Probs hosting game w/3Com ISDN router

[DegreeC]

With no cable or xDSL available I'm stuck using expensive ISDN. I have a 3Com Office Connect ISDN LAN Modem Mod 3C892A-US.

http://www.3com.com/products/en_US/deta ... pe=support

It is a basic ISDN modem with a built in 4-port NAT router. I get an IP dynamically assigned by my ISP every time I connect and the router uses DHCP to assign IPs to the 4 connected PCs (although I do have the option of assigning fixed IPs to the PCs).

I can connect and play flawlessly on other internet game servers but can't host one myself because of NAT. This equipment has no provision to make a PC a DMZ server nor does there appear to be any way to open specific ports. I have seen reference in this forum to "port forwarding" as a way to create a game server behind a router. What is this? Does port forwarding relate to the router or game software? Is there any other way around the NAT limitations of my router?

Thanks in advance for your help!

[GRIM]

Hmmmm you got a tought 1 bubby, the best way would have been to configure and forward the ports from the routers software but since that seems impossible I really dodnt know lets hope some one with experience on this matter responds. Try DSL reports message board the have a router board with experienced peeps that might be helpful to you. Good luck m8

[GRIM]

Router boards

[YeOldeStonecat]

Port forwarding is done to open up ports on a computer behind the routers NAT. For example, if you want to host a Quake 3 server, you would assign your computer a static IP, subnet, gateway, and DNS settings, instead of letting it get an IP from your routers DHCP service. You want to specify this because you need to forward the ports to a specific IP address...you can't hit a moving target. Then, you forward the ports your server needs for whatever apps you run...Quake 3 being 27960.

That's all!

[DegreeC]

Thanks for the responses. I actually got through to 3Com tech support and they confirmed my equipment's lack of capability. Since port forwarding is a function of the router software and my weak 3Com software dosen't support it, I appear to be out of luck.

The only option I currently seem to have is to ditch the 3COm LAN modem, get a stand alone ISDN modem for one of my PCs and make it a proxy server for the remainder of my PCs. I should be able to run a game server on the PC with the stand alone ISDN modem. Any good articles out there on how best to set this up and/or recomendations for proxy server software?

One the other hand, I may just wait until cable or DSL becomes available sometime in 2002(maybe). What are the best cable/DSL routers out there now for running game servers?