Preparing for Hyperoptic (not too late to cancel my order)

Hello,

My building got connected to Hyperoptic and I have applied to connect. I am doing some homework as there seems to be a LOT that is new to me and I am slightly worried I might be better of with Virgin's cable service where speed is not that bad... Here's the new stuff I'm worried about:

1. I have asked to pay the extra charge for installing the socket to my living room where the previous Virign / BT sockets are. What type of socket does Hyperoptic use? I hope it is a standard Gigabit Ethernet RJ-45? (want to plug my own router into it).

2. I understand they run their phone lines via their router. I want to use my own router. How do I use the phone line then? I suppose at worst I could use my router in AP mode with the Hyperoptic router as the primary router so I can use its phone line. But I would REALLY prefer the other way around: have my own router as primary and not use the Hyperoptic one at all (or just use it as an "adapter" to connect it as a client to my own router for use as an "adapter" that converts the IP-phone to RJ11).

What are my options here? Does the Hyperoptic HAVE to be primary in order to use its RJ11 plugs or can it be connected to my router via Ethernet cable and still serve the RJ11 connectors?

Alternatively, is there some "adapter" device I can buy (to plug into my own Router's wired Ethernet and provide an RJ11 for my phone?). But then I might as well buy an IP phone right? What should I look for in terms of compatibility? Does anyone have anything they'd recommend (has to be DECT/cordless). Does this scenario require something special protocol-wise from the router or is it just standard IP which doesn't care about the router and just needs configuration/protocols on the phone I buy?

3. I should mention my router is a slightly old: D-Link DIR-890L AC3200 but it does have IPv6 which I hear Hyperoptic uses. Has anyone used this router successfuly with Hyperoptic?

4. How do I connect home? Currently I have a dynamic DNS registration and I can SSH/SFTP into my home Linux PC by having my router forward port 22 to that PC. I suppose there are dynamic DNS providers that support IPv6 so that I can connect to my home from outside using the DNS name? Is something different here?

5. What if I am outside my home and using IPv4? For example I'm on my laptop in a coffee shop that has IPv4. Can I still ssh into my Linux box at home using its IPv6 address (looked up via dynamic DNS)? How does that work? Or do I need to keep IPv4 around just for that, so I can forward port 22 of my dynamic IPv4 address to the Linux box via my router?

Hyperoptic use a standard RJ45 presentation

I use an Asus RT-AC86U router, and a Gigaset S850A for the phone. Hyperoptic will provide the SIP account details so you can use any SIP device you want, if you don't want to have their router connected.

Hi,

I can help with questions 4 & 5. I have a personal VPN setup using the desktop app from no-ip.org. I signed up to them to get a FREE domain (renews every 30 days) that points to my dynamic IP address. Then I setup the PPTP connection on an old laptop that I am using for my "Server". I also had to setup the firewall on both my laptop and the router to allow port 1723 (UDP) access to my internal network. That is pretty much all I had to do but even I have problems whenever I rebuild my laptop and need to re-setup my VPN. I acknowledge that PPTP is NOT secure but I am willing to take that risk if it means I don't have to duplicate data. As for accessing my VPN externally, I don't use IPV6 at all (my ISP (Virgin Media) don't use it) and just connect to it like I would any other VPN.

If you would like more information on this then please feel free to PM me and I will get back to you ASAP.

HTH,

In reply to a post by locutus:

Hyperoptic use a standard RJ45 presentation

I use an Asus RT-AC86U router, and a Gigaset S850A for the phone. Hyperoptic will provide the SIP account details so you can use any SIP device you want, if you don't want to have their router connected.

This is excellent news. The fact that I can use standard SIP account is very encouraging as it was my main reservation (need the landline, but don't want to be stuck on their router because of that). I am looking at the Yealink W60B base which has SIP and relay to DECT. Amazon allows returns so if it does not work I may try a Gigaset GO 100 base.

So then my plan is: I'll let the HO engineer sort out their router, so I have Internet and landline. I will then have a look at its settings and try to configure my DIR-890L using the settings on their router as reference. I can always use the internet/phone with their box. If I run into issues with the 890L I may look into buying something new, maybe even the Asus RT-AC86U. Meanwhile the Yealink will arrive and I will try it as well (via the 890L or their own router). Hopefully I'll be able to get the 890L working along with the W60B and be done, but as long as I know it's feasible I'll just try a few devices until I find something compatible.

Really appreciate you took the time to respond. Thank you!

In reply to a post by mking90031:

Hi,

I can help with questions 4 & 5. I have a personal VPN setup using the desktop app from no-ip.org. I signed up to them to get a FREE domain (renews every 30 days) that points to my dynamic IP address. Then I setup the PPTP connection on an old laptop that I am using for my "Server". I also had to setup the firewall on both my laptop and the router to allow port 1723 (UDP) access to my internal network. That is pretty much all I had to do but even I have problems whenever I rebuild my laptop and need to re-setup my VPN. I acknowledge that PPTP is NOT secure but I am willing to take that risk if it means I don't have to duplicate data. As for accessing my VPN externally, I don't use IPV6 at all (my ISP (Virgin Media) don't use it) and just connect to it like I would any other VPN.

If you would like more information on this then please feel free to PM me and I will get back to you ASAP.

HTH,

Thank you mking90031!

I actually use no-ip as well for my ddns.net host name. I'll ping you if I decide to go down this route but right now a simple SSH setup will do for me. I am mostly worried about the IPv6 aspect of this. Since posting I've been reading that:

1. HO gives real IPv6 addresses to your devices which means they are accessible via IPv6 without any NAT happening: you just get a subnet of public IPv6 addresses and HO will route that traffic into your box, which should be able to deliver it to end destination (as long as you have proper firewall settings on your side to allow what you need to pass through). So I'm pretty sure I can get the SSH using IPv6.

2. It appears HO uses something called CGNAT meaning you don't really have a public IP address (i.e. you external IP is 192.168.x.x or 10.x.x.x for example) and this is my cause for concern: I will very likely need to SSH into my Linux PC from IPv4 but then how can I forward a port from some real external IP to my router? I can set up port 22 of my router to hit my Linux PC, but that's useless unless HO forward the port of some real public IP to my router. I have no idea if that's even an option...

The solution is to pay the £5/m for a static IPv4 address that bypasses the CGNAT

Hello karypid! Thank you for reaching out. We will be more than happy to answer all of your questions.

1. Our socket fits the standard RJ-45 Ethernet cable so it will definitely be compatible if your router is using those. We recommend a Cat 5e category at least.

2. That's right, we use Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), which means that your phone ought to be plugged into the Phone 1 port in the back of our router, with an RJ-11 phone cable. However, you don't need to have our router set up as primary for that, but you ought to keep it connected. The ideal setup would be our router connected to the Hypersocket with the phone device plugged into it and your third party router connected to our router.

You can have your router as the primary source of WiFi signal and we would recommend the setup explained above.

3. We can't do much to assist with third party router interface and feature setups but we can confirm that we have rolled out IPv6 and it is enabled by default on our router.

4. Due to the shortage of IPv4 addresses, we use Carrier Grade Nat (CGN) which allows for more efficient use of our IPv4 address range. This means that your public IP address is shared among several other users. There are, however, some applications that may be affected by this. These include applications such as online gaming, VPNs, P2P applications, port forwarding and hosting at homes. If you do notice any issues with any of these applications, we can provide you with a static IP address for the price of £5 per month. The static IP address is an add-on to your account, and you can therefore choose to add it or remove it whenever you wish, as it won't impact your minimum period with us.

A similar option is available for IPv6 done via IPv6 filtering. To set this up, you would need to know the IPv6 address of the client that you would like the traffic forwarded to and the ports that you would like to open. However, please keep in mind that this will only work for traffic that is incoming via IPv6. Also, you would need to set up your device to use the same IPv6 address as the traffic is being forwarded to that address only.

5. Answered under 4. - a solution to this would be investing into a Static IPv4 Address.

We hope this answered most of your questions but if you have further inquiries, please don't hesitate to let us know. We will be more than glad to assist.

Thank you for choosing Hyperoptic!

Thanks for your reply.

After considering the above, I've enabled the static IP option as it's the simplest way to get around all this.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

The solution is to pay the £5/m for a static IPv4 address that bypasses the CGNAT

Indeed it seems like the simplest thing to do, so I've gone for it.

I actually did some searching and was surprised to find that PSN does not support IPv6 yet. Hopefully they'll add it, along with the launch of PS5? Though I doubt it's an issue with the console hardware, as the PS4 already has it, just their infrastructure does not provide it...

Either way, the Xbox seems to have it and the new Xbox is looking quite impressive, so no I'll have one more reason to switch!

I had never considered this before, but given that IPv6 has been around for quite some time now, I suddenly feel like there's no excuse. By now, it's become the sort of thing that requires government intervention! All ISPs and major IP-based service providers (I'm talking about Sony here) should be *required* by law to offer IPv6. It is hindering adoption to the point that it is hurting the market and competition.

Anytime! Feel free to reach out via PM if you need any further assistance with your connection.