Not a happy camper after upgrading from 4.2.2 to 5.2.3

[wb4alm]

I have been using WINGATE PRO since version 2 - overall I think it's a great product, but after spending multiple days in trying to restore full functionality to my LAN, I'm wondering where the quality in the earlier versions went...

I was very happy with 4.2.2 - until a couple of months ago when I tried to install a Amateur Radio Package called ECHOLINK. This package requires two UDP ports to be port forwarded to the client that runs the software...

No big deal, says I, because I have installed many other packages that also did port forwarding. Little did I realize that all of the previous packages were port forwarding TCP - and that ECHOLINK would be the first package that I was using that required UDP port forwarding.

Needless to say, I could not make it work. After verifing with other Hams that they had been able to get it to work, I discovered that they were all using version 5 or higher of WINGATE. According to your website, and confirmed by others, version 5 could be installed and used with a version 4 license key. Version 5.2.3 is the only version currently available for your website so I downloaded it, and installed it over the version 4 per instructions.

This was on July 1 - and things have gone downhill ever since.

My network:
1) High speed internet is not available in my area, so I use an unlimited dial-up service.
2) The gateway machine (running WINGATE) is a dedicated 133MHz machine with a modem card, dedicated phone line, a NIC card and WIN98SE. There are a few applications installed on this machine for backup purposes - but the machine is dedicated to WINGATE.
3) The gateway NIC is connected to a hub, which in turn is connected to a series of machines running LINUX, WIN 2000, WIN XP.
4) My primary workstation is a WIN2000 system with multiple monitors.
5) The wingate machine is addressed on the LAN as 192.168.0.8
6) The workgate machine is addressed as 192.168.0.3

One system uses I.E. and Outlook - all of the others use Mozilla and it's builtin Mail and Newsgroup reader. If problems occurred in Browsing and/or Mail services it affected both Microsoft and Mozilla products.


Under WINGATE 4.2.2 I used the POP3, SMTP, and WWW proxies to handle mail and web. The DNS proxy is used to dial the Internet, and because of activity the dial-up connection is active most of the time. The browsers were supposed to be configured to use 192.168.0.8 as a proxy address, but as it turns out only one was (the others apparently were using NAT). All machines in the network are also configured to use 192.168.0.8 as both DNS and as Gateway address. Many of the installed internet applications used NAT translation services provided by WINGATE. WGIC was not installed (or used) as it was not reliable in the early days -- and when it became stable, I had already gotten everything to work, so I didn't need it!

Under WINGATE 5.2.3, nothing worked. Only one laptop could browse the Internet, and all other applications and systems lost access to everything beyond simple file sharing.

After discovering that NAT was no longer functioning, I configured the browsers to use wingate proxy services - and that functionality was restored. Mail has been highly intermittant - one machine uses Outlook, and the others use Mozilla.

For a while, I had no problems with mail, now I get a Message "Mailserver 192.168.0.8 error:" followed by a blank line whenever I try to access my Earthlink POP3 primary mail account. Mail access has not been functional for 5 days now.

Mail Access usually works when accessing IMAP mail accounts at a different vendor (as long as the connection attempt doesn't time out).

PCAnyway no longer functions inbound or outbound, even though the ports are open. ECHOLINK used to be able to get status screen displays
(TCP/IP traffic), and only failed when trying to do "UDP" things. Now ECHOLINK does nothing.

Other tests indicate that sometimes traffic is not being received by the WINGATE machine.

Thinking that WGIC might be required now, I installed it on my WIN2000 workstation - didn't change anything. If I change Moxilla or I.E. preferences to "direct internet connection" I lose browser access. If I define them as "use proxy" I regain browser access.

I tried to revert back to WIN 4.2.2, but ran into incompatable engine and ENS problems, so I reinstalled 5.2.3 and reverted back to the error conditions described above.

What information do you need to help me?

[dholm]

Sounds similar to the problem I am having. I started with version 3 home 3 and upgraded to version 4 and have been a happy user for 5 years. I upgraded to 5.2.3 on a whim. My server still connects just fine and everything works, but my client won't download any pages, or send any email. It will receive email though. Because the 3 user home version is a limited version I have to run all the default options and have no access to the advanced options. Tech support quit talking to me and won't give me any answers. I am very unhappy with the service and would go back and try the version 4.2.2 if I had a copy of it, but it looks like I will have to buy another software all together as Wingate is not standing behind their product.

[wb4alm]

Oh, yeah, I forgot to say that I am using Wingate PRO 12-user.

---

dholm, email me direct- I have a question or two for you. http://post227.org/~wwt1057

[dholm]

Sent an email to your arrl address. The link wouldn't work.

[adrien]

Hi David

Sorry to hear about the problems you are having with 5.2.3.

There were some significant changes in the ENS driver from version 5.0.8 onwards, and some people experienced problems with dialups moving from 5.2.2 to 5.2.3.

5.2.3 was the last release we did of the version 5 line, we are in RC1 of WinGate 6.0, and releasing a second release candidate on Monday. I would suggest trying version 6.0 RC1. We made some changes in version 6.0 again to resolve the issues with dialups on some platforms running 5.2.3.

It will only run in trial mode for now, but you will be able to activate your version 4 key when the final WinGate 6.0 release is made available, and therefore be able to use it (with restricted functionality, similar to the functionality you would have had with WinGate 4.x).



Regards

Adrien de Croy

[Nev]

This was on July 1 - and things have gone downhill ever since.

My network:
1) High speed internet is not available in my area, so I use an unlimited dial-up service.
2) The gateway machine (running WINGATE) is a dedicated 133MHz machine with a modem card, dedicated phone line, a NIC card and WIN98SE. There are a few applications installed on this machine for backup purposes - but the machine is dedicated to WINGATE.
3) The gateway NIC is connected to a hub, which in turn is connected to a series of machines running LINUX, WIN 2000, WIN XP.
4) My primary workstation is a WIN2000 system with multiple monitors.
5) The wingate machine is addressed on the LAN as 192.168.0.8
6) The workgate machine is addressed as 192.168.0.3

Hi WB4ALM,

Noticing W98SE as the os for Wingate, I'd be reluctant to go back there these days. Although I have one site working well on ME [providing System restore is completely disabled] at present.

Other point, have you tried deleting the history files in the Wingate directory, this happens occasionaly, more so on W98 then restart!

The lack of NAT suggests a conflict with another network driver in your system, however 5.2.3 did have broad compatibility in this area.

Edit #1: Turning off all logging would help for every service not required and a pc with 'more horsepower' IMHO at least P!!!-800 / 256m for Wingate and a few users.

73!
Nev
VK2SIX /QF ex: 4W/VK2QF

[wb4alm]

adrien, does release 6 fix any problems with NAT and DNS that may have been introduced with Version 5?

- - - - -

Nev, Under 4.2.2 the 166 does quite well for 6-10 users. I'd love to have a 800MHz machine, but my retiree's pension doesn't allow for nice toys --- So I do with what I have. Beside that would be faster then my main workstation, which is "only" a 750.

The only reason that I'm running WIN98SE, is that the gateway machine does not have enough RAM to run WIN2000.

- - - - -

Which brings up an interesting point - what is the recommended minimum machine for WINGATE 5 and also for WINGATE 6?

[Nev]

adrien, does release 6 fix any problems with NAT and DNS that may have been introduced with Version 5?

- - - - -

Nev, Under 4.2.2 the 166 does quite well for 6-10 users. I'd love to have a 800MHz machine, but my retiree's pension doesn't allow for nice toys --- So I do with what I have. Beside that would be faster then my main workstation, which is "only" a 750.

The only reason that I'm running WIN98SE, is that the gateway machine does not have enough RAM to run WIN2000.

- - - - -

Which brings up an interesting point - what is the recommended minimum machine for WINGATE 5 and also for WINGATE 6?

G'day Bill,

Have you by any chance a Realtek NIC in use? See: http://forums.qbik.com/viewtopic.php?t=2211

Nev.

[wb4alm]

Nope, it's a good old 3com 3c503. But thanks for thinking about it.

[adrien]

Yep, 6 did fix (I believe) some problems introduced in 5.2.3 relating to dialup, so could be worth a crack.

Adrien

[drbob42]

Hi Adrien,

... you will be able to activate your version 4 key when the final WinGate 6.0 release is made available, and therefore be able to use it (with restricted functionality, similar to the functionality you would have had with WinGate 4.x).

Does that also work the other way around: will a WinGate 6.0 / 12 User key work in WinGate 4 Standard? (I'm looking for a way to upgrade from 4.4.0 / 6 User to 12 User, and since my Wingate Engine also runs on a slow machine, I would rather not try to update the engine itself, but only need to update the license.

If I can purchase/upgrade to WinGate 6.0 Pro / 12 User and that key will also work in Wingate 4.x Standard, then I'm all settled and happy!

[adrien]

Hi

There is a new key system for WinGate 6, which won't be accepted by WinGate 4. However WinGate 4.x will accept a WinGate 5.x key, so if you upgrade your license count prior to us switching over to selling only WinGate 6.0, then your key will work in WinGate 4, and you could think about upgrading later.

Adrien

[drbob42]

Hi Adrien,

Thanks for the tip - I just upgraded (for US$ 200) to WinGate Pro 12 User and the new license key works fine in my WinGate 4 Engine. Great!

[wb4alm]

Adrien, I did as you suggested and downloaded the version 6 Beta.

While I was able to get Browser access to work correctly, I could not get either MAIL , PCANYWHERE, or ECHOLINK to work.

I suspect the problem with MAIL, was that my systems are configured to use mail proxy as supported in Version 4, and I have never used (not licensed) for the mail server facility as delivered in version 5 and enhanced in Version 6.



After spend a fair amount of time and a lot of frustration, I "uninstalled" version 6 - which did a better job of removing the ENS engine then did version 5.2.3 - but it also removed all configuration information previously used with version 4 including the authorization keys.

I reinstalled version 4, and after several hours, have gotten browser and mail access back.

My next task is to get PCAnywhere to work again - I'm hoping that there are no problems there, as it only needs TCP ports forwarded. Unfortunatly for me, ECHOLINK needs UDP ports forwarded, and I guess there are problems in version 4 and version 5 in that area. After all, that is what got me into the mess of trying a newer version.

Suggestions for the future: During un-install ask if keys and/or configuratioon data needs to be kept. (An install process should also ask if the configuration info needs to be saved - which version 5 and 6 do.) Unfortunatly, neither version 5 or 6 ask if you want saved information restored.


Apparently, I am going to have to stay with version 4 until DSL or cable is available in my area, and I will probably use a hardware firewall/NAT solution when that occurs.

/s/ Bill Turner, wb4alm

[wb4alm]

May have spoken too fast.... Now ENS is shuting itself down because its running out of memory...

...it appears to be related to dns lookup. I'll keep looking...