IE6 and 2 x ISPs

[Jon Lawrance]

I have a PC connected via cable to a router with a Zen 1mb internet connection. I have now put a wireless USB thingy in the USB slot and installed a Netgear wireless router, connected to a Plusnet 2mb connection.

How do I get my browser to use the Plusnet connection instead of the Zen connection?

[Midknyte]

please explain your setup. do you need both connections? the easiest thing would be to disable the zen nic. Otherwise, you would have to use a static route.

[Jon Lawrance]

Oops! I meant that I have the PC connected to a router but it goes into one of the ports (it has 4). This is part of a network that all use the same router.

I need to stay attached to that network. However, I want to use the wireless router since it is a 2mb connection, instead of 1mb.

I presume I therefore need to leave the physical network connections as they are and to do some configuring on my PC. But I'm not sure what needs changing there!

[Midknyte]

so you have 2 routers going to 2 isps, right?

what OS is this? I know in win2k/2k3 server you could do static routes, but not in xp pro/home.

you could use static IPs on the zen nic (local dns or no dns) and dhcp on the plusnet nic to get dns information. if that doesn't work, try static IPs on both nics and manually enter gateway and dns info on the plusnet nic.

[Jon Lawrance]

Each router is connected to its own ISP. I am running Win XP pro.

"you could use static IPs on the zen nic (local dns or no dns) and dhcp on the plusnet nic to get dns information. if that doesn't work, try static IPs on both nics and manually enter gateway and dns info on the plusnet nic."

I really don't know what you mean by all this. I was hoping that there would be a simple way of saying in my browser, which internet connection I wish to choose. After all, there is a Connections tab where you can add connections. Currently, it is set to the "default" connection, which I presume is the Zen as it was there before.

Do I need to click Add and add another?

[Midknyte]

that won't route your tcpip information. you can add proxy server info, but the computer still needs to know which pipe to send the data out of. that's what you are doing with the IP information.

is this a work computer? I'm not following why you need 2 connections.

[rraehal]

If you are using two different NIC's, one wired to ISP 1 and the other wireless to ISP 2 then you can simply enable and disable the betwork connection you don't want to use. Enable the one you want to use.

You can do this by right clicking on "My Netowrk Places" and selecvting properties. Right Click a network adapter and hit disable or enable.

That is the only way you can switch between the two conections. I am not sure if both can be active and still allow you to switch them.

[Midknyte]

Winxp lacks RRAS. You can have multiple nics and route traffic via RRAS in win2k servers, but not on workstations.

your two options are to enable/disable the nics (as RRaehal and I stated), or learn how to manipulate the tcpip settings.

[cat5e]

Or spend $50 and get a Dual WAN Router.

:cool:

[Jon Lawrance]

I don't need two connections to the internet. I just need the PC to be connected to my network via the cable going to one router, and an internet connection going to the other router.

[Midknyte]

the point is that the data needs to know which path to take. if you want the internet data to take the Plusnet path, it needs the street signs to tell it where to go. that's what the IP, gateway, etc. are doing.

you need to either:
1) create a roadblock (disable a nic)

2) make the street signs (IP addressing)

3) get a cop to direct traffic (dual port router)

[Jon Lawrance]

Well put. I think you hit it on the head there. Option 2 appeals to me the most as I need to stay connected to the network as my emails are stored on the Server in a public mailbox.