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VPN Tunnel Control

Activating a VPN Tunnel

There are three ways to activate a VPN tunnel:

Use the VPN Status page.
Activate the VPN tunnel by pinging the remote endpoint.
Start using the VPN tunnel.

Note: Refer to Using Auto Policy to Configure VPN Tunnels to enable the IKE keepalive capability on an existing VPN tunnel.

Using the VPN Status Page to Activate a VPN Tunnel

To use the VPN Status screen to activate a VPN tunnel, perform the following steps:

Log in to the Modem Router.
Open the DG834 management interface and click on VPN Status to get the VPN Status/Log screen (Figure 6-30).

Figure 6-30

Click on VPN Status (Figure 6-30) to get the Current VPN Tunnels (SAs) screen (Figure 6-31). Click on Connect for the VPN tunnel you want to activate.

Figure 6-31

Activate the VPN Tunnel by Pinging the Remote Endpoint

Note: This section uses 192.168.3.1 for an example remote endpoint LAN IP address.

To activate the VPN tunnel by pinging the remote endpoint (e.g., 192.168.3.1), do the following steps depending on whether your configuration is client-to-gateway or gateway-to-gateway:

Client-to-Gateway Configuration-to check the VPN Connection, you can initiate a request from the remote PC to the DG834's network by using the "Connect" option in the NETGEAR ProSafe menu bar. The NETGEAR ProSafe client will report the results of the attempt to connect. Since the remote PC has a dynamically assigned WAN IP address, it must initiate the request.

To perform a ping test using our example, start from the remote PC:

Establish an Internet connection from the PC.
On the Windows taskbar, click the Start button, and then click Run.
Type  ping -t 192.168.3.1 and then click OK.

Figure 6-32

This will cause a continuous ping to be sent to the first DG834. After between several seconds and two minutes, the ping response should change from "timed out" to "reply."

Note: Use Ctrl-C to stop the pinging.

Figure 6-33

Once the connection is established, you can open the browser of the PC and enter the LAN IP address of the remote DG834. After a short wait, you should see the login screen of the Modem Router (unless another PC already has the DG834 management interface open).

Gateway-to-Gateway Configuration-test the VPN tunnel by pinging the remote network from a PC attached to the DG834.
Open command prompt (i.e., Start -> Run -> cmd).
ping 192.168.3.1.

Figure 6-34

Note: The pings may fail the first time. If so, then try the pings a second time.

Start Using a VPN Tunnel to Active It

To use a VPN tunnel, use a Web browser to go to a URL whose IP address or range is covered by the policy for that VPN tunnel.

202-10133-01, November 2005