Getting two consoles to open NAT w/o enabling UPnP

Sdawg

Sdawg

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I just got an xbox for my room and have just finished setting up a static ip and manually forwarding the necessary ports to it since my isp and router aren't officially supported by live to get my NAT from strict/moderate to open. The problem is that since you apparently can only forward ports to one ip, only one xbox will have an open NAT while the other will have a strict/moderate one. So I was wondering if any of you guys had any ideas on how I could get both of them to be open at the same time as the only way I know of to do this would be activating UPnP (would rather not do that for security) or having multiple external ip addresses (which I don't have and don't know how I would go about getting another ip).
 
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[quote name='Sdawg']The problem is that since you apparently can only forward ports to one ip[/QUOTE]

I'm fairly amateur at this, but, this seems like the point where you may need a second device at this one IP. Like you said, in having 1 Xbox, the way you're doing it may work, but, having 2 may mean you need some more hardware.

For note, I have FIOS, so I have my FIOS router, obviously, with wireless enabled. On the other side of the house, I have my Xbox connected via wire to a WRT54GSL router w/ HyperWRT. That router connects back to the FIOS router wirelessly using the firmware's ethernet bridge capabilities.

I'm just projecting your situation to mine, and I think if I had a second Xbox and connected that with wire to my Linksys router, I think the router(s) as is should be able to meet the qualifications for any NAT issues.
 
Or place the Xboxes in the DMZ on your router. You're not really going to run into security issues via the consoles anyway. They don't have a web browser and therefore any attacks are limited to none.

What brand is the router?
 
If your on DSL I had issues with the Belkin router to get two 360's on at once.
Once I switched to Linksys I had no issues (so far).
 
The router is an Actiontec GT704-WG, I tried placing the xbox in the DMZ and it still says moderate on MW2's multiplayer screen and I was going to try and put both in there but I can only add one ip to the DMZ. May try and see if I can borrow a friend's spare router to see if I can mess around with it to get it to have both consoles set to open. If all else fails, I'll just activate UPnP, the only reason I'm trying to avoid that option is that I'm not the only one who uses the network, so even with a firewall and virus/spyware scanners, there's a chance that somebody downloads something and infects the computer and gives whatever virus/trojan full access to screw around with my network or turn it into a spam bot before I can find out about it. And yes, I know I'm paranoid about that kind of crap :D
 
[quote name='Sdawg']having multiple external ip addresses (which I don't have and don't know how I would go about getting another ip).[/QUOTE]

Contact your ISP, however I think you'd still need a switch (which requires an external IP for each device) to utilize that instead of a traditional router (which has it's own pool of internal IP addresses for assignment via DHCP), but I could be wrong.

I also had the same issue you did with NAT issues in addition to having one Xbox get kicked offline when the other signed in with my Linksys WRT54G. Eventually it got so bad and I was so annoyed I caved in and got a D-Link Gaming Router (being that I worked for an ISP and was rather familiar with settings and port concepts this says quite a bit). Right out of the box it allowed both Xboxes online simultaneously and with open NAT for both. Life was good again.

Fighting routers and their settings and ports for multiple computers/gaming consoles becomes extremely annoying rather quickly.
 
Just enable UPnP. I was reluctant to do so at first too because I'd heard a lot of bad things about enabling it, but after researching it a bit, I found out that it's apparently not really that big of a security risk anymore. Now I'm gaming with no issues.
 
Yeah, I may try and contact the isp to see what my options are to get another public ip, I've been needing to call them about their charges for going over the 50 GB bandwidth cap anyways. That gaming router looks like an easy way to fix it, but I don't think it would be worth it to drop $200 on it just to leave for college in the fall and have little use for it. Been doing some more research about UPnP as well and am leaning more towards that as it does seem the security issues are made to be a bit more than they really are as stated above.
 
Well, I finally enabled UPnP and it still only made one xbox open while the other was moderate, so I put the 2nd xbox in the DMZ and both were open (oddly enough, it was only after I changed the static ip of the 2nd xbox that it turned to open). So I guess if all else fails, jumble a bunch of the solutions together until they work.
 
Yeah, I'm pretty sure I had a couple problems for a little while after enabling UPnP, but eventually everything just sort of started working; I don't know why. Give it a day or two.
 
You're going to need UPnP I'm pretty sure. I tried everything to get my 2 360's on with open NAT, and like you ended up with 1 open and 1 moderate. After doing loads and loads of web searching, this page does an excellent job describing the whole issue and was literally the only solution that worked for me --

http://jakebillo.com/two-xboxes-one-router-making-upnp-work-using-dd-wrt-or-tomato/

Granted I am using a Linksys WRT54GSL router, but it was the only way I was able to get it to work...maybe some of the principles in there would be applicable to the op's router (particularly if that router's firmware can be edited to do what that page outlines).

Good luck...it was a massive source of frustration until I found that solution. Certainly give it a try before buying a new router or contacting your internet provider.
 
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