I have been wondering for a while what caveats there would be if the extenders were connected to a separate, dedicated NIC in the PC.

One of the guys at work seems to think that you could make a bridge to allow the extender to access the 'net. I don't know if it would be necessary. Maybe the extender is smart enough to find the path itself.

Anyone have experience with this?

 

 I'm a little curious about your motivation to do this.  I don't see any reason why it would not work. 

 

Some people have had problems with their gigabit network causing network issues when using extenders.  Are you hoping to have a gigabit computer network and then a 100BT extender network?

gildavis:

I have been wondering for a while what caveats there would be if the extenders were connected to a separate, dedicated NIC in the PC.

One of the guys at work seems to think that you could make a bridge to allow the extender to access the 'net. I don't know if it would be necessary. Maybe the extender is smart enough to find the path itself.

Anyone have experience with this?

 

 other than firmware updates, which you could do once since they arent in production any longer, your extenders wouldn't need to connect to the internet so a seperate extender network would be fine,  probably unnecessary, but fine.

ColeAudio:

I'm a little curious about your motivation to do this.  I don't see any reason why it would not work

I have two servers and a couple of other clients on my network, and I am disrupted from time to time with network errors on my DMA2200. I thought I would try to isolate the bugger from the rest of the world. Things seem to slow down surfing the net on the clients when I watch something on the extender.

ColeAudio:

Are you hoping to have a gigabit computer network and then a 100BT extender network?

No. All my switches and routers are 100mb. Only my newest PC has a gig NIC anyway.

mjp14:

your extenders wouldn't need to connect to the internet so a seperate extender network would be fine

I believe the extender has to access the internet for guide data and cover/artist info. I can see if it goes through the PC for that when I get home.

gildavis:

mjp14:

your extenders wouldn't need to connect to the internet so a seperate extender network would be fine

I believe the extender has to access the internet for guide data and cover/artist info. I can see if it goes through the PC for that when I get home.

 Everything runs on your PC.  Your extender is a specialized RDP session.  Look in your task manager when the extender is connected, there will be another instance of ehshell belonging to user MCX1. 

Well, I shoved a 10/100 Netgear NIC into my PC and ran a wire from there to the DMA2200 (with appropriate cross-wiring). I set both the NIC and the DMA2200 to static IP and the DMA2200 won't see the PC.

Do I have to disconnect/reconnect the DMA2200 since the MAC and IP address changed?

Just to test the cable and the adapter, I created a network bridge between the two NICs on the PC and reverted to automatic IP. The DMA2200 logged on with no trouble. I tried watching a few things and it all works, but in my mind the bridge seems to defeat the purpose of having the second NIC.

I see 13% network usage watching live TV and recorded TV located on the PC. I see 27% usage when I play recorded TV located on the server, with or without the bridge.