ip addresses

Gary uses TMobile's home service for $50 a month. Speeds fluctuate from 25-115 MBps. Leo says that's pretty usable. Gary likes YouTube TV, but TMobile thinks he's in another city, and so he can't get local TV. Leo says that's the problem with mobile-based internet. It's based on where your IP is located. It's a universal problem because people trust geo-located IP and it's never accurate. Leo says that there may be a way by contacting YouTube.

​Doctor Mom says that YouTube now has a page where you can tell YouTube TV where you are.

Brett has moved to ExpressVPN, but he's having issues surfing to his own IP. It worked fine with his old VPN, but not ExpressVPN (who is a sponsor of the TWiT Network). What can he do? Leo says to check your router settings. It may be that in your devices, there could be a security issue that's blocking it. Leo does that with his network for his NAS. Leo also says that Brett's problem may be due to his previous VPN being less secure. 

Neal has a cheap Samsung laser printer that he used wirelessly connected to his ASUS router. But it would only work in the less secure WEP. He would disconnect it when he didn't use it. But now, he's picked up an Eero Mesh router and it doesn't support WEP. It's configurable through an internet interface, but how does he do that?  Leo says that to connect, just enter the IP address in the browser in the desktop. Even an iPad will be able to do it. Then he should be able to connect to it and enter the wifi access point, name, and password. It should then open up the printer interface.

Todd bought an Eero mesh router and he wants to know if he should enable IPv6. Leo says he did. IPv6 gives more space for more websites, and is a much better system. Instead of a "dotted quad" of numbers, it has eight sections of numbers separated by colons, offering so many possibilities that everyone could have their own internet address. The problem is, routers have to be upgraded, and ISPs don't want to spend the money. So we're stuck with IPv4 for now. But IPv6 will speed things up if he enables it.

Howard's Windows computer thinks he's in China when he uses Skype. Leo says to go into your Windows region settings and check the location setting. By default Skype will self populate the location for you. There could be a problem with his IP address. There's probably a batch of IP addresses that used to belong to an ISP in China and it's associating with it. Your ISP should be able to fix that if you request a new IP address. You can also just unplug your router and then plug it back in and it will get reassigned. Check out MaxMind.com. They provide IP Address Geo Location.

Jim says that every time he does a search on Google Maps, it always comes up with a location in Richardson, TX. Leo says that's probably a regional default when Google Maps can't find what he wants it to find. It may also be that Google Maps thinks that's where he is. Google can sometimes use IP addresses to figure out where you are so it can do a search for locations near you. An IP address can also be read as part of the ISP's headquarters, though. AT&T HQ is in Dallas/Richardson, so that is likely why it's showing up that way. There's not much Jim can do about that.

Julie wants to know how she can understand the IP addresses she sees in her Gmail. Leo says that a cellphone company IP address may be attached somewhere other than where she lives, because they're located in another location. If there's an authorized app, that app can go through her Google Mail and contacts and that could have a different IP address as well.

Howard went to Google to search something and he discovered the website is Google Korea. Leo says it's an easy fix. Click on the far right setting, go into search settings and save his location. That should solve it. If it doesn't, then he should look into the date/time utility in system preferences to see what time zone it's set for.

Victor is curious about how many possible addresses are available in IPv6. Leo says that there are a ton. With IPv6, we'll have 2^128th. Victor did the math and it means we'd be able to cover the entire world with a blanked of sand worth of internet addresses, and we'd have more internet addresses than stars in the universe. Leo says that's mind boggling, and the reason it's important is that we're moving towards putting everything online with its own IP address.

Michael has a computer that drops off the network from time to time, causing him to restart either the computer or the router. Leo says it's probably not the router since other computers aren't effected. If a computer drops off the network, then there's probably an issue with Mike's ethernet card since it's wired in. He should first replace the ethernet cable. That's the cheap and easy fix.