Cannot access the wireless repeater's control panel

Question

Level 1

7 points

Cannot access the wireless repeater's control panel

Hello,

Some hours ago, I bought a wireless extender (TP-Link TL-WA500G) to broadcast the Wi-Fi from one floor to another.

The default IP address is 192.168.1.254, but if I ping, it doesn't "pong". The ping command from Terminal tells: "host is down"

I've tried resetting it to the factory defaults, but nothing seems to happen.

I've tried setting the Ethernet manually -> Router IP: "192.168.1.254", but nothing changes: the browser hangs forever till timeout.

Any suggestions?

*+Please note+*: at the beginning it was working, but when I changed something from "Static IP address" to "Use DHCP" the issue began serious. Did I ruin the router? I think not, because connecting it via Ethernet still turns the "LAN" light on. I'm beginning to think I've changed the (private) IP address of the router from static to dynamic (i.e. using DHCP to set it), but why resetting it to the factory defaults doesn't reverse the situation?

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.5), 2,53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB RAM

Posted on Jan 5, 2011 1:11 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Jan 5, 2011 9:05 PM in response to Tyrexionibus

If the device is IP addressable then it should have a MAC address written on it somewhere. See if your router is reporting that address in a connected device. If it is you should also be able to see its dynamically allocated IP address. Possibly your factory reset wasn't a full reset? DHCP leasing may also be interfering with allowing it to revert to a static address?

Maybe try restarting the router also?

Longer term, I'd use that MAC address to set up a static allocated IP address in your router configuration.

Reply

Answer 2

Tyrexionibus Author

Level 1

7 points

Jan 6, 2011 3:27 AM in response to Kiwi Graham

(Repeater has been restarted with no luck.)

Yes, it does have a default MAC address. It begins with 74:EA:....

Default settings are:

IP: 192.168.1.254 with username and password "admin"

This is what I notice:

1. When I connect the Ethernet cable, Apple's Network utility says that it has an "Auto-assigned IP address" thus it is not able to access the Internet (this is normal). However, I can't even access the repeater because the "router's IP address" field is empty. *This doesn't change if I assign a forced address to the router*.

2. If I first connect the repeater and then try accessing AirPort, *I get an error* and I am unable to go wireless. I have to disconnect the repeater, enable AirPort and then use the other wireless connection (on the other floor) I have.

My question is now:

*How do I get the MAC and IP addresses of all devices connected to my MBP?*

Message was edited by: Tyrexionibus

Reply

Answer 3

Jan 6, 2011 7:28 PM in response to Tyrexionibus

OK, now that I've had a look at the user guide it would appear that the TL-WA500G _doesn't provide DHCP_ when using factory defaults, so let's go back to the start.

What we're trying to achieve initially is to just get to the TL-WA500G web interface - so forget about getting the TL-WA500G to connect to anything other than your MBP for the moment.

1) Do the factory reset again just to be certain. (With the TL-WA500G plugged into the power and nothing else do the hard/factory reset using a pin on the reset button. Make sure to hold it for 5 seconds until the system light starts flashing rapidly.)
2) Connect an ethernet cable between your MBP and the TL-WA500G.
3) Temporarily configure the MBP with a static network setup. (Make sure you keep details of any current ethernet settings.) Based on the Windows example in the user guide.... System Preferences > Network > Ethernet
a) Configure IPv4 manually
b) IP address: 192.168.1.2
c) Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0
d) Router: 192.168.1.254
4) Click apply - hopefully the ethernet status light will turn to green.
5) From your web browser try the address: http://192.168.1.254
6) Follow the guide for info on setting up the TL-WA500G to act as a wireless repeater. I recommend that you give it a static IP address within the address range of the existing wireless network - setting that address both in the TL-WA500G and in your other router.
7) If required, update your MBP config to revert to the original ethernet settings.

Hope that helps.

Reply

Answer 4

Tyrexionibus Author

Level 1

7 points

Jan 7, 2011 4:31 AM in response to Kiwi Graham

Even following these rules, the situation doesn't change.

The LAN green light is on, telling that there is communication via Ethernet, but I am still unable to open the TL-WA500G web panel.

Do you have any terminal commands whose output can be pasted here ? Screenshots are not a problem, but you'd have to understand Italian :/

This is the output of a ping to 192.168.1.254 :

PING 192.168.1.254 (192.168.1.254): 56 data bytes
Request timeout for icmp_seq 0
Request timeout for icmp_seq 1
Request timeout for icmp_seq 2
ping: sendto: No route to host
Request timeout for icmp_seq 3
ping: sendto: Host is down

Followed by the statistics that you can imagine.

Reply

Answer 5

Jan 9, 2011 6:46 AM in response to Tyrexionibus

Hmm - first thought - do you have Airport (and any network interface other than ethernet) on your MBP turned off while doing this?

Second thought - do you have a different machine you can use to try and connect to the repeater?

Third thought - get a replacement. (I've run out of obvious suggestions at this point!)

Reply