAS directly to the modem, rather than the router? But would devices connected to the router be able to see it or access it?
Unfortunately, everything I found online about people calling my ISP to request having the modem put in bridge mode resulted in them being unsuccessful, and switching ISPs is not an option. I also don't know if the network switch is funking things up. So what's the move here? Any and all help is truly appreciated!
