Server Version#: 1.28.0.5998
Player Version#: 4.84.1 (web)
I recently switched my NAS gear from a Synology DS1019+ to a QNAP tvs-h1288x.
I migrated my Plex installation and while the road was bumpy…I appear to be good except for this one consistent thing…it seems like no matter what I do, when I try to get remote access goin, it fails after a short time.
I have ATT UVerse and have included a screenshot showing that I have set up port forwarding rules for 32400 (and 32500 as a test) to go to the IP of the QNAP device.
I have included a screenshot showing the Plex remote access information.
I have quadruple checked that the Public IP shown on Plex is the correct public IP for me and the internal IP for the port forwarding is the correct IP for the QNAP.
But each time I manually set a port…the remote access tab shows it’s available to the outside world…for 30 to 60 seconds and then it drops back to “inaccessible”.
My attempts at searching for resolutions have come up empty.
This setup was nearly identical for the Synology and things appeared to work fine, but for the QNAP, I am lost.
Can someone help me figure out what’s going wrong?
Please show the Firewall Rules tab of that settings screen instead of Status. Also, if you’re configuring something in the “Public IP” section of that screen, don’t. Leave that blank, or set it to whatever value on your firewall which means “don’t restrict by remote/public IP address.”
I didn’t update the firewall rules for the test on 32500…but the response is the same over both ports so that seems pretty definitive to me that what is happening here isn’t over-riding or negatively impacting my port forwarding.
The port forwarding rules are in the screenshot in the original post, showing TCP and UDP 32400 (because I wasn’t 100% sure which type) going the the NAS.
The NAS is my only server, it replaced a Synology that had previously been sitting on the same IP, where all of this stuff seemed to work.
Well, previously I’d had a legacy router in place having my whole network at 192.168.2.xx behind the ATT because it had all my setups on it, but I took the legacy router out of it and migrated everything to just the one network to get rid of a level of port forwarding once I had problems with the QNAP to take one point of failure entirely out of the loop.
I am not clear on your meaning and networking is not my professional skillset, so I need some clarification.
The port forwarding screenshot appears to show that all TCP and UDP traffic that the router receives on 32400 goes to the NAS internally. This would seem to me to be regardless of source.
The firewall rules appears to show that all traffic inbound and outbound on 32400 is “allowed” with no IPv4 address limitations either internally or externally (I have IPv6 turned off on the port the QNAP server is communicating on, so only IPv4 would seem to matter).
What might I need to do for Plex.tv hosts? Are they not communicating on 32400? The article about firewall ports above reads to me that only that one port needs to be forwarded through the external router.
You are correct. It’s showing all TCP and UDP traffic for port 32400 to go 192.168.1.x You do not need UDP. Recommend changing to TCP only.
Port 32400 is extremely well known. People try to break into port 32400 all the time. I recommend something really odd in the range from 10000 → 65534
(A birthday works well… e.g. 14-March-1990 → 14390). Mathematics is my hobby, I use a prime number
The firewall is only used to control INBOUND traffic. All traffic outbound is allowed by default unless you block it – else you’d have no internet connectivity.
My concern is about what appears to be a list of Allowed IP addresses…
– It allows only those listed to connect to you that you want.
– The problem is it doesn’t allow Plex.tv to connect to you for testing
– Do you really restrict access to a list (which you blocked for privacy) ?
– If you do, then consider the solution steps I show below
The solution to number 4 is simple.
When PMS starts, “MyPlex” is going to print out a list of IP addresses.
Those are the IP addresses which serve your server.
Add those servers to the list.
BE ADVISED. From time to time, the operations teams make hardware changes and the IP addresses change. If you ever lose remote access after you establish this high fidelity control then look at your logs and update the IP addresses. ( I do this too. It’s a burden we have when maintaining tight control over which IPs can even see our server.
Plex.tv hosts will connect to your EXTERNAL port (the one you forward) . The port forwarding handles delivering to internal 32400 where it’s expected.
I am not 100% sure it’s resolved yet, but I made a change that has stopped the remote connection to stay up for 15 minutes so far (which is a record for this server by 13+ minutes).
The change was as follows:
Changed the IP configuration on the QNAP from a static IP to DHCP.
Went to the ATT router, found the QNAP in the DHCP list and changed it to a fixed IP address matching the static IP I had previously assigned.
removed the port forwarding rules from the static IP address
added the port forwarding rules to the QNAP which was now visible in the firewall list of devices to manage.
So, it seems to me like the culprit is the ATT router, which seemed to be inconsistently handing forwarding packets to a generic IP address rather than a device that it is managing through DHCP.
I have no idea how that can actually be different, but empirically it has dramatically improved my behavior.
