Need to change ip ranges as set to public

A long time ago i setup the following network.

Main office - range 169.254.0.x Mask 255.255.0.0
Main office has several linux and winxp pro as servers


small office 1via WAN 169.253.0.x MASK 255.255.255.0
Small ofice 2 via Wan 169.252.0.x MASK 255.255.255.0

I now have lots of problems due to using public ip ranges.!!
when i should have used 192.168. etc

What are the correct ranges for private IP addresses ?

and as i am trying to change it bit by bit if you have a
server on 169.254.0.10 MASK 255.255.0.0 and a workstaion on the same wired network on 192.168.0.10 MASK 255.255.255.0 is there any way to connect to the server or ping the server from the Workstations are win xp without changing the server.

My problem is i need to try and change it over a few weeks as several routers etc are mannaged by other compaines and it would be impossible to change it all over a weekend.

What a messup i have created.

Nick

There is no problem with these ip address ranges.

There is ONLY a problem if you are trying to get on the internet and are NOT using NAT [network address translation].

See here for private vs public.
http://www.netdummy.net/privateip.html

I would suggest you clarify your issue. I suspect someone has misinformed you.

The EASIEST solution is wherever you are getting to the internet configure the router to do nat. This means you will have a public ip on the wan interface and private ip on the lan interface. All your problems will be solved. Well at least this one :-) And at a WHOLE lot less work and trouble than changing every ip address.

If you were going to have to do that you would be better off setting up dhcp servers and only have static on the servers and network equipment. You would still have to touch every last piece of equipment.

Thanks for the info.

Our internet is behind Nat so from your info we should be ok.

It was Our ISP and a few other people said we will get problems with the way it is setup at the moment.

Thanks

Nick

Nat solves that issue. Where nat can get into trouble is where the same ip ranges are on both sides of the router. Is your isp providing 169.25x.x.x addresses on the wan side? If not I wouldn't worry about it.

Im gonna have to dissagree here as NAT/PAT will not help you if you have a public IP scheme in your network. for instance you have 66.218.71.198 in your network and you want to get out to yahoo.com ( or send email) then you will have an issue such that when your web browser resolves yahoos name (66.218.71.198) and tries to pull up the web page your PC will think it is on that network and ARP for it and not send it to your router. if it does send it to your router it will try and send it back in ( ie IP redirect) the router will get the request see that it has a route to that on it internal network and loose the packet it will never get NAT/PATed. At first I thought this was an APIPA address ( well it is for the main office ) but at closer look it is public on the remotes. You need to change these.

for simplicity I would use 192.168.1.x/24, 192.168.2.x/24, 192.168.3.x/24. if all the PCs are using DHCP this is very easy to change the scope. you should contact whoever does your routers and set a time where they can be changed all at once as well change the dhcp scope and IPs on the servers at the same time, (shouldnt take more than 2 hours unless you have IP dependent programs on the servers).