Static IP address

My router assigns addresses from 192.168.1.2 to 254. I want to give my wireless printer a static address and I know that this has to be outside that range - do I simply go for 255 or is there some other rule of thumb?

.255 will not work because it is the broadcast address for the 192.168.1.0/24 network.

Simply choose one high up in the range, it will *never* conflict, you'll be OK.

I would go for .200 or something easily memorable.

If you like you could go into your router and adjust the range down to .2-199 for example so it would never conflict, but I strongly doubt you'd ever plug in 199 devices anyway to make it conflict.

Edited by Pipexer (Tue 21-Apr-15 20:21:24)

In reply to a post by Pipexer:

.255 will not work because it is the broadcast address for the 192.168.1.0/24 network.

Simply choose one high up in the range, it will *never* conflict, you'll be OK.

Assuming the router uses sequential allocations. It's not exactly a sensible bit of advice though and just leaves the potential for a world of pain later.

The BETTER advice was to reduce the size of the DHCP pool your router gives out - say give out between .2 and .150 - that'd still be huge amounts and leave you a shedload for other stuff.

In reply to a post by therioman:

Assuming the router uses sequential allocations. It's not exactly a sensible bit of advice though and just leaves the potential for a world of pain later.

If the router doesn't use sequential allocations, it is garbage and should be thrown in the bin.

And even if it did give them out randomly it would still be a 1 in 240 chance (shall we say) per every week or so it would conflict, very unlikely.

In reply to a post by Pipexer:

In reply to a post by therioman:

Assuming the router uses sequential allocations. It's not exactly a sensible bit of advice though and just leaves the potential for a world of pain later.

If the router doesn't use sequential allocations, it is garbage and should be thrown in the bin.

And even if it did give them out randomly it would still be a 1 in 240 chance (shall we say) per every week or so it would conflict, very unlikely.

Whereas you could have a 0% chance by just doing it properly once...

It's a BT HH5.

It's easy to change the DHCP server range to give you some spare addresses to allocate statically.

I've delved into the hub's advanced settings and set the range up to 150. So I need to give the printer 155, for example? It's been allocated 71 when the hub re-set. I read an article that suggested a static address and extended lease time to solve the issue of printers not responding. I'm getting there, I think.

Yes

In reply to a post by GeoffB:

It's a BT HH5.

Don't quote me on this, as I haven't got one but from memory you disable DHCP, then you can edit/reduce the size of the range, and then re-enable it.

In reply to a post by GeoffB:

I've delved into the hub's advanced settings and set the range up to 150. So I need to give the printer 155, for example? It's been allocated 71 when the hub re-set. I read an article that suggested a static address and extended lease time to solve the issue of printers not responding. I'm getting there, I think.

Yep - now on the printer settings, disable DHCP and manually set it to the IP you want (eg 155 as you suggest). I agree, printers are generally best on static allocations, cabled rather than wireless. If you must have a printer that is

There is actually a simpler method with the HH5 (and many other routers). Leave the DHCP settings as they are and tell the printer to obtain the IP address from DHCP. Then, with the printer connected, go to the HH5 Advanced Settings / Home Network, click on the link for the printer, edit the IP Address to the one that you want and set the Always use this IP address to Yes and apply. Restart the printer.

That way the printer will always be allocated the same IP address. I have done this for all of my devices using ranges from .100 upwards leaving the addresses below 100 for visitors.

Set the DHCP setting from xx.xx.xx.2 to xx.xx.xx.230, which gives around 228 devices that can connect to your router etc and then place your printer as a static at xx.xx.xx.240.

For me I start DHCP at xx.xx.xx.80 through to xx.xx.xx.120, which gives over 40 devices in my house (I have never went over 20 at any one time) and then I have set the main printer at xx.xx.xx.79