cox.net FYI

[Craig White]

On Sat, 2002-02-09 at 11:08, Lisa Winkler wrote:
> I have been using 2 @home ips.  They stopped working yesterday.  I couldn't reach a DHCP server, so I couldn't get a cox ip.
> 
> I finally got through to tech support (the wait is 1.5 hours) and the guy told me to plug the modem directly into the computer instead of going through the hub.  I know this is on their standard list of things to tell the user to do and explained to the guy that it wouldn't solve anything if the DHCP server was unreachable.  Finally I agreed to do it anyway.  I was connected instantly!
> 
> The t.s. guy explained that the software on their DHCP server (it's probably running windows!) is having problems when the modem reports that there are 2 different MAC addresses behind it.  Apparently when this happens it just refuses to respond to my request.  He says they are working on it, doesn't know when it will be fixed, but until it is you won't be able to have 2 computers with real-world IPs connected because if they are both up at the same time the DHCP server will refuse to assign them ips.  I guess this is my official kick in the ass to try to get NAT working (instead of a bridge as I am currently using).
> 
> Anyway, just a public service in case anyone else is dead in the water but still reading mail!
-----
I think that this is what we've been saying for a few weeks now - that
cox.net for home users is entirely predicated upon the first Mac address
it sees when you connect to the new cox setup. It is entirely locked in.
In your situation, using the hub, gave it a few Mac addresses at the
same routing point and though their setup should be able to distinguish
the difference, they are going through some major growth pains.

Consider that their setup is actually quite linux friendly - it really
doesn't matter whether you use pump or dhcpcd to get an ip address from
them, you don't have to do any real configuration, just set it up for
dhcp and you're on. The problems occur when you are used to using a
windows machine to get the dhcp info from their server and then you
switch computers and try to use the info derived from the windows
computer on your linux box - what used to work is now a disaster.

The other issues that seem to present itself when you use linux on dhcp
like this are:
- you have to accept the hostname that they provide (use /etc/hosts for
other 'local' hostnames that this machine should be known as and bind
them to the lan based NIC and not the external if/ip)
- you will likely find that running bind/dns as a caching server for the
computers on the internal lan is faster than using cox's dns servers
- you will have to monitor and possibly adjust your iptables/ipchains
firewall scripts to re-run themselves after each renewal of your ip
address - which at this point is about 2 hours since the lease period
for those that I've looked at is 4 hours. On one system, I altered
/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifup to exec /etc/rc.d/firewall (redhat
7.2 system)
- ports 25 & 80 and NetBIOS ports are blocked to all cox.net ip
addresses UNLESS they are coxbusiness customers.

Craig