Using router to restrict access

[bairdy]

I want to limit the amount of time my kids spend online so I was wondering is it possible setup my Netgear Dg834PN router to limit the amount of time the internet is accessable. I know you can do it with software but as we have 3 PC's all sharing the same connection via wireless, I wondered if you can do it via the routers settings?

[Sterling_Aug]

Did you check the router settings using a web browser and logging into the router as the local admin account?

Did you read the manual yet?

[bairdy]

Did you check the router settings using a web browser and logging into the router as the local admin account?

Did you read the manual yet?

Yeh, I can get into the settngs and I have read the manual but to be honest I'm not sure I understand it fully. You can set user defined services and set when to run these services but I think thats just to block certain sites and not general access to the internet, which is what I'm trying to do.

[Train]

Do you have XP pro?
If yes, check out gpedit and restrict their accounts.

[MJCfromCT]

I think it would be better to do this at the router rather than through gpedit on multiple computers.

If this is the manual for your router:

http://kbserver.netgear.com/pdf/dg83...al_11Nov05.pdf

On page 4-13, it shows how to create a custom service. You could tell it to block every port, and then set it up on a schedule, which would effectively block anything and everything. Unfortunately, it would block it for you as well during that time period. There may be a way to set your computer to bypass that rule, but I'm not too familiar with your particular router.

[bairdy]

Yeh, thats the manual. I'll have a go at blocking all the ports which will do the trick. I suppose I can override those settings if I want to use it myself.

[spoon579]

Hi there,
I don't know if you're still looking at doing this, but I just got it working on my router (different brand, but the same principle) and the bit of the manual you need to look at is PAGE 4-5 about firewall rules and, specifically, 4-9 about outboiund blocking..
Basically you say I want to set THIS IP address (the IP address of your kid's computer) to to not have access at these specific times.

So in your router it looks like under service you would want to choose something generic
Action you want to set it to block by schedule otherwise allow (this will mean that no other PC on the network are affected)
LAN users, put the IP address of your kids computer. You will want to make sure that they have a static IP address, or, better still, an IP address that is always given to it by the DHCP bit of the router
WAN users leave blank (this means that this will block any address they try to access)

Your has a nifty logging feature as well, so you can check out where they do go. I wish mine had that.

Anyways, hope that helped.

[1Chris]

Yeh, but to be honest I'm not sure I understand it fully.

I'll bet your kid understands it, or will understand it soon.