[larkost]

I am working with another company to get a VPN working, and they are telling me that it is up and running, but I can't seem to get any response on the IP they are telling me. So, I have been trying to test it out using telnet.

With another server that I know is working I get a connection, and then a message telling me that it is disconnecting. With this server I never get a connection and my telnet connect attempt just times out.

My question is: am I missing something? I should be able to connect to the pptp port (1723) and get something (even if it is nothing useful), right?

[ghporter]

Depends on a lot of things. First, what VPN client are you using, and what VPN hosts are the two companies in question using? I don't think any two different VPN packages work quite the same. Details are essential...

[larkost]

I don't think you understand my question... I am only looking to see that the VPN is operating at all on the port. And we are talking about PPTP in particular. There are a few different settings that can be done, but I don't think that affects either the port number, or whether it builds a TCP/IP port at all.

I am troubleshooting this on as low a level as I can, because I think that the company did not set it up at all, and I can't get the higher levels to work (no response).

And this is not a server-to-server setup, so your question about VPN hosts is meaningless.

If someone who knows something about PPTP would respond, that would be great.

[kampl]

You should get something of a connection telneting to the port just as you said, similar to you telneting to a webserver for instance.

Is there a router ACL or other packet filter upstream from the PPTP server that you are aware of? They should have TCP 1723 and IP protocol 47 open to the server for control connection and data channel respectively.

Do they have a sort of host.allow file perhaps on the server itself, similar to tcpwrappers? I've never done that before for that service, but I imagine it's possible.

[larkost]

It turned out that the company had not done the work, and the tech was lying to me about it being checked out. it is now working, and I can get a telnet response on the proper port.

...and on this box (an old Cisco PIX) there is not enough horsepower to get TCPwrappers running, but that thought had crossed my mind.

We are using this for the moment, but are getting a Rumba Server and will be passing VPN traffic through to an XServe on our network. That way will will not have to pay for changes in the future (the changes cost more than a Rumba box).

[ghporter]

You were right-I didn't really understand your question. It looked like one of those "My company says we have a VPN that I'm supposed to use, but I don't know anything about it" questions. Obviously you got it handled.