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[Robert S]

I want to connect to my Media Server at home when I'm at work. I've got a VPN tunnel and I can fully access my server at home, but it's got another subnet and when I try to find my server from MC11 I get the anwer "Failed to find local media server" which is correct, there is no local server.

How can I tell MC11 to search for a server on another network? I can for instance type:

http://192.168.10.5:80/GetLibrary

And my browser starts downloading the library.

/Robert

[JimH]

I think you may need to tell your router what local IP address you want the request forwarded to.

[Robert S]

No, I'm not an network specialist, but I don't think I would need a port forward. I've got a VPN tunnel up, and it's supposed to forward every reqest without any problems, as long as I specify the correct IP and port.

For instance, my PDA can control my MediaBridge server on my computer at home when I am at work. That's not what I'm looking for here though, (but it is amusing to start playing music for my kids when I'm not home).... ;-)

It's just like my computer is in this network, it's just that it's on another network segement. My work network is 192.168.1.XXX and at home I've got 192.168.10.XXX.

I've done a port forwarding just to see if I'm wrong, and now I can do this in my browser:

http://192.168.10.5/GetLibrary              -> and the library is starting to be downloaded.

But my guess is that Media Center doesn't scan the network on other subnets, what I would like is to be able to type the actual computer name or the IP no. of the computer that is the media server, just like NetRemote can.

[JimH]

what I would like is to be able to type the actual computer name or the IP no. of the computer that is the media server, just like NetRemote can.

You should be able to do that.  MC doesn't do anything tricky with TCP/IP names or addresses.  That's left to the OS.

Does it work locally?  Can you connect from the same PC?

When you test, why are you using the browser instead of MC?

In any case, the issue you have is almost certainly a network configuration issue.

[evanr76]

Maybe your VPN server is not relaying the beacons?

As a work-around, could you just manually define the library and specify the IP address?

[Robert S]

As a work-around, could you just manually define the library and specify the IP address?

That's just precicely what I would like to be able to do. Since there is no problem for me to reach the library server from Internet Explorer, there really should be no problem reaching the server from Media Center. It's just that it doesn't seem to look in that IP-range.

I'm using a browser to test the connection between my work computer and my Library Server since this is the only way I know of that I can test the connection with.

I don't know how the connection process works, but;

I guess my library server waits for a connection attemt on port 80.

And when MC scans for library Servers it scans the local network and sends a request over port 80 and wait for replies. Is that so? In that case, if I change my library server to work on another port, how can I tell MC to scan other ports. What I can see, MC11 has no options to change when connecting to a library server.

[Alex B]

MC can find the server automatically only if it is on the same subnet.

Try this:

File > Library > Library Manager... > Add > Name: Library Server, Location: 192.168.10.5:80, Clone from: none

I have never used the default port because it is the browser port. You could try something else, e.g. 59000 (not used by any known application or Trojan according to grc.com).

The location would then be 192.168.10.5:59000. That port must be open and configured in the Library Server plug-in too.

[John Gateley]

To add to Alex's helpful note: Media Center accesses the library in the same way that IE does, there is no searching going on unless you click on "Search for servers".

j

[Alex B]

Yes, I meant that too. I should have written: "Search for Media Servers" can find the server only if it is on the same subnet.

I guess Kobba just didn't find any other way to connect. The option is not very easy to discover. There could be a separate clearly named entry for adding the server address and port manually.