50 | Chapter 4: Customizing Your Network Settings
N150 Wireless Router User Manual
-RIP-2M carries more information than RIP-1 and uses multicasting.
Using the Router as a DHCP Server
By default, the router functions as a DHCP server, allowing it to assign IP, DNS server, and
default gateway addresses to all computers connected to the router’s LAN. The assigned
default gateway address is the LAN address of the router. The router assigns IP addresses to
the attached computers from a pool of addresses specified in this screen. Each pool address
is tested before it is assigned to avoid duplicate addresses on the LAN.
Note: For most applications, the default DHCP and TCP/IP settings of the
router are satisfactory. Click the link to the online document TCP/IP
Networking Basics in Appendix B for an explanation of DHCP and
information about how to assign IP addresses for your network.
To specify a pool of IP addresses to be assigned, set the starting IP address and ending IP
address. These addresses should be part of the same IP address subnet as the router’s LAN
IP address. Using the default addressing scheme, you should define a range between
192.168.1.2 and 192.168.1.254, although you might wish to save part of the range for
devices with fixed addresses.
The router delivers the following parameters to any LAN device that requests DHCP:
• An IP address from the range you have defined
• Subnet mask
• Gateway IP address (the router’s LAN IP address)
• Primary DNS server (if you entered a primary DNS address in the Basic Settings screen;
otherwise, the router’s LAN IP address)
• Secondary DNS server (if you entered a secondary DNS address in the Basic Settings
screen)
To use another device on your network as the DHCP server, or to manually specify the
network settings of all of your computers, clear the Use Router as DHCP Server check box.
Otherwise, leave it selected. If this service is not selected and no other DHCP server is
available on your network, you need to set your computers’ IP addresses manually or they
will not be able to access the router.
Using Address Reservation
When you specify a reserved IP address for a computer on the LAN, that computer always
receives the same IP address each time it accesses the router’s DHCP server. Reserved IP
addresses should be assigned to computers or servers that require permanent IP settings.