Mobile phone takes PCs IP addresses at random

Hi,

I have 3 wireless PCs connected to my home network, all on W7 Home Premium.
My Router is an Actiontec R1000H.
The PCs have their own IP address and use the opendns servers.

Recently my son got a mobile phone and what happens is that almost on a daily basis one of the PCs goes off-line due to an IP address conflict.
This is due to the fact that when the mobile phone connects to the Internet it takes one of the 3 PCs addresses, at random.

How is this possible?

Can you help me to understand and solve this issue?

Thank you
Alex

Metallo said:

Hi,

I have 3 wireless PCs connected to my home network, all on W7 Home Premium.
My Router is an Actiontec R1000H.
The PCs have their own IP address and use the opendns servers.

Recently my son got a mobile phone and what happens is that almost on a daily basis one of the PCs goes off-line due to an IP address conflict.
This is due to the fact that when the mobile phone connects to the Internet it takes one of the 3 PCs addresses, at random.

How is this possible?

Can you help me to understand and solve this issue?

Thank you
Alex

When you say the PC's have their own IP address does that mean they are set up with a static IP?

If this is true and your phone is obtaining it's IP from the DHCP server that means that the static IP's you assigned are within the range of the DHCP addresses.

This means you need to move those static IP's outside the range of DHCP addresses so that it doesn't hand out an IP that is already in use.

You will see the DHCP range in your routers settings, which are different depending on the router. Lets say it starts at 192.168.0.100 to 192.168.0.199 this means the static IP's need to be assigned outside of that range so the address doesn't get reassigned through DHCP.

So the static IP's can start at 192.168.200 and upwards. Or you can actually change the DHCP range to fit your needs.

Hi,

yes , I meant static IP addresses.

I have changed the settings and I am sure I won't have any problem from now on.

You explanation has been very clear and much appreciated.

Thank you!

Alex

Metallo said:

Hi,

yes , I meant static IP addresses.

I have changed the settings and I am sure I won't have any problem from now on.

You explanation has been very clear and much appreciated.

Thank you!

Alex

Your quite welcome. The problem was easy to solve thanks to your excellent description of the problem. Enjoy your reliable network.