Powerline adapters and DHCP

[timcart]

I have a wireless router and a wireless/Ethernet LAN in my house linking 3-4 computers of various kinds and providing internet access to all of them.

About a year ago, I bought a couple of dLAN HighSpeed 85 powerline adapter units and used them to add one more computer to the network. One adapter is connected to a port on my router and the other is plugged into the mains and connected to the additional computer.

Now, I have added an AMAHI HDA/server to the LAN. Installation has gone very smoothly and I am connected to the HDA using VNC to write and send this email. In short, marvellous -- not least because I have no previous experience with Linux!

However, the suggestion at installation is to let the HDA (rather than the router) assign DHCP addresses to the computers on the network. But if I do that (turn off DHCP assignment on the router and allow the HDA to do it), the HDA does not seem able to provide an address for the computer on the dLAN plug. So the dLAN computer is unable to access the internet.

Is this normal? Is there a way around this problem?

[cpg]

when you installed the powerline adapters, did you set some setting like "bridge" ?

typically, if they are in bridge mode, which they should by default, they should just transmit everything through the powerline. they are supposed to be transparent, like a switch/hub!

1) you can look at the settings of the adapters to see if there is something like bridging

2) you can see the log in your hda at /var/log/messages at precisely the time that the computer behind the two powerline adapters comes in and requests the dhcp lease. it should indicate so.

3) you could just try to configure that machine with a static DNS configuration (pointing at your hda or anything else you want).

HTH

[timcart]

Oops! It looks like the problem was a damaged Cat5 cable between laptop and adapter! Very embarrassing.

Thanks very much all the same for taking the time to suggest some remedies.