I am hoping someone can help with a network that includes a Maxwell Mesh network. Maybe @drandyhaas will chime in (Maxwell Mesh was his project). I have tried to make something akin to the following physical connections work with no success.
Current wired configuration follows:
// Internet modem // --enet-- // beefy wired only router (with other devices connected wired) // --enet-- // Maxwell Mesh base node (with two other mesh nodes connected by wired backhaul) //.
Goals:
Not rely on the base Maxwell Mesh modem as the first connection downstream from the cable modem. Have the beefy modem first.
Have all wireless devices connect to Maxwell Mesh
Setup network (routers) so that wireless devices on the Maxwell Mesh wireless can communicate with devices connected wired to the beefy router.
I realize I need to avoid double NAT. I have flexible options for running Ethernet cables (lots of access). Beefy router is currently running DD-WRT (plan to switch that but one bite at a time!)
Can I / how do I set network settings to achieve my goals?
I am not sure if I can set Maxwell Mesh router to bridge mode (or how to do that).
As Bartles would say "thank you for your support"!
This seems to be a straightforward modem -> main router -> wireless access points (dumb AP) setup you’re looking for.
You can have the main router (beefy router) run all DNS, DHCP, and firewall work. Turn all of those services off on the Maxwell Mesh nodes (this is done in the System -> Startup tab of the GUI and disabling them). You can setup the lan interface, in whatever Maxwell node your beefy router runs directly to with Ethernet via lan to lan, to either DHCP or a Static IP in the subnet that the beefy router is using (out of the DHCP range is best practice for static).
That pretty much covers the bulk of what needs done.
EDIT: you’ll want to look for dnsmasq, firewall, and odhcpd in the Startup tab. Click the enable button to disable them. Be patient. The enable button will eventually say disabled instead.
For the lan interface/s of any ethernet ran to the Maxwell nodes, click edit and select your preference (either DHCP or Static address). If you select static, again, the address must be in the same subnet that the beefy router is using. More than likely you’ll put 255.255.255.0 as the mask and make the gateway address the same IP as the beefy router.
@drandyhaas , if the Maxwell Mesh nodes are to use 192.168.2.x (incrementally) but I turn off DHCP on them, how will they get assigned IPs in that range? Or is there where I need to define a static IP for each node on the beefy router? If I do that, how does the base node know that the other nodes exist (if it did not do the IP assigning)?
If only the nodes are to use 192.168.2.x, don't I need at a min a subnet mask of 255.255.254.0 (for a 2.x - 3.x)? Apologies if I am way off on these follow ups.
BTW, I have three nodes in a Maxwell Mesh and they have been working great for me!
You can turn off dhcp serving on the hub node, as long as the upstream router is doing dhcp and it's configured to pass dhcp requests to the beefy router upstream.
Maxwell mesh satellite nodes contact 192.168.2.1 by http and request the next node ip available starting with 192.168.2.20 or something like that.
I would let the Maxwell mesh (hub plus satellites) set up under normal conditions, and then start messing with things.