I picked up a WD MyCloud 4TB drive the other day. I live in an apartment in a house with four other apartments and so the main Wifi Router is setup on a floor I don’t have access. For this reason I am trying to setup the drive on a separate router that isn’t connected to the internet in my apartment.
The router is a Smart RG SR505 modem/wireless router and was previously set-up to have the internet going through it at our last apartment. I can still see and connect to the network on my Macbook computer.
I’ve plugged the WD MyCloud into the Smart RG router via the ethernet cable and LAN port and connected to it on my Macbook in the wifi settings. (keep in mind this router is offline as no internet is running through it.) I ran the set-up installer and the drive can’t be recognized.
I’ve read you can use the WD MyCloud as a LAN network if you have a router with no internet so my question is, how can I setup the drive on a router not connected to the internet? Does the Smart RG Router have to be configured a certain way? Currently it is setup on WLAN with the MyCloud plugged in to LAN 1. I’ve did a hard reset on the MyCloud and still can’t be recognized. I am not familiar with setting up router configurations or resetting it from when it was last setup for internet usage. Any help is much appreciated.
If you haven’t already done so you may want to read through the My Cloud User Manual (http://support.wdc.com/product.aspx?ID=904) which gives general setup directions along with how to use the various features/options of the My Cloud.
Is your Mac connected to the WiFi of the Smart RG SR505? What happens if you connect your mac to the Smart router via Ethernet? Is the LED on the front of the My Cloud blue?
Make sure the My Cloud is connected to one of the networking ports on the router and NOT the WAN/Internet port of the router.
Thanks Bennor! Your suggestion of connecting an ethernet cable to both the drive and Macbook worked! On a whim I logged into wdmycloud.local with this setup and was able to configure the My Cloud drive. Then I unplugged the Macbook from the router and it remained accessible through my Finder side panel. Thank so much for your help! There is one issue with this set-up though. Essentially I have to change routers from the internet router to the one the Smart RG if I want to access or transfer files. This is very inconvenient as the main purpose for purchasing the My Cloud drive was so I could access movie files through the VLC player on Apple TV. This means every time I want to watch files off the WD My Cloud on Apple TV I have to switch routers and go offline. Also, the same is true if I want to transfer files from my computer to the My Cloud.
That because you have created two SEPARATE networks, one of which you didn’t want connected to the Internet and you are connecting the My Cloud to the network that doesn’t have internet access while connecting the Apple TV to the network with internet access. There is no way for devices to communicate across the two networks without disconnecting them from one network and connecting them to the other network.
There are potential ways to solve the issue but it involves knowledge of networking configuration and having one or more routers that are highly configurable to allow for configuring multiple separate IP networks and limiting what traffic can or cannot pass between them and their firewalls.
Yes makes sense. It’s not that I didn’t want the internet, I just don’t have access to the router it runs through. I wonder if I connect the Smart RG router to the telephone/dsl jack in our apartment if it will work as a second internet router in the house?
