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Manually Connect to 6600M at Specific IP?

k0oks
k0oks Member ✭✭
in Networking
I'd like to manually be able to connect to my 6600M at a specific IP without using SmartLink. Is there a way to do this?

I have multiple LAN segments on different private subnets. I need to be able to connect to a radio at 192.168.10.100 from another LAN segment at 192.168.20.200 (note the different third octet). These private LANs are connected through a router.

I cannot use SmartLink because it tries to be helpful and sniff out my public IP address, but the LAN segments are private networks that communicate privately through a router. Thus connecting to the public IP from either private LAN does not work.

I'd like to avoid using reflection or other firewall forwarding tricks if at all possible.

Comments

  • Mike-VA3MW
    Mike-VA3MW Administrator, FlexRadio Employee, Community Manager, Super Elmer, Moderator admin

    Not simply.

    If you want to connect to a radio on a different subnet, you will need to create a VPN tunnel to that other subnet that will also share layer 2 broadcast packets.

    The IP design was created to work with 99% of our customer's home networks and that is a single subnet on a basic router connected to the internet,

  • k0oks
    k0oks Member ✭✭
    I figured it was broadcast, but that limits you to the local subnet. I can enabled NAT reflection in the router, but that slows everything down a tiny bit because then all LAN1-LAN2 traffic has to go through the WAN interface.

    I would make a vote for the ability for a user to manually enter a target IP address for the radio, rather than only pull it out of SmartLink.

    This would also allow tech savvy people with static IPs to connect directly to their radio. There are a lot of computer people in Amateur Radio, and giving more flexibility is a good thing.

    At the very least perhaps there could be a config file to edit to add this IP. I couldn't find anything like that in %APPDATA%. At least I couldn't find an ip in there.

    Thanks.
  • Mike-VA3MW
    Mike-VA3MW Administrator, FlexRadio Employee, Community Manager, Super Elmer, Moderator admin

    Your request is a common one. :)

    One of the reasons we don't do it is related to post sales support. We spend a LOT of time fixing networks for people who have some or little IP knowledge and that is expensive to do and it ultimately drives up the cost of the radio (it is in the economics).

    Where hear this almost daily. My buddy came over and made some changes to my network. It worked great for a while (month/year) but now nothing works --- you get the idea and their buddy is long gone. :)

    So, we have to then spend time undoing things once we figure out what is wrong. Over 95% of the install base has no network experience. They want it to 'just work'.

    This doesn't help you at all, unfortunately.

  • frc2302
    frc2302 Member ✭✭
    edited February 2023
    Just finding this thread. I have a 6400 and a Maestro on order, but did not expect that I would have to reconfigure my network to use them.

    Since, as best I can tell, there is no kind of access control on the radio's firmware (it seems it'll talk to whoever answers its broadcast), then it absolutely will be segmented on its own subnet and firewalled. If I cannot then simply point a Maestro or SmartSDR at its IP address, and broadcast discovery is the only way to find it, then I will have to set up a VPN just for that subnet, simply to connect to my own device. That's a lot of unnecessary complexity that I've never encountered with any other networked device, IoT or otherwise. Not to mention that I presumably won't be able to use the Maestro at all unless it happens to be connected to the same network as the radio, greatly limiting its utility. (I have no interest in SmartLink.)

    This seems a little baffling. You've built what appears to be the world's best remotely controllable radio and made it impossible to connect directly to it like any other IP-networked device.

    I hope you'll reconsider, or that I have misunderstood.
  • Ron Koenig
    Ron Koenig Member ✭✭✭

    We can only Dream of having Acess to our radios like the Mac users.

  • frc2302
    frc2302 Member ✭✭
    Does that mean that the inability to specify a target device directly is a limitation only of the Windows client, and that the (3rd party) Mac client _can_ connect directly?
  • LA4XLA
    LA4XLA Member ✭✭

    Direct IP connect would be much appreciated to access the radio that sits on a different subnet !!

  • WX7Y
    WX7Y Member ✭✭✭✭

    You can do that from the setup \ Network screen

    image.png


  • K9YK
    K9YK Member ✭✭

    Seems Like it should be possible to write an app that sits on the network segment with the client software, that send out discovery packets with the IP address of the Flex Radio on some other segment.

  • LA4XLA
    LA4XLA Member ✭✭
    https://community.flexradio.com/discussion/comment/20602229#Comment_20602229

    Good try. True when you sit on the same LAN as the radio, then you can change those settings.

    But when you sit on another VLAN or a subnet via VPN and then start SmartSDR there is no possibility to to do manual connection and point to the flexradio. The only option to connect to the radio is via SmartLink and Autodiscover, whick will only work if you are in the same LAN

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