MN-500 is a great router, except for two outstanding issues it has. . .

Hi folks,

I've found the MN-500 with the latest firmware to be a surprisingly robust router, however, there are two outstanding issues Microsoft has not addressed. They are:

1) When using the "Virtual DMZ" feature, the router will occasionally (a couple of times a month for me) "uncheck" the option which says "Enable virtual DMZ at IP address: 192.168.2.x." I experience this quite often when one of my customers calls me with Net Meeting and my Net Meeting doesn't ring. I have to go back into the firmware-based setup and click the checkmark back on and put the private IP address of my PC back into the router and click "Apply." Has anyone else experienced this? What are the odds Microsoft might fix this behavior? It does make the router such that you can't rely on it.

2) When using Windows XP Remote Assistance and/or Remote Desktop, the router inserts an entry into the Persistent Port Forwarding table which causes the port forwarding for Remote Desktop to not work, because the inbound connection isn't being forwarded anywhere on the LAN. Rather, with the entry in the Persistent Port Forwarding table that is automatically inserted, the port forwarding function of the router appears to become "comatose." I've noticed the following entry is present in the Persistent Port Forwarding table at those times that I discover that the ability to connect to a PC via Remote Desktop is not working:

Enable Description Inbound Port Type Private IP Address Private Port

? sessmgr (192.168.0.100:3389) 61901 61901 TCP 192.168.0.100 3389



When the above entry is placed in the Port Forwarding table and not removed automatically by Windows XP, the next time I try to connect up to the PC via Remote Desktop, a Trace Route indicates that the connection went as far as the MN-500, but didn't make it to the PC on the LAN.



Has anyone else experienced this behavior? I used to use Linksys and never saw behavior such as this. Will Microsoft fix these two outstanding problems?



Thanks for your feedback.



- Jeff

You may want to send these issues to (E-Mail Removed).


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Jason Tsang - Microsoft MVP

Find out about the MS MVP Program -
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"Jeff Houston" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
Hi folks,

I've found the MN-500 with the latest firmware to be a surprisingly robust
router, however, there are two outstanding issues Microsoft has not
addressed. They are:

1) When using the "Virtual DMZ" feature, the router will occasionally (a
couple of times a month for me) "uncheck" the option which says "Enable
virtual DMZ at IP address: 192.168.2.x." I experience this quite often when
one of my customers calls me with Net Meeting and my Net Meeting doesn't
ring. I have to go back into the firmware-based setup and click the
checkmark back on and put the private IP address of my PC back into the
router and click "Apply." Has anyone else experienced this? What are the
odds Microsoft might fix this behavior? It does make the router such that
you can't rely on it.

2) When using Windows XP Remote Assistance and/or Remote Desktop, the router
inserts an entry into the Persistent Port Forwarding table which causes the
port forwarding for Remote Desktop to not work, because the inbound
connection isn't being forwarded anywhere on the LAN. Rather, with the
entry in the Persistent Port Forwarding table that is automatically
inserted, the port forwarding function of the router appears to become
"comatose." I've noticed the following entry is present in the Persistent
Port Forwarding table at those times that I discover that the ability to
connect to a PC via Remote Desktop is not working:

Enable Description Inbound Port Type Private IP
Address Private Port

? sessmgr (192.168.0.100:3389) 61901 61901 TCP
192.168.0.100 3389



When the above entry is placed in the Port Forwarding table and not removed
automatically by Windows XP, the next time I try to connect up to the PC via
Remote Desktop, a Trace Route indicates that the connection went as far as
the MN-500, but didn't make it to the PC on the LAN.



Has anyone else experienced this behavior? I used to use Linksys and never
saw behavior such as this. Will Microsoft fix these two outstanding
problems?



Thanks for your feedback.



- Jeff

The second issue you mentioned is most likely caused by a problem with
UPnP on the Windows XP computer.

Jeff Houston wrote:

> Hi folks,
> 2) When using Windows XP Remote Assistance and/or Remote Desktop, the
> router inserts an entry into the Persistent Port Forwarding table which
> causes the port forwarding for Remote Desktop to not work, because the
> inbound connection isn't being forwarded anywhere on the LAN. Rather,
> with the entry in the Persistent Port Forwarding table that is
> automatically inserted, the port forwarding function of the router
> appears to become "comatose." I've noticed the following entry is
> present in the Persistent Port Forwarding table at those times that I
> discover that the ability to connect to a PC via Remote Desktop is not
> working:


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time.

Thanks very much for the suggestions.

- Jeff