Adding switches to Linksys BEFSR41 Network

[jrlouie]

I have wired 4 rooms with cables from the 4 ports on the router. I would like to add additional ports at the central location of the router and in two rooms without stringing more cables. I understand that I can use EITHER port 1 OR the uplink port to connect a multiport switch near the router. My questoin is: how I can add multiport swithces in the other rooms with the existing single cable to each room? Basically, I would like to have 4 uplink ports at the router so the other end of the cables can be connected to the uplink inputs of switches at the other ends. (I'm new at networking, so please keep it simple and detailed.)

Thanks.

[lumis]

if you want to add more than one switch you have to daisy chain them.

that means running a cable from one room to another from the router to the switch, another cable from the switch to another room connected to another switch, and so forth and so on.

[stiltman]

crossover cable from switch to switch in any port

[ozymango]

My questoin is: how I can add multiport swithces in the other rooms with the existing single cable to each room? Basically, I would like to have 4 uplink ports at the router so the other end of the cables can be connected to the uplink inputs of switches at the other ends. (I'm new at networking, so please keep it simple and detailed.)

This may or may not be very simple based on if I'm reading you correctly. Let's hope I am!

What lumis and stiltman wrote is correct, depending on your needs, but there may still be a more simple way -- you're on track with the "either port 1 or the uplink port," but you need to be careful here, they're both the same and not the same. They're the same because you can only use one or the other (on each switch), because they are connected to the same "location" (I'll spare you the jargon ). But they're not the same because they need different cables depending on what you're trying to do.

I can write you up an entire diagram if you need (not really necessary, thank goodness!) but basically what you should be able to do is this --

* You've already got your router connected to your internet modem, right? So those are set, don't touch.

* You've got 4 "straight-thru" ports left over on the back of the router/switch combination, and those currently go directly to 4 computers with cat5 cables. Close enough? I hope so!

* In the rooms you want to install additional switches, you take the existing "straight-through" cable from the wall (or however you've got it hooked up to the router) that you've got plugged into whatever computer, and plug that wire into the "UPLINK" port on the new switch. This "uplink" port is a "crossover" port that talks to the router, and splits the one line from the router into 4 or however many ports there are on the new switch.

* Then just plug more devices into that new switch, you're done!

* You can do the same for the other room(s).

* So basically just plug your existing network cables from each port in the router (don't touch the port from the router to your cable/DSL modem!), to the "uplink" port on each switch.

* You can link even more switches by plugging a plain "straight-through" cat 5 network cable from the "uplink" port of each new switch to any port on any other switch.

* Big caveat -- if you are using the "uplink" port you cannot connect anything to Port 1 because this is a shared port. The uplink port is the same as port 1 except it can use a "straight-thru" cable and you don't need to use a crossover cable.

I hope that helps!

[jrlouie]

Yes, that helps a lot. What you describe is exactly what I want to do. I thought it would work, but was getting conflicting information. I wanted to get a definite answer before buying hardware. Thank you!

However, for educational purposes, I do have 2 questions. If all 4 of the ports on the router can be connected to the uplink port on a multi-port switch, what purpose does the special uplink port on the router serve?

Second, is there any difference in using straight through ports 2-4 and port 1 that is disabled if the uplink port is used when the cables are connected to the uplink ports of the new switches? Or is the uplink port made to take input from another source rather than an output to another piece of hardware? Maybe my confusion is primarily understanding the purpose of the uplink port.

Thanks again!

[pfh]

I couldn't get ports 2,3 or 4 to work when I wired an upstairs bedroom and hooked directly to nic. Only worked when I used the uplink port.
But then again, I'm kind of a network idiot. My main pc is ethernet on port 1 so maybe the switch is needed when adding to the other ethernet ports unless you use the uplink? I assumed the uplink port to be there for just such occassions when you don't have any switches. The wireless works good though.

[ozymango]

However, for educational purposes, I do have 2 questions. If all 4 of the ports on the router can be connected to the uplink port on a multi-port switch, what purpose does the special uplink port on the router serve?

Second, is there any difference in using straight through ports 2-4 and port 1 that is disabled if the uplink port is used when the cables are connected to the uplink ports of the new switches? Or is the uplink port made to take input from another source rather than an output to another piece of hardware? Maybe my confusion is primarily understanding the purpose of the uplink port.

Thanks again!

Glad to be of help! And though I (theoretically) have some idea what I'm talking about, it sure is confusing trying to put it all into English!

Okay, I'll answer your questions (as best I can) in order.

Question 1. Most likely your router is actually a "router/switch," so it's doing 2 things at the same time -- "routing" the IP addresses from your cable or DSL modem to your little LAN (local area network, the various computers you have "downstream" of the router), and the "switch" part allows for more than 1 computer on the network (the 4 or more ports).

The main job of the router (very simply speaking) is in the creation and assigning of individual IP addresses to each device on the network -- your internet provider (and cable/DSL modem) has one single IP address assigned to your home or location, and the router takes that one address and says, "Okay, I will be this one address. However, downstream of me, on all the switches connected to me, I will make up individual IP addresses for each separate connection, computer or printer, and let all these devices talk to each other and talk to the cable modem. The cable modem just sees me -- I'm the postmaster for everybody else." Again, that's the very layman's definition there. Also I'm digressing, sorry.

The "uplink" port on your router/switch can be used to connect to yet another router/switch and actually create a network of routers and switches all working harmoniously together to give you vast network of multiple IP ranges and addresses. Boggles the mind. Boggles my mind, anyway; I used to be able to figure out IP address ranges in my head, but no more, alas.

Question 2: Simple answer: The "uplink" port is a physical straight-thru port, while the "regular" ports on a hub/switch are crossover ports. The difference between "straight-thru" and "crossover" is as follows --

Your cat5 cable has 8-wires in it, 4 twisted pairs, but only 2 pairs (4-wires) are actually being used. Usually this is the orange/orange-white pair and green/green-white pair of wires, and one pair is used for transmission of data and one pair is the receiving pair. Pretty basic.

One "standard" is to use the orange/orange-white wires for transmission, on pins 1 and 2 of your network jack, and the green/green-white pairs are for reception, on pins 3 and 6. Pins 4 and 5 are reserved for telephone lines and pin 7 and 8 are part of the shielding and cat5 standard, long story; anyway so you've got 1-2 transmitting and 3-6 receiving.

Now, your standard straight-thru connection for hubs and switches has pin 1 of one connector going to pin 1 of the other connector, pin 2 to pin 2, pin 3 to pin 3, and pin 6 to pin 6. Notice all the "receiving" pairs are going to the same place and the transmitting pairs are going to the same place -- this is necessary because your basic switch/hub/port is set up so that the signal is re-directed (crossed-over) inside the switch device, and it "knows" how to get each device to talk to each other. Again, very very simply speaking.

In a crossover connector (either a crossover port or cable), pin 1 of one end goes to pin 3 of the other, and pin 2 goes to pin 6. Thus, the "transmitting" pair of wires is crossed-over to to the "receiving" pair of wires on the other end, and vice-versa Your "uplink" port is wired physically differently, in that the wires are not crossed-over.

So, if you connect two regular ports with a crossover cable, you're actually "uncrossing" the ports by doing this! Incidently, this confuses me (and others) even today. Related note: At work recently we had a situation where a computer worked fine when plugged into one port but not another. Turns out that computer's network cable was actually a crossover cable, and the switches they were using in one subnet could automatically sense if a computer was connected to it no matter if was a crossover cable or not. But the other switches couldn't tell, so depending where you were plugged in, you may or may not get a connection. Let me tell you, that took us a while to figure out!

Anyway, with a crossover cable, you can get two devices (usually computers) to talk to each other directly, without the need of an intermediate switch or hub. This is one way of doing a very cheap "network" between two computers, just plug a crossover network cable between two computers, fiddle with the network settings (sometimes can be a pain), and voila, instant network!

If you want to connect two hubs or switches, it's very similar to trying to connect two computers via network cable without an intermediate hub or switch, there needs to be a "crossover" connection between the two devices so that they can talk to each other. That crossover connection can be with either a crossover cable plugged into a crossover (i.e. "regular") port on each, or a straight-through cable plugged one end into a "normal" (crossover) port and the other end into a non-crossover (uplink) port. Whew. Still with me?

So in the most simple terms possible -- to connect a switch or hub to another switch or hub, you must use a crossover connection. This connection can be made with either a crossover cable plugged into two non-crossover ports, or a straight-thru cable plugged one end into one non-crossover (uplink) port and the other end plugged into a crossover(regular) port.

So that's all the uplink port is -- it's a non-crossover port. It's really the same port as port 1, it's just the wires are not crossed. Thus it depends on what kind of wires you have, straight-thru or crossover, to decide which "port" to use.

If you're only more confused than ever, let me know! I know I just made myself more confused than ever!

[stiltman]

The main job of the router (very simply speaking) is in the creation and assigning of individual IP addresses to each device on the network -- your internet provider (and cable/DSL modem) has one single IP address assigned to your home or location, and the router takes that one address and says, "Okay, I will be this one address. However, downstream of me, on all the switches connected to me, I will make up individual IP addresses for each separate connection, computer or printer, and let all these devices talk to each other and talk to the cable modem. The cable modem just sees me -- I'm the postmaster for everybody else." Again, that's the very layman's definition there. Also I'm digressing, sorry.

That's a perfect discription of a firewall/proxy server or NAT box, but not a "router"

All a router does is direct (routes) IP addresses from one subnet to another subnet. That's it in a nutshell. (simply speaking)

Home DSL/Cable routers like that of Linksys/Netgear/Belkin are more than a "router". They are a router, a switch, a firewall, a DHCP server, a DNS forwarder, and a Web server all rolled into one.


Edit:
BTW, might want to read this again
https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1300143#1300143

[ozymango]

That's a perfect discription of a firewall/proxy server or NAT box, but not a "router"

All a router does is direct (routes) IP addresses from one subnet to another subnet. That's it in a nutshell. (simply speaking)

Ya know, I can put "very simply speaking" right there and I can always count on somebody to point out the details where I went wrong. Thanks for that. :P

One thing that I try to consider that may or may not be something you would consider yourself -- just what the heck is the person trying to do, and can I talk to him or her in a way that actually helps them rather than point out my own superior knowledge and attention to dictionary defintions? No offense, but in my own case, if some person asks me how to do something and they don't really have much experience, I tend to go into "easygoing chat" mode, where I'm not so much into IEEE tech specs and more wondering if there's a way to phrase it so it kinda reads friendly.

For most home uses, and from the situation as described by the orginal poster, the "very simply" router part was an aside -- just a bit of info to show that the switch/router is two different things, though it might all be in one box. And for most home users, their "router" is there to to talk to the cable/dsl modem and route the data between their home LAN to the WAN on the ISP side. And it is usually-- and very often primarily -- acting as a DHCP server to create IP addresses for your LAN. So yeah I didn't go into great technical detail, not that I'm even sure the original poster cares either way, so there is that.

My own goals: To talk to a person so that they write back and say, "Hey, thanks for the help, that worked for me."

Or are you interested in a pissing contest? Crossover cable from switch to switch in any port to any port? Does that work if you connect two uplink ports? Two crossover ports? One crossover and one uplink port? Not trying to be a dick, just pointing out that we're all here because we like helping and it can be more than a bit tricky to be letter perfect all the time.

[stiltman]

nope, I can't piss that far

BTW, in this case the uplink port was being used and with most new switches, they can auto sense a crossover, again that's just most newer switches.

BTW2, I really don't call the Linksys BEFSR41 a router or home router, I usually refer to them as applainces.

[ozymango]

BTW2, I really don't call the Linksys BEFSR41 a router or home router, I usually refer to them as appliances.

I like that a lot myself -- appliances. Because nowadays your average "box" does the job that used to take fifteen pieces of hardware and half your back account to get to work!

Sorta along those lines, I've been on the fence for quite a while now about buying myself one of those DVD/VHS machines for capturing my stack of VHS tapes to DVD in one fell swoop -- apparently they often work rather nicely and it would sure solve a lot of my headaches ... but then here I've spent all this time getting my computer to do all this video transfer stuff that I hate to think I can replace 99% of what I've spent years and $$$ acquiring for a $200 appliance! Just seems so ... easy, ya know? What fun is that?

[jrlouie]

After reviewing user comments on capturing video with a PC, I bought a Sony RDRGX300 DVD recorder and a JVC HR5912 VCR to dub. I had some interference when they were stacked. but after spacing them apart they gave great results. Now I'm building a PC (3.6 GHz. P4, 2 G. ram, 160 G and 400 G SATA hard drives, 19" panel monitor) to edit the mpeg files on the DVD's and author new ones with titles, chapters, etc. That's how I initially found this web site. Some of our tapes were 20 years old, and I was anxious to get them digitized before the oxide flaked off.