I am considering setting up my own server and was wondering if there is anyubody who has done this over here in te UK using an BT ( British Telecom )
provided HomeHub ( version 2 ) .
Experience / guidance etc. would be very much appreciated.
THanks in advance
iMac, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2)
See if your ISP offers static IP addresses or a business-class service tier in your area (and if you're willing to pay), as a starting point. If not, running a server may be a violation of the terms and condfitions, and it'll be more rather work to configure and run a server on a dynamic IP address. OS X Server and most other servers expect static IP, and most ISPs either don't provide that or they charge extra for that.
See if your ISP offers static IP addresses or a business-class service tier in your area (and if you're willing to pay), as a starting point. If not, running a server may be a violation of the terms and condfitions, and it'll be more rather work to configure and run a server on a dynamic IP address. OS X Server and most other servers expect static IP, and most ISPs either don't provide that or they charge extra for that.
Earlier BT HomeHubs including I believe v2 (don't know if v3 does) have built-in support for the DynDNS service. Even if yours does not you could run the Mac DynDNS client to achieve the same thing.
This will let you have a host name like something.dyndns.org which even with a dynamic IP address from BT will still point to you. you then need to setup port-forwarding in the BT Homehub so for example any incoming HTTP traffic gets redirected to your Mac server. Ideally you would give your Mac server a static IP on your private internal network.
So, yes it should be possible to run a server with a BT Homehub and access it from the Internet. Depending on what services you want to offer you may want to have the Mac server also act as a VPN server. Internet users would first have to connect via the VPN server and then would be able to see the rest of your network.
You could get a static IP address from BT, but typically they then want you to be on the business version of the service, i.e. pay a lot more.
John,
thanks a lot. Has already helped me. BTW: BH 2 has the build-in DynDNS support. I checked.
If you don't mind one more question: Do you have such a set-up ? If yes:
- one would connect the server via Ethernet cable to the Hub ( staitic IP as you mention )
- my MAC via Ehernet cable to the server
- iPad, iPhoes etc. via Wi-Fi provided by the HUB
- external HD for backup etc. va ethernet cable to the server
Would appreciate, if you can, your response.
Thanks a million.
I am on O2 but my O2 router also has DynDNS support.
Typically yes the server would be on Ethernet, but it is possible to use WiFi. The Mac definately could be on WiFi.
Not to intend to harp, but do check your ISP terms of service.
Various ISPs can and sometimes do block prohibited network services and can choose to add those blocks at any time, which means that server oriented traffic — mail, web, and in some cases most everything except VPN traffic — can encounter an ISP-level firewall.
Some ISPs are more cranky about ToS violations than others, too.
If server-oriented traffic is permitted, then DynDNS is decent for accessing stuff, but there are some network services that still won't work well, such as SMTP mail, short of forwarding your mail through a DynDNS or other mail proxy. (This due to spam filtering, as other SMTP servers can and variously do intentionally detect the DNS mismatches inherent with most dynamic IP address configurations, and will then drop messages from or to the mail server.)
FWIW...
OSX Server and BT HomeHub
