Been bugging me for months and months....

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Scott M. - 30 Jan 2005 22:28 GMT

I have a home office network setup with:

DSL with static IP address
DSL to router/NAT with firewall
router to workstations
workstations have ZA Firewall
SBS 2003 server acting as both a domain controller and a mail server
(Exchange 2003 is running).

Everything works fine except getting the audio & video features of Windows
Messanger working.

I have tried opening those ports on the router and allowing the software
from ZA Firewall but have never been able to get it working.

Any thoughts?

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Chuck - 30 Jan 2005 23:03 GMT

>I have a home office network setup with:
>
[quoted text clipped - 12 lines]
>
>Any thoughts?

Scott,

Are you testing WM with two computers behind the router?

WM Audio / Video uses TCP and UDP dynamic ports. It's a lot easier to make this
work with a UPnP router, unless you want to forward a wad of ports to the
computer with the A/V equipment.

You might get more help in microsoft.public.windowsxp.messenger.

Signature

Cheers,
Chuck
Paranoia comes from experience - and is not necessarily a bad thing.
My email is AT DOT
actual address pchuck sonic net.

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Scott M. - 30 Jan 2005 23:33 GMT

See inline:

> Scott,
>
> Are you testing WM with two computers behind the router?

Doesn't work inside or outside the LAN (but regular text IM-ing works fine
in and out of the LAN).

> WM Audio / Video uses TCP and UDP dynamic ports. It's a lot easier to
> make this
> work with a UPnP router, unless you want to forward a wad of ports to the
> computer with the A/V equipment.
>
> You might get more help in microsoft.public.windowsxp.messenger.

I've acutally tried there some time ago and got no meaningful responses.

Thanks,

Scott

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Chuck - 31 Jan 2005 01:12 GMT

>See inline:
>
[quoted text clipped - 17 lines]
>
>Scott

Scott,

Regular text will work fine in any circumstance, because text goes from you to
the Microsoft server to the other party. That's easy to pass, even thru NAT.

An MSN / Windows Messenger audio / video conversation runs connections directly
between you and the other party, and uses dynamic ports. In order for this to
work, you have to forward a range of dynamic ports (TCP and UDP) from the router
to your computer. Or, you need a UPnP capable router, which dynamically sets up
and forwards each specific port as requested.

Making this work with both computers behind the same NAT router requires a
Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) server behind the router also.
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=324214
<http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/winxppro/deploy/worki01.mspx>
<http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/winxppro/deploy/worki01.asp>
<http://search.microsoft.com/search/results.aspx?view=en-us&st=b&na=82&qu=msn+mes
senger+nat+server>

Yahoo Messenger, OTOH, routes all conversations between you and the other party,
thru the YM server. This makes it easier to setup even audio / video
conversations. Unfortunately, that also makes for audio / video latency, which
is why the MSN / Windows Messenger conversations are more real-time (better
quality) than Yahoo Messenger. You can't have everything.

To summarise, if you want to run audio / video conversations between two
computers on your LAN, forget about MSN / Windows Messenger - get Yahoo
Messenger (or setup a SIP server). If you want to make MSN / Windows Messenger
work with a computer behind another NAT router, both routers need to be UPnP
enabled. Or again, use Yahoo Messenger.

Signature

Cheers,
Chuck
Paranoia comes from experience - and is not necessarily a bad thing.
My email is AT DOT
actual address pchuck sonic net.

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Scott M. - 31 Jan 2005 14:54 GMT

Thanks Chuck. Yes, I have been able to get Yahoo Messenger work, but would
prefer not to have to install another IM product.

My router (and the one of the other party outside my LAN that I've tested
this with) are both UPnP NAT devices. And, we've tried tests with the ports
being forwarded.

I haven't heard of the SIP protocol though. I'll look into that.

Thanks for your help.

-Scott

>>See inline:
>>
[quoted text clipped - 59 lines]
> UPnP
> enabled. Or again, use Yahoo Messenger.

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