Explaining Port Forwarding to Parents.

[Knaj]

Ubisoft support suggested I port forward my router so that Rainbow Six Siege won't give me such high pings and have ping spikes.

So, I'm going to portforward my router.

 

My parents said no to it though, because they don't want me to screw up the internet for the rest of them.

How can I explain to them what it is and how it won't screw things up?

They no absolutely nothing about this, so I can't find a good way to word it.

 

If somebody could help me that would be fantastic.

Thank you!

[roblesaturcamilo]

just do it when they are not watching, they wont even realize...

[Energycore]

I'm gonna drop a follow to the thread because I don't know WTF is port forwarding

[Legolessed]

2 minutes ago, Energycore said:

I'm gonna drop a follow to the thread because I don't know WTF is port forwarding

http://superuser.com/questions/284051/what-is-port-forwarding-and-what-is-it-used-for

[Energycore]

1 minute ago, Legolessed said:

http://superuser.com/questions/284051/what-is-port-forwarding-and-what-is-it-used-for

I'll read up on that, but let's assume I wasn't tech savvy since what OP needs is a simple way to explain it to parents

 

But bear with me while I read

[MightyMic]

Tell them portforwarding only affects a single local ip address your computer and won't do anything to the rest of the network

[Philcat101]

12 minutes ago, Knaj said:

Ubisoft support suggested I port forward my router so that Rainbow Six Siege won't give me such high pings and have ping spikes.

So, I'm going to portforward my router.

 

My parents said no to it though, because they don't want me to screw up the internet for the rest of them.

How can I explain to them what it is and how it won't screw things up?

They no absolutely nothing about this, so I can't find a good way to word it.

 

If somebody could help me that would be fantastic.

Thank you!

Show them this comment.

 

It does NOTHING to affect your experience, they are just routing traffic through a "road" you aren't even using.

Any changes in speed are extremely negligible.

[Legolessed]

16 minutes ago, Knaj said:

Ubisoft support suggested I port forward my router so that Rainbow Six Siege won't give me such high pings and have ping spikes.

So, I'm going to portforward my router.

 

My parents said no to it though, because they don't want me to screw up the internet for the rest of them.

How can I explain to them what it is and how it won't screw things up?

They no absolutely nothing about this, so I can't find a good way to word it.

 

If somebody could help me that would be fantastic.

Thank you!

my parents said the same thing. i ended up cheating and using a vpn service  

[brwainer]

Normally, routers only allow responses from the internet to requests that are made by a local computer - it's like a phone number that can only be used to make calls, not receive calls.

 

Port Forwarding allows incoming data from specific sources to reach a specific computer on the network. It's like having an extension on a phone that allows you to reach a specific person's desk phone. 

 

This is only an analogy, but that's the closest to accurate you can get with someone who isn't technically savvy.

 

A different analogy:

Normally, the post office only delivers mail to the main address, e.g. 105 Main Street. Port forwarding is like putting out a mailbox for "105 Main Street, Apt 1"

[paradigm249]

its like a highway, when you port forward you open an alternativ road or entrance for motorcycle only or tractors or what ever

 

[iCrushDreams]

First, try dumbing it down and reexplaining that it can't possibly harm anything if you follow basic steps and improved your speeds while leaving everyone else untouched.

 

If they fail to understand that or still think it's going to screw something up, as long as you're on the network just 192.168.1.1 and port forward anyways when they're not on the internet. The internet will break for a few seconds (or maybe not at all depending on your router) and then you'll be golden. Who cares? It's not like they're going to notice a port is opened, given how technology inept they sound from your description.

[dalekphalm]

5 hours ago, iCrushDreams said:

First, try dumbing it down and reexplaining that it can't possibly harm anything if you follow basic steps and improved your speeds while leaving everyone else untouched.

 

If they fail to understand that or still think it's going to screw something up, as long as you're on the network just 192.168.1.1 and port forward anyways when they're not on the internet. The internet will break for a few seconds (or maybe not at all depending on your router) and then you'll be golden. Who cares? It's not like they're going to notice a port is opened, given how technology inept they sound from your description.

Configuring Port Forwarding should NEVER break the Internet. A modern (And by "modern", I'm going all the way back to WRT-54GL days) router will not require a reboot for simple port forwarding.

[iCrushDreams]

6 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Configuring Port Forwarding should NEVER break the Internet. A modern (And by "modern", I'm going all the way back to WRT-54GL days) router will not require a reboot for simple port forwarding.

I had a router that I used from ~2006-2014 and it needed a short reboot for port forwarding lol.

[dalekphalm]

1 minute ago, iCrushDreams said:

I had a router that I used from ~2006-2014 and it needed a short reboot for port forwarding lol.

That's very unusual and non-standard. Substandard programming