How to put the Motorola NVG589 in 'bridge mode' (or as close as you can).

[frostcall]

Overview

Most people don't need advanced features that personally owned routers offer and will be just fine using the NVG589 and turning off their personally owned router.  But if you're like me (and I know I am!) then you are probably reading this thread because you have ip cameras, personal clouds, photo servers, guest wifi, VPN's, xbox, QOS settings, et al.  I have an ASUS RT-N66U , a VIP2250, and a wireless reciever with a WAP; but your settings should be similar. 

The NVG589 does not have a simple 'Bridge mode' setting so you will need to get into weeds to get this working.  I hope you're ready.

First Steps

Make sure you have a laptop or a computer that you can connect directly into the NVG589.

Unplug all ethernet cables from the NVG589 except for the one going into the aforementioned laptop.

Write down the MAC address of your personal router (the WAN MAC address if you see different ones for LAN and WAN)

Settings on the NVG589

• Login to your NVG589 by going to 192.168.1.254
• Go to 'Home Network' then 'Subnets & DHCP'.  Your password is on the side of the modem.
• If your 'Device IPv4 Address' is the same subnet as your local router, I suggest changing it.  I changed mine to 192.169.2.254 but you can stick with whatever you like / need.  My subnet Mask remains at 255.255.255.0
• Change 'DHCPv4 Start Address' to 192.169.2.1 (or whatever your above Device IPv4 address is but with a 1 at the end instead of .254)
• Change 'DHCPv4 End Address' to 192.169.2.5, Just a few more than the Start Address.  We need these for any WAP extenders for wifi TV's.  It's important that you only have the laptop plugged into the ethernet at this point.
• Click 'SAVE' at the bottom.

• Go to 'Home Network'  then 'Wireless' and turn wireless off.  You want to use the wifi on your own router right?
• Go to 'Firewall' then ' 'Packet Filter'.  Disable Packet Filters.  Again, we want our router to do the work.
• Make sure you don't have any of your own settings turned on in 'NAT/Gaming' (don't worry if you see 1 in there already that you can't delete).
• Go to 'Firewall' then 'IP Passthrough'.  For 'Default Server Internal Address', select or type in 192.169.2.1.
• For 'Allocation Mode' select 'Passthrough' (I had to do it in this reverse order to be able to type for some reason)
• For 'Passthrough Mode', select 'DHCPS-Fixed'
• Type in the MAC address for your router under 'Manual Entry', lowercase is fine.
• Click SAVE.  It will tell you that it needs to reboot.  Hang on for a minute.
• Go to 'Firewall Advanced' at the top and turn everything OFF.
• Near the top of your screen, you should see an option telling you to reboot the router. Go ahead and do this now. It takes about 2 minutes.

Personal Router Settings.

• Unplug your laptop and plug in your personal router while the NVG589 reboots.  
• Plug your laptop into your personal router and login to it.  For me, it was 192.168.1.1 (hence why I changed things above)
• For the ASUS RT-N66U, I had to go to my WAN settings, then 'Internet Connection'.
• Change 'WAN Connection Type' to 'Automatic IP'.  This will give your personal router the external IP of the NVG589 and is the key to making this whole thing work. Some folks will have to manually enter in an IP and this can be found under the 'Broadband - Status' section of the NVG589 settings.  If you don't have 'automatic IP' then I feel bad for you since you will have to manually change this every time your IP changes.
• 'Enable WAN', 'Enable NAT' and 'Enable UPnP' is all set to YES for me.  
• I recomend Setting your own DNS server.  I use Google's but you use whatever you like.  Google's is 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4
• 'Account Setting - Authentication' is 'None'.
• There are no Special requirements from ISP at the bottom.
• Hit APPLY at the bottom and your router will reboot.

I also changed settings in my IPTV under LAN:

• Profile was None.
• Choose IPTV STB port, I set to LAN3 & LAN4.  I plugged my U-Verse WAP for the wireless reciver into the NVG589 and I plugged the ethernet cable going to the VIP2250 into LAN3 on my personal router.  I'm really not sure if this was necessary but I'm having 0 issues with this setup.  I initially tried putting the WAP on my personal router but had issues so I stuck it back on the NVG589 and it's fine.  I could probably just plug the VIP2250 into the NVG589 as well but I'm just enjoying the small victory of using my personal router for now.  
• Hit apply at the bottom, another possible reboot.

At this point, I checked the internet and everything was working great through the router.  I restarted by 2 TV boxes (the VIP and the wifi ones).  Everything is peachy.

Your mileage may vary.  Good luck.

 EDIT to update WAP configuration. 

[ddbear]

Since my previous post, I experimented with several different routers.  Some of them work with frostcall's settings (for example Linksys WRT1900AC), others will not work with those settings (for example D-Link DIR-868L) and require my settings instead to route traffic normally.

Therefore it appears that the peculiar pseudo-bridged mode on this NVG589 is implemented in some nonstandard way that behaves differently with different routers.  Try both, see which one works for yours.

[ddbear]

For the "standard" passthrough setting that works with the Linksys WRT1900AC, I noticed that the DNS is very slow (web pages slow to lookup initially).  When the Linksys fetches its DHCP setting, the primary DNS server is assigned to point to the NVG589 (192.168.2.254).

In order to assign my own direct DNS servers, I wrote down all the assigned WAN settings in my Linksys status screen, and then set the Linksys Internet connection to Static using these settings.  I entered my own preferred DNS servers, for example Google DNS 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.  I changed the firewall passthrough setting on the NVG589 to Manual. 

One step further, I used a free utility called namebench to find the fastest DNS servers, and it found the fastest AT&T DNS servers, so I used those.  Now my browsing tests on the Linksys WRT1900AC are much faster.

[ddbear · Accepted solution]

Also if anyone is experiencing very slow loading on some websites with the NVG589 and IP Passthrough, disable IPv6 on your personal router:

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29352935-New-AT-T-UVerse-Power-tier-slow-only-for-some-major-websit...

[careycj0219]

I was able to get things working, but like a few others, I'm unable to open any ports to the outside world.  My port forwarding rules are being defined by my router, which is behind the NVG589.  Everything is routed correctly inside my LAN, and I have internet access.

Ideally I'd like all ports to be open through the NGV589 to my router and use my router to forward and block.  'm thinking there's an issue with the two routers being on different subnets (192.168.1.* and 192.168.2.*).

Has anyone had any luck with this?

[JefferMC]

If you're using your router as a router behind the RG, then you want it to have a different subnet on its LAN side from the RG's subnet.

If you're putting the NVG 589 in IP Passthrough mode, then all Internet traffic to your public address should flow through to your router, and you should set up your port mapping there.

What are you trying to do and how do you test it to know it's not working?

[careycj0219]

Basically, I'm trying to use the NVG589 as a modem only, and handle all my routing with my Linksys router.  The only exception is that I understand my two TV boxes (one wireless) must be connected to the NVG589.

Currently I have the NVG589 set as 192.168.2.254 with DHCPv4 192.168.2.1-192.168.2.5 and subnet mask 255.255.255.0.  My Linksys router is set as 192.168.1.1 with subnet mask 255.255.255.0, gateway 0.0.0.0, local DNS 0.0.0.0.  (Note that I've also tried with gateway 192.168.2.254 with the same results)  All port forwarding rules are specified on my Linksys router, and I've disabled all packet filtering and advanced firewall rules on the NVG589.

TVs appear to be working fine, and the internet works.  Within the LAN, I can specify my external ip address and port number (i.e. ***.***.**.***:1234) and reach the service running on my server.  If I try to do the same from outside my LAN, I can't see the service.  I've also tested with canyouseeme.org, which also says my port appears closed.

Hopefully this makes sense, and thanks in advance for any help.

[JefferMC]

So... you have the WAN side IP address of your router statically set to 192.168.2.something, or you're allowing to to be acquired via DHCP?   If DHCP, are you getting a 192.168.2.something address or are you getting your public address?

I'm guessing you have all this correct because you seem to be saying that your router is bouncing your public IP address traffic back into your LAN (which some users have quite a fit getting to work correctly), but I want to be sure.

Also, would the port you're attempting to use be something that maybe the NVG 589 uses and won't pass.  Examples would be the default SSL port (443) [if you have a wireless TV receiver and WAP] and possibly the SIP ports.  Also, you should not have any port forwarding rules set up for these on the NVG 589, just on your router.

[careycj0219]

WAN is set to DHCP on my Linksys, and it's successfully obtaining the public ip.

The ports I'm testing are fairly arbitrary and not typically blocked by an ISP.  Strangely enough, I tried a few other ports just to double check, and I noticed that ports forwarded to another server running on the same subnet are visable.  It sounds like there might be an issue with my server itself.  I'll have to dig around since to my knowledge I haven't changed anything with regards to the Linksys router or any of my servers.  All I've done is swap out my old cable modem from Cox to my NVG589 from Uverse, and everything was working fine before the swap.

It's strange though because everything works fine from within the LAN, even when specifying the public ip.

Thanks

[careycj0219]

It ended up being an issue with my main server.  Corrected that and everything seems find.  Appreciate the feedback.

[zmaynard67]

I have done all above (except the IPTV part, im not sure where to do this).

The only issue I am having is that i would like my TV boxes to be plugged into my main router, not my RG. I have a Netgear Firehawk R7000. (I have a switch that is running my HTPC and my DVR. I need my HTPC to be on the same subnet as my unRaid server on a different floor of my home).

I can get them to work, but after 20seconds on any single channel it says they lose connection, however if you change the channel they will begin working again for another 20seconds.

Any ideas?

Device IPv4 Address: 192.168.2.254

Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0

DHCPv4 Start: 192.168.1.2

DHCPv4 End: 192.168.1.5

R7000 IP: 10.10.10.1

Subnet : 255.255.255.0

Let me know if you need any more info.

[JefferMC]

The problem, @zmaynard67 , is that your router doesn't know how to handle multicast properly.  When you change channels on a U-verse Set Top Box (STB), it starts a unicast stream which you get to see immediately, while also starting a multicast stream by sending an IGMPv3 com up the line to request it.  Once the STB starts getting the multicast stream, it matches up the packet sequence with the unicast stream and switches over.  After 10-20 seconds, the unicast stream is stopped.

So... when your home consumer grade router gets the unicast request packet, it's a standard looking TCP/IP packet and it forwards it to the RG to be handled up the line, no problem. The unicast TV feed in return is also fairly standard UDP stream and the router passes it from the RG to the STB without issue. So you get to start watching your new program.  However, when the IGMPv3 multicast request comes up from the STB, your router takes one look at the smelly multicast addressing and strange protocol type and promptly drops that thing on your carpet (you need to clean that up, by the way).  If the multicast downstream just magically started anyway, the router may (or may not) decide to route the multicast packets. If it's a wireless router, transmitting those multicast packets is not a good thing for your network, because it goes into a slow mode to try to reduce the chance of errored/dropped packets, since the multicast packets cannot be requested to be resent, which just gums up your whole Ethernet network, wired and wireless.  In any case, in 10-20 seconds the unicast flow stops and your STB doesn't have the multicast stream, so your program stops.

In short, do not attempt to pass IPTV traffic through your garden variety router.

You can have more success with passing it through gigabit switches, so long as you don't put a wireless access point/router on the same switch farm with the IPTV traffic (for the above mentioned reason).  If you're bound and determined to mix IPTV traffic with IP traffic to an remote STB and wireless router, then you'll have to spring for two managed routers that can do VLANs with tagging and handle it that way.

[zmaynard67]

It seems like unchecking the "disable IGMP Proxying" box has fixed the issue. I will watch for slowdown however, and adjust if need be.

Thanks for the help.

[UnderwaterMike]

Exact same problem here, and it's driving me nuts. Tried power cycling the NV, resetting everything to default, etc., and it still won't accept/hold any of the new IP settings. I can't get past the initial stage of trying to change the subnet / netmask / DHCP range as you note below. The only thing connected to the NV is my laptop, by cable.

(BTW, I've tried letting the lappy get its IP via DHCP and by fixing it myself. Same problem either way.)

Has anyone figured out a way to get around this for NV's that seem to be "stuck"?

---

@amenic wrote:

No matter what I try, I cannot change the subnet / netmask / DHCP range for the NVG589.

This is very frustrating....   Why can I at least not disable DHCP?     AT&T is crazy annoying with wanting to take over MY internal network settings so I can run on THEIR EXTERNAL network.

I've about had it with this and am extremely close to calling TWC up for an install...

The error I get on any network config I use is:

Address must be on network (192.169.2.0)

I get it no matter what I try...

I've tried the following:

device IPv4 address: 172.21.0.1
DHCPv4 start IP address: 172.21.0.7
DHCPv4 end IP address: 172.21.0.14
Subnet mask: 255.255.255.240

device IPv4 address: 10.0.0.1
DHCPv4 start IP address: 10.0.0.2
DHCPv4 end IP address: 10.0.0.5
Subnet mask: 255.255.255.240

device IPv4 address: 192.168.2.254
DHCPv4 start IP address: 192.168.2.1
DHCPv4 end IP address: 192.168.2.5
Subnet mask: 255.255.255.240

device IPv4 address: 192.169.2.254
DHCPv4 start IP address: 192.169.2.1
DHCPv4 end IP address:  192.169.2.5
Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0

(I've tried a subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 as well with all configs and increased the DHCP range.

Am I doing something wrong that I'm missing or did  AT&T disable this on my firmware?

[aham23]

so what is the best option for running the NVG589 with a Apple Extreme Router (tower version). my set up includes 3 STB with 2 hardwired & 1 wireless. iMac computer, but we consume most of our internet via our wifi devices.

bridge the NVG589 and use the AE as my router and wife?

when you bridge the NVG589 is it best to shut of its wireless radio. mine is in the basement which could help provide wifi down there while the AE is on the main level providing coverage there. not sure if the two conflict with each other.

right now i just have the AE in bridge mode providing additional ethernet ports and wifi on the main level.

much thanks.

[Dbiondo77]

I am having the same problem with the multicasting and 10-20sec drops. when i plug the vip2250 into the nvg589, i get no connection. How do i get it to connect?