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So, outside a building I have a device with a fixed IP address: 192.168.25.10. This cannot be changed.

I want to connect this device to my home network and all the equipment within my home network have the addresses 192.168.1.xx (cannot be changed).

Also, there is no possibility to use a cable to connect to these networks, have to be done wireless. How would I solve this problem and preferably with what products?

Idea: Outside device connected by Ethernet-cable to rugged/outdoor wireless repeater installed near the device. Sending signal to an extra wireless router with attached bridge to my home network router?

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  • What subnet masks do these devices have?
    – VL-80
    Aug 27, 2015 at 19:50
  • If I'm not mistaken, both 255.255.255.0.
    – Christian
    Aug 30, 2015 at 21:50
  • Well, I am not sure to understand your idea part. But, for the rest: could you afford a computer in one of the networks with two wireless devices (NIC: network interface card)? Aug 31, 2015 at 1:00

3 Answers 3

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First of all, since you cannot draw a cable across the street, you will need to setup a wireless AP (Access Point) attached to the network to which the 192.168.25.10 machine belongs; you can do this either by using a switch immediately before the 192.168.25.10 machine, to which you you will connect both this machine and the AP, or by connecting the AP directly to the machine, if you know what you are doing. There are billions of Access Points by just about all manufacturers, you will have no problem finding one suitable to your budget.

What you need on the other side of the road is a wireless bridge, i.e. a component which connects wirelessly to a router, and accepts wired clients sharing the wireless connection to the router.

The following pic, from the DD-WRT wiki, should clarify the situation: enter image description here

In fact, your case is the textbook case for the use of a wireless bridge.

Caution: there is some confusion in the literature, you will see sometime people refer to a wireless repeater; a wireless repeater is identical to a wireless bridge, except it can also have wireless clients, not just wired ones. This is not a good solution for you, for two reasons: first wireless repeaters tend to cost more than wireless bridges because they pack two functionalities into a single component; second, they are slower, because the wireless repeater bridge is used, for half of the time, to listen to its wireless clients, and it uses thus only half of its time to broadcast to the main router the traffic of its wired and wireless clients.

This picture uses a specific model (a now obsolete Linksys-WRT54G) for both the router and the wireless bridge, but this is just a suggestion among many possible ones. To make this work you may use any modern router supporting DD-WRT, for an up-to-date list see here; please notice that Buffalo sells some models with DD-WRT pre-installed, which I always found convenient. But you can also buy a non-DD-WRT component specifically called wireless bridge, just check any online sellers to find many different possibilities.

When you have the wireless bridge in place, just connect an ethernet cable from one of its client ports to the outer port of your router, and you are done: from the point of view of your home network clients, all of this will be totally transparent: your home machines will connect freely to the Internet and to the LAN on the other side of the road.

Last point: this configuration is now asymmetric, i.e. computers on your home LAN can reach computers on the LAN 192.168.25.0/24, but the vice versa is false: the machines on the other side of the street cannot reach your home LAN. In your OP, there is no such requirement, hence I will skip this part, but if instead you need to accomplish this too, just write and I will show you how to do it.

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  • So, if you add the last part I guarantee you the 50p. I do need symetric. I,ll send "questions" from my "home" network and need to receive the "answers".
    – Christian
    Sep 3, 2015 at 21:52
  • @Christian Oh, but you can do that as it stands. What cannot happen is that the others initiate a communication with your home LAN. That is, they cannot see you unless you start talking. It is a security measure: you exist to them if and only if you want to be found out. Do you still want to make it totally symmetric, and thus destroy this security feature? Sep 4, 2015 at 5:05
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If the outside device has wireless capabilities (or they can be added via a wireless bridge) and is near enough to pick-up your home router, then you need a router that can serve and bridge multiple wireless sub-networks.

I cannot recommend such a router, but if your router's firmware cannot handle this, check if your router can accept a more evolved firmware, namely DD-WRT, by checking if your exact router model exists in their Router Database. Check also in the database the installation procedure, because for some routers they are pretty complicated, and keep as backup the installation media of your existing firmware.

I am not a user of DD-WRT, but I believe it can support and bridge multiple wired/wireless sub-networks. These articles might help you to decide :

Multiple WLANs
How to setup multiple BSSIDs using DD-WRT
Set Up Multiple SSIDs and VLANs on a DD-WRT Router

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So I suppose you can't change the IP or Subnet Mask on either your home one or the outside one.. If it were just the IPs that were fixed i'd say make them both 192.168/16

But it looks like you'll have to have 2 subnets, which means, you'll need a Router that can handle different Subnets. I did once contact Netgear asking them about that and the best they had was a VLAN Switch with a router built in(though it got bad reviews as it wasn't reliable). It may be you can get a VLAN Switch that can handle different subnets. And you will need 2 Wireless Bridges, they may have to be the same make in order to connect to each other.

I believe each wireless bridge would have a cable going to the adjacent router.

And I guess each router would have to be good enough to handle two different subnets. So maybe a VLAN Switch with built in router. Or if the VLAN switch doesn't have a router built in, then a good enough router connected to each VLAN switch.

My knowledge of doing something like that is more theoretical than practical though.

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