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These days most measurement instruments in m,y lab are controlled via an ethernet connection.
In my lab the PCs that control the experiments therefore have two network cards: one is used of "normal" internet/intranet access the other is set to static IP address (typically 192.168.0.x) and is only used to communicate with the instruments. .
All the instruments as well the "local" network card are then connected to one switch (NOT a router). The instruments should NOT be connected to internet in any way so we don't e.g. need a gateway. Effectively this means that we have several small LANs running in the lab, one for each measurement setup (which can have more than one PC)
It used to be that we did not have that many instruments and we would just use 192.168.0.2-254 with a 255.255.255.0 subnet mask. Each instrument in the lab is assigned an unique static IP address when we get it; as long as we are careful about keeping track of these we can also move instruments between setups.
This worked well in the past, but now we have some many instruments that it is getting messy.
My question is if there is any reason why we shouldn't start using a bigger address space (e.g. 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.1. 255) by changing the subnet mask (to e.g. 255.255.254.0) on the PC network card?
That is, keep the 255.255.255.0 subnet mask on the instruments and only use a "wider" mask on the PC ( there is very rarely a reason for why different instruments would need to communicate; everything goes via the PC). This way we could keep different instruments on different subnets while still being able to control all of them from a single network card.
Are there any drawbacks to this solution? I guess I could just try it, but I know from experience that when it comes to network the fact that "it work" does not mean that you won't run into weird problems later.
In my lab the PCs that control the experiments therefore have two network cards: one is used of "normal" internet/intranet access the other is set to static IP address (typically 192.168.0.x) and is only used to communicate with the instruments. .
All the instruments as well the "local" network card are then connected to one switch (NOT a router). The instruments should NOT be connected to internet in any way so we don't e.g. need a gateway. Effectively this means that we have several small LANs running in the lab, one for each measurement setup (which can have more than one PC)
It used to be that we did not have that many instruments and we would just use 192.168.0.2-254 with a 255.255.255.0 subnet mask. Each instrument in the lab is assigned an unique static IP address when we get it; as long as we are careful about keeping track of these we can also move instruments between setups.
This worked well in the past, but now we have some many instruments that it is getting messy.
My question is if there is any reason why we shouldn't start using a bigger address space (e.g. 192.168.0.1 to 192.168.1. 255) by changing the subnet mask (to e.g. 255.255.254.0) on the PC network card?
That is, keep the 255.255.255.0 subnet mask on the instruments and only use a "wider" mask on the PC ( there is very rarely a reason for why different instruments would need to communicate; everything goes via the PC). This way we could keep different instruments on different subnets while still being able to control all of them from a single network card.
Are there any drawbacks to this solution? I guess I could just try it, but I know from experience that when it comes to network the fact that "it work" does not mean that you won't run into weird problems later.