I suck at networking

[Pykrete]

I am new to any kind of networking or NAS application. Please be gentle.

My setup:
Supermicro X8SIL-F motherboard
Intel Xeon x3460 CPU
16GB RAM
4x4 WD RED
32GB ssd for freenas
650 Watt SeaSonic power supply

This feeds into a tp-link switch (TL-SG105)

then from there to my main computer. which has a Realtek nic which I know is not preferred.

The question:
Now, for my incredibly noob issue. Upon booting FreeNAS it returns the address for the web interface as http://0.0.0.0. I am sure this is not right. From the freeNAS setup instruction video on YouTube is seems like I should be able to access the web GUI at this point, but I cannot. I a pretty sure this has something to do with earlier in the boot process when FreeNAS returns "No dhcp offers received." I feel like I need to configure something on my computer so it can offer a dhcp address to the FreeNAS box but I am unsure what it is that I need to do.

Can someone point me in the correct direction here.

Thanks for your help!

 

[Supa]

You sure it's connected to your network? It should grab a IPv4 Address on the initial boot. Maybe check bios settings and make sure something isn't disabled?

 

[melloa]

@Pykrete

If I read correctly, you have your FreeNAS connected to a switch (tp link). For your computer and/or FreeNAS to obtain an IP Address it would also need to be connected to a router wish would provide them with an IP Address.

Unless you have that switch connected to a router (i.e. your internet provider router) and it has DHCP enabled, you won't be going anywhere.

 

[SweetAndLow]

You need a DHCP server on your network. Usually these are included with your router on your home network. If you don't have that then you can still use static ip configuration. This can be done from the console of freenas. You will also have to configure a static ip on your client computer.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[Pykrete]

Ok, here is what i have done since reading what everyone here has had to say.

First, @Supa
I checked that nothing in the bios of either motherboard was preventing a connection.
In my main computer Ipv4 PXE is enabled, aswell as the network stack, and the lan Rom.
Im my FreeNAS computer PXE is enabled on lan1 (i am connected to lan1)
I think that takes care of mobo settings.

Second, @melloa
I am not connected to a DHCP server. Thank you for that insight. I guess it makes sense that i could not automatically acquire an IP address without this.

Third, @SweetAndLow
I did it hahaha. Thanks for the tip about the static ip address.
How i finally managed to get to the GUI was setting the client static IP then setting the static IP on FreeNAS machine to the Default Gateway address of the client.
Is this the proper protocol?

Anyway, Thanks everyone for the help.

hopefully I can manage it from here haha.

 

[pirateghost]

How i finally managed to get to the GUI was setting the client static IP then setting the static IP on FreeNAS machine to the Default Gateway address of the client.
Is this the proper protocol?

Uh. Absolutely not.

FreeNAS isn't a gateway. It isn't a router.

You seem confused on how IP addresses work. Perhaps it would be good for you to take a little time to understand the basic concepts first.

You simply need 2 addresses on the same subnet. Period. That's it. Done.

Your gateway is typically your router internal IP address.

If you want updates and jails/plugins, you need to get internet access to the FreeNAS which means you configure it's gateway to be the router of your network and make sure it has nameservers that it can reach (typically your router or you can use Google's free DNS servers)

 

[melloa]

Let's start over.

I assume you have internet otherwise you won't be writing the posts above (unless you are doing from your phone :) )

What's your internet provider (ATT, Comcast, etc) and what equipment did they provided you with? What you are trying to do is something like the attached picture.

The above router has five connectors on the back (rj-45), that you connect your devices. One is the WAN (wide area network connecting you to the internet). To that you connect your provider ISP modem.

Nowadays the ISPs don't provide modems, as it caused lots of support calls with customers that couldn't make that work, so you probably have a router (i.e. Broadband, Cable, etc), with at least one LAN port, so the picture above would have the modem and router in one device (most like what you have).

The others connectors are the LAN (Local Area Network) you'd connect your computers. Your switch is acting as a "port multiplier", in other words would be adding to the four LAN connectors on the above picture and you could have more than four computers connected to the internet.

The way the internet works is based on routing the information using tcp/ip, so do some research on that. You also wants to understand what are:

- IP
- Router
- Switch
- Gateway
- DHCP

Just the basics.

Once we understand what you have we can try to help, so please, what are:

- FreeNAS version installed
- ISP Provider
- ISP equipment


[]'s

 

[depasseg]

which has a Realtek nic which I know is not preferred.

This applies to the FreeNAS, since the driver support is very poor. Windows clients might be better supported.

It sounds like the only connection your client and freenas have is to each other and there isn't any internet access. Is that accurate? IOW, is this a completely closed/isolated network?