Online gaming through a hardware firewall

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2003-12-12 09:47pm

I used to be a pretty good twitch player (back when 56k was the cat's ass), especially with the venerable X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter. I got out of the gaming world a couple of years ago, but now I want to get in a game once in a while. Problem is, I now use an SMC router, and I find that I can't join in games over the IGZ, even when I disable the firewall.

Does anyone have any suggestions or experience with this kind of thing?

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2003-12-12 10:10pm

You'll need to open some ports on your router to let the traffic through... this is incredibly annoying if you use online gaming services because they try and use up to ten ports, and don't tell you what they are. Install zonealarm and start the game, zonealarm will tell you what ports its trying to use, and open those on your router.

Also, SMC routers often have problems with the original firmware. Get online and update if you haven't already!

TrailerParkJawa · Post by **TrailerParkJawa** » 2003-12-12 11:37pm

I have an SMC Barricade and some games just dont work behind it. For others you have to find out what ports to open and set that up in the admin utility. But then you have to set everything up. So it can be a lot of work.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2003-12-12 11:40pm

TrailerParkJawa wrote:I have an SMC Barricade and some games just dont work behind it. For others you have to find out what ports to open and set that up in the admin utility. But then you have to set everything up. So it can be a lot of work.

I assume you've flashed the router, so may I ask which Barricade it is? We sell a lot of SMC hardware, and I'd like to do some research to find a workaround.

TrailerParkJawa · Post by **TrailerParkJawa** » 2003-12-13 12:38am

Stark wrote:
TrailerParkJawa wrote:I have an SMC Barricade and some games just dont work behind it. For others you have to find out what ports to open and set that up in the admin utility. But then you have to set everything up. So it can be a lot of work.
I assume you've flashed the router, so may I ask which Barricade it is? We sell a lot of SMC hardware, and I'd like to do some research to find a workaround.

I only recently upgrade the router software. I forget why, but it never gave me any troubles. I have the DSL/CABLE router with a 4 port switch and the printer server built in. I think mine is the 7400 model.

The documentation on how to open the ports is not as good as I would like. Uh, I played with it a little bit without any sucsess. One of these days I will sit down and make a real effort but for now, I just have a friend host games.

When playing Empire Earth you join games behind when using NAT, but you cant host games.

SCRawl · Post by **SCRawl** » 2003-12-13 11:31am

(Mine is a SMC7004VBR, by the way.)

I think my problem is this: I can't join online games when I *disable* the firewall. One would think that any closed ports would be opened by this action, and yet, I cannot join (or host) games.

Also: I've gone through the configuration screens, and either I'm an idiot or they've made it unusually difficult to figure out where to open ports. Just to make things even more difficult: I used to run ZoneAlarm, and it made my computer crash (Win2k system). Strange but true.

Any suggestions/experience to share?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-12-13 01:47pm

You may have to pout your computer in the DMZ.