Hi all. I've been trying to do some research on making my connection faster. I'm ready to try portforwarding, but I'm concerned about the security of my home network. I use just one of my computers at home for p2p. I like to minimize exposure to my other computers. Will changing all the computers on my network to static IPs and configuring my router to portfoward compromise the security of the computers in my home network?
When you portforward you do so only for one ip. as long as the ip of the computer you want to use is the only one with the port forwarded to it none of the other computers are anymore vulnerable.
Ronin is correct. Port forwarding only affects 1 comp on your network, and it SHOULD be only one port, and your firewall should ONLY be configured to allow ONE application use that port, i.e. your torrent client.
However.
I highly, HIGHLY advise AGAINST establishing static IP's for every computer on the home network. It definitely has its pluses, but for non-networking-savvy people, it has some HUGE drawbacks that you won't notice until later on. For the most part, your local IP won't change on your home network very often, and if it does--it takes 10 seconds to change your forwarding rule in the router.
Whereas if you bork your static-ip setup, it's very easy to make it so your computer(s) are no longer online, and then you can't even ask for help.
~Melee
PS--for more info on static vs dynamic IP's, click the link in my sig that doesn't talk about the BT Bible, (or heck, click 'em both, I don't care), and read the "Long IP Tutorial".