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Configure an Incoming Connection to use TCP/IP

  • Article

Applies To: Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 7

You can use this procedure to configure how Windows assigns TCP/IP addresses to remote computers that attach to your computer by using an incoming dial-up or VPN connection. You can configure your computer to:

  • Assign an IP address to the remote computer by using the DHCP server on your network (IPv4 only).

  • Assign an IP address from a static pool of addresses (IPv4) or a range of prefixes (IPv6).

  • Allow the client computer to assign its own address (IPv4 only).

In addition, you can specify that the remote computer only has access to resources that are located on the host computer, or you can specify that the remote computer has access to both the host computer’s resources and all additional network resources that the host computer has permission to access.

Membership in the local Administrators group, or equivalent, is the minimum required to complete this procedure.

You can use the following methods to configure an incoming connection:

  • To configure an incoming connection to use IPv4

  • To configure an incoming connection to use IPv6

To configure an incoming connection to use IPv4

  1. Open the Network Connections folder and view available connections.

  2. Right-click Incoming Connections, and then click Properties.

    If you have created an incoming connection but Incoming Connections is not visible in the Network Connections folder, you must configure folder options to show hidden files and folders. To do so, press ALT, and then click Tools and Folder Options. In the Folder Options dialog box, click the View tab. In Advanced settings, in Hidden files and folders, click Show hidden files and folders, and then click OK.

  3. On the Networking tab, click Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4), and then click Properties.

  4. If you want incoming users to be able to access the local area network on which the dial-up host computer resides, select the Allow callers to access my local area network check box.

  5. Do one of the following:

    • If you want to automatically assign a TCP/IP address to the incoming computer, select the Assign TCP/IP addresses automatically using DHCP check box.

    • If you want to specify a TCP/IP address for the incoming computer, click Specify TCP/IP addresses, and do the following:

      In From, type the starting IP address.

      In To, type the ending IP address.

      Based on the addresses you type in From and To, the number of addresses that are allocated is displayed in Total. The starting and ending IP addresses that you choose depend on the originating address space and the number of addresses needed.

  6. If you want incoming connections to be able to use a self-defined TCP/IP address, select the Allow calling computer to specify its own IP address check box.

  7. Click OK to save your changes.

Additional considerations

  • Most TCP/IP networks use subnets in order to effectively manage IP addresses. The closest matching subnet is calculated for the range that you specified in From and To. The range of addresses in the closest matching subnet might exceed the range that you specified. Unless the addresses specified in From and To are subnet boundaries, the range based on the calculated subnet will be larger than the range that you specified. To avoid this, specify a range that falls on subnet boundaries. For example, if you are using the 10.0.0.0 private network ID for your intranet, a range that falls on subnet boundaries is 10.0.1.168 to 10.0.1.175. Or, if you are using the 192.168.0.0 private network ID for your intranet, a range that falls on subnet boundaries is 192.168.1.0 to 192.168.1.255.

  • If you select Allow callers to access my local area network or Allow calling computer to specify its own IP address, these changes take effect immediately.

  • If you select Assign TCP/IP addresses automatically using DHCP, but there is no DHCP server available, random addresses from the range 169.254.0.1 to 169.254.255.254 are assigned.

To configure an incoming connection to use IPv6

  1. Open the Network Connections folder and view available connections.

  2. Right-click Incoming Connections, and then click Properties.

    If you have created an incoming connection but Incoming Connections is not visible in the Network Connections folder, you must configure folder options to show hidden files and folders. To do so, press ALT, and then click Tools and Folder Options. In the Folder Options dialog box, click the View tab. In Advanced settings, in Hidden files and folders, click Show hidden files and folders, and then click OK.

  3. On the Networking tab, click Internet Protocol Version 6 (TCP/IPv6), and then click Properties.

  4. If you want incoming users to be able to access the local area network on which the dial-up host computer resides, select the Allow callers to access my local area network check box, and then select the network adapter to be used to access the local area network in the Private Adapter list.

  5. Type the IPv6 network address prefix for your network in the From box.

  6. Click OK to save your changes.

See Also

Concepts

Configure Incoming Connections
Configure Network Connections