Inspired by another thread, does anyone have any tricks and tips for putting 7MC into S3 sleep during the day but getting it to wake up when a HTTP request comes through for Remote Potato?

I'm guessing that I'd have to configure wake on LAN, so that the first request would fire up the machine (and probably fail) but then the second request would work because the machine would be on. I did have a quick look at the wake on LAN settings but I'm currently using WiFi and that option doesn't seem to be available.

Thoughts and advice would be appreciated because I'm currently running my media center throughout the entire day - which seems a little silly.

I haven't tried setting this up (yet).

Two options that I'm aware of are the Wake On Wan service here:

http://www.depicus.com/wake-on-lan/woli.aspx

If your router supports DD-WRT then there are options for setting up remote WOL.

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/WOL#Remote_Wake_On_LAN_via_Port_Forwarding

Other options are probably available..........

 

mrsilver

Inspired by another thread, does anyone have any tricks and tips for putting 7MC into S3 sleep during the day but getting it to wake up when a HTTP request comes through for Remote Potato?

I'm guessing that I'd have to configure wake on LAN, so that the first request would fire up the machine (and probably fail) but then the second request would work because the machine would be on. I did have a quick look at the wake on LAN settings but I'm currently using WiFi and that option doesn't seem to be available.

Thoughts and advice would be appreciated because I'm currently running my media center throughout the entire day - which seems a little silly.

 

This has been brought up in the past. It's fairly easy to do, but it does require that your router support this feature -- Remote Potato can't do much in this regard. There are plenty of sites and apps that will allow you to send the WOL command, but since your router is the only device "awake" to hear it, it must be able to issue the command. If you have a supported router, DD-WRT offers it, but I have not had the guts to mess with a new firmware on a working router. I've resigned myself to an always-on HTPC -- for this as well as extender use.

I use the depicus tool posted above and my Dlink router can also be configured with a "Virtual Server" which maps the public IP on a defined port to a directed broadcast on the local LAN. It is helpful to also use Dynamic DNS, which I assume you probably are since you're already logging in remotely.

Thanks for the tips. I'm using an O2 router (made by Thomson) so no chance of the firmware being able to support WOL. The broadband package I'm on gives me a static IP which has been very handy.

I'll give the Depicus tool a go. Assuming it works then with a little Perl hacking I might be able to knock a page up which checks if the box is up and running and if not, calls Depicus, waits for the box to come up (should only take a few seconds) and then redirects the user to the Remote Potato server.

That would make it GF friendly :)

mrsilver

I'll give the Depicus tool a go. Assuming it works then with a little Perl hacking I might be able to knock a page up which checks if the box is up and running and if not, calls Depicus, waits for the box to come up (should only take a few seconds) and then redirects the user to the Remote Potato server.

 

I still don't see how you can do this without WOL support on the O2 router? You can't hit the LAN IP address directly -- unless you are planning on running the WOL tool from your internal network. Can the O2 do that?

ACraigL

I still don't see how you can do this without WOL support on the O2 router? You can't hit the LAN IP address directly -- unless you are planning on running the WOL tool from your internal network. Can the O2 do that?

 

Oh, I'm probably being dense then. The Depicus site seems to infer that if you provide it with your machines Mac address, IP and subnet then it can do a remote wake on LAN. Thinking about it, that sounds too good to be true.

At present I have a static IP assigned to the Media Center and port 80 forwarded from the router so I can access the Media Centre UI remotely from another computer or mobile phone without a problem.

I don't believe there is WOL support on the router, it's hardly dripping with features but will have a dig tonight and see what it can do. I could probably use a cable as the router is in the lounge with the TV but I don't like the idea of running a cable around the edge of the room.

Basically, the tool will send the WOL packet inside of a UDP datagram to your router. The router must be specially set up to handle this datagram by unpacking the WOL packet from the UDP payload and then transmitting the WOL packet onto the local subnet.

While that is true about what the WOL tool is requesting, it still gets sent to the broadcast address -- meaning that the router will send a wake-up event (magic packet) to all devices on the network, but since the MAC address is included, only that device will actually respond to it. The IP address it is asking for is the one connected to the internet (i.e. the router), not the internal LAN address. If you had the machine directly hooked up to your cable modem, then it would probably work. Internal IP addresses are simply not there (so to speak) when the computer is asleep, and therefore can't be accessed remotely while in this state. That's why the MAC address is used, since the router is "aware" of this even the sleep state.

That being said, give it a shot... maybe it will work. On my Linksys WRT600N I could use it from the internal network, but since the router does not support WOL or the broadcast IP, the request never gets past the router.

On a lower tech solution, you might be able to get away with Wake-On-Ring. If you have a modem for caller ID in your box, it may support wake-on-ring, and older version of the same technology. I can wake up my office PC simply by calling my home phone number. 

On a complete side note, you may want to change ports on how you access your PC remotely. Port 80 is not very secure, even if you have protection enabled through you router (like a username/password -- which I sincerely hope you changed from the defaults!)

 

I have an O2 router (Thompson) and have been able to set it up so that WOL works from across the internet.  Rather than use the GUI on the router, it supports a telnet session.  From the telnet session, you can create a static ARP entry so that you can put in a fixed entry which put's the MAC address of the NIC  of your computer to the private IP address of your computer.  Then just port forward to that private IP address, and make sure you configure your computer or router so that your computer has a static IP address.

When you use whichever WOL tool you want to use from across the internet, just put in your public IP address (or DNS if you use dynDNS or something similar).

 

ACraigL

I can wake up my office PC simply by calling my home phone number. 

I guess you don't get many people ringing you up, trying to sell you crap that's of no use to man nor beast - my PC would never get to sleep in the first place if I did this! 

Great thread, I'm definitely gonna get around to trying this out.

chanechane

I have an O2 router (Thompson) and have been able to set it up so that WOL works from across the internet.  Rather than use the GUI on the router, it supports a telnet session.  From the telnet session, you can create a static ARP entry so that you can put in a fixed entry which put's the MAC address of the NIC  of your computer to the private IP address of your computer.

Now this sounds extremely interesting. I'm pretty au fait with Linux and basic server admin but this is new terratory to me.

I've already got a static IP assigned to the Media Centre (say 192.168.0.10) and I know the MAC address of it's on-board wireless (say 00:12:ab:34:cd:56) and I've already set up the HTTP service on that IP address so that any requests to port 80 are forwarded to it. Are you suggesting that I telnet into the box and then do something like:

arp -s 192.168.0.10 00:12:ab:34:cd:56

then I can use a WOL tool to wake it up over the internet?

Have I missed anything? Do I need to restart any service?

Many thanks!

The easiest way to use WOL from the internet is by telneting into something on your network that is always on (like a router with DD-WRT firmware or tomato firmware, or any other device that is on, and can send WOL packets throughout your network... possibly a NAS that runs linux, ect), and using that device to wake up systems on your network. you don't need to worry about port fowards for WOL, as long as you can telnet or SSH in.

Putting WOL to one side for a moment, is there any way to keep the box awake for a set period of time?

Thanks for everyone's help!

I've configured the router to pass though net broadcasts and forwarded UDP on port 7 through the firewall to the media center (which is already on a static IP). I'm still not sure how to add the box to the ARP list as it turns out that the router is running some command line interface which doesn't resemble Unix, so using arp -s doesn't work.

I've subsequently found out that Wireless Wake On LAN isn't supported by my wireless card (Atheros 9285) so I'm going to have to run a cable around the lounge. Annoying, but the savings from the electricity bill should compensate!

Almost there...