Note: Work in progress

Polkast Personal Cloud automatically works according to your network configuration. Here's a little Home Networking 101 to help you set up your network like a pro!

First a bit of background: 1) Wired vs. wireless connections -- your iPad, iPhones and Android are wireless, your laptop is wireless, your TV might be wireless. The devices wired to your router/switch(es) are your desktops, printers, and/or NAS (Network Attached Storage).  2) Polkast refers to your laptops, desktops and NAS as the homebase -- this is where your files are stored; and your mobile devices are the roambases -- where you access the files. 

What follows are suggested configurations to allow you to move about with your wireless devices and still have great connectivity back to your homebases-- within your home/office and remotely.

Typical Network setup: 

1. Home/Office with a Router

Home/Office with a Router (UPnP compatible and is ON). Your PCs, Mobiles, and NAS are connected to this primary router via WiFi or Cables.  

For the Techies: Gateway (DSL/Cable modem) with a public (WAN) IP address with NAT. All devices connected to this UPnP gateway get assigned a private IP address by this router. Polkast makes a local connection between devices on that network, as indicated by the connectivity icon in the lower left on your Polkast mobile app. 

At home 

Polkast makes a local connection between your mobile and homebases. This is the fastest (up to 10x) and most efficient connection. Your content is exchanged directly between your devices, bypassing the internet completely. 

Out and about 

You are using a mobile device or a PC accessing your homebase via Wi-Fi or 3G/4G connection. Polkast tunnels a private Direct connection to your personal cloud. 

2. Home/Office with 2 Routers

Home/Office with two Routers (UPnP compatible and is ON). Your PCs, Mobiles, and NAS are connected to either of these two routers via WiFi or Cables. Your primary router (closest to your internet provider box) is responsible for passing private IP Addresses for the entire network, the secondary router is only extending your network. Some routers call it bridged mode, some simply allow you to disable NAT and DHCP. Unfortunately some Wi-Fi routers simply don't support bridged mode at all.

Scott Hanselman does a good job explaining how to set this up: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ConfiguringTwoWirelessRoutersWithOneS...

More tech talk: Without assigning primary router to dispense your private IP Addresses you will create a double NAT scenario. Polkast and other devices on your network will get confused since both routers will dispense conflicting IP Addresses for your devices. Note:  in this case, Polkast still works but not optimally in a Local environment and route trip time to transport a file will be similar to traditional cloud service.  

 

At home 

Polkast makes a local connection between your mobile and homebases. This is the fastest (up to 10x) and most efficient connection. Your content is exchanged directly between your devices, bypassing the internet completely.

Out and about 

You are using a mobile device or a PC accessing your homebases via Wi-Fi or 3G/4G connection. Polkast tunnels a private Direct connection to your personal cloud.  

Note: your connection will be relayed via Polkast service if the routers are not setting up correctly. In this case, Polkast never stores your files, we simply relay the connection, like a virtual router.  

3. Home/Office with none UPnP supported router

 Home/Office with none UPnP supported router (or UPnP feature is OFF). Examples of non-UPnP routers are DSL and Apple Time Capsule. Port forwarding is required.

Please see this KB for how to enable port forwarding http://support.polkast.com/entries/20650948-does-polkast-support-port-forwarding. 

  

 

At home 

Polkast makes a local connection between your mobile and homebases. This is the fastest (up to 10x) and most efficient connection. Your content is exchanged directly between your devices, bypassing the internet completely. 

Out and about 

You are using a mobile device or a PC accessing your homebase via Wi-Fi or 3G/4G connection. Polkast tunnels a private Direct connection to your personal cloud.

Note: your connection will be relayed via Polkast service if port forwarding is not setting up correctly. In this case, Polkast never stores your files, we simply relay the connection, like a virtual router. 

4. Multiple Subnets

For the subnets that were set up for isolation, Polkast automatically adheres to that segregation as well, and a local connection won't be made between subnets unless they are allowed. Note: in this case, Polkast still works but not optimally and route trip time to transport a file will be similar to traditional cloud service, even when you're at home. 

If multiple subnets were not your intent, please refer to scenario 2 above. Your network performance will be better. 

 

Issues?

Please ensure Port forwarding is disabled within Polkast, then email support@polkast.com the following to help us isolate your issue:

• Log file
• Screenshot of relevant router configuration and status page, any port forwarding, Polkast Screenshot
• Router name and model