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dleggett · #1 Post by **dleggett** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 9:45 am

Hello all,

This is my first post. We have about 30 ThinkPad X41s and are going to order some X60s soon. We are having some trouble using wireless as I am new to this world. I was wondering if someone could help me out. have a few questions about wireless mobility. We are testing an Alltel wireless aircard and should be getting a Verizon aircard soon but while testing this card, we are having some issues. We can connect to the Internet, login through a Cisco VPN; but here is where the problem starts, we cannot login to the Novell network. Am I missing something here? The Novell Server is 6.5 SP6 and the client is 4.91 SP1. The VPN version is 4.8. Any help on how to get this started would be greatly appreciated.

#2 Post by **jdhurst** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 10:05 am

When you say air card, it appears you are talking about Cellular-style air cards (unlike short-range WiFi). I use a Sony-Ericsson card (not as fast as Verizon, but similar).

My Sony card will not pass traffic through all VPN's. I can use it for Juniper Netscreen V4 OS, but not V5 OS. One client has a Bell (Canada) EV-D0 air card (much faster than mine) that will do both Netscreen versions.

I do not know why, except it appears to be how the host ISP translates the network traffic for the particular card.

Put another way: If the Sony card works for VPN, then it works just like any bland connection point. If it doesn't work for VPN, there is no setting I can find to make it work.

Not much help, but it is my experience. ... JDH

dleggett · #3 Post by **dleggett** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 10:22 am

Thanks JDH,

Our Alltel aircard does accept the Cisco VPN, just will not let us login the network.

#4 Post by **jdhurst** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 10:28 am

When you are remote, you have a non-routable IP assigned by the air card (at least I do with the Sony). Then there is a non-routable IP in the network inside the Cisco. A mis-match here prevents traffic.

By analogy, on a wired network, if I have the same subnet at home as my clients do inside their network, then I can connect but not pass traffic. I have two clients (newer) that I assigned strange subnets to in order to avoid this problem. I have one client (older) using a common 192 class subnet. Some routers use the same subnet so they cannot be used.

In short, there are a lot of variables and you need to isolate them to see if you have control or not.
... JDH

#5 Post by **GomJabbar** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 12:10 pm

I have never messed with VPN myself. But if I am not mistaken, I saw on the at&t/Cingular forums that some users required a static IP address for VPN. Normally these cellular connections have a dynamic IP address. While a static IP address can be had, they say it is very expensive and only practical for corporate use (due to the cost).

dleggett · #6 Post by **dleggett** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 12:38 pm

We have an HP tablet that I tested this on as well and it worked. Then tested on the ThinkPad and it didn't work. We compared the settings on this and it seems they are all the same with one difference the HP has a Broadcom 802.11 b/g WLAN card and the ThinkPad has an Intel Pro/Wireless 2200 BG.

#7 Post by **jdhurst** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 12:43 pm

For the VPN I use, the remote end can be a dynamic IP. The host end almost always has to be a static IP. ... JDH

#8 Post by **jdhurst** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 12:45 pm

dleggett wrote:We have an HP tablet that I tested this on as well and it worked. Then tested on the ThinkPad and it didn't work. We compared the settings on this and it seems they are all the same with one difference the HP has a Broadcom 802.11 b/g WLAN card and the ThinkPad has an Intel Pro/Wireless 2200 BG.

Strange. I have not seen that kind of issue. The Intel Pro 2200BG is a decent card. Having said that, I use Netscreen, not Cisco.
... JDH

dleggett · #9 Post by **dleggett** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 2:58 pm

Thanks for your help guys. I found out where the problem was. I did some reading through the posts on here and decided to try the Access Connections. This was the only thing that I did not configure. It works like a champ. You guys gave some great ideas, and I appreciate them. Thanks again. I will posting up here some more I am very sure. Does anyone know if there are any forums for the ThinkCentre's as well?

The Spirit of X21 · #10 Post by **The Spirit of X21** » Thu Aug 30, 2007 3:08 pm

There's always the IBM/Lenovo Desktop conference:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewforum.php?f=25

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