Remote connection failing all of a sudden

[Aleaha 0]

For some reason, my Emby server is unable to accept remote connections all of a sudden. I’ve been able to connect to it remotely for over a year. Nothing has changed, except my ability to connect remotely… This server is running and I can connect locally. I have reset both the Emby server itself and the computer it is running on, I’ve reset the network and verified port forwarding settings, the server is up-to-date and my clients app is up-to-date. Remote connections were working yesterday, nothing has changed, but all of a sudden today they aren’t working.

[Luke 43213]

Hi there, can you show us how you've setup port forwarding?

Connecting from Client Apps

[Aleaha 0]

I figured it out, I did change something. I started using a VPN and thought I’d set up split tunneling but SurfShark was waiting for me to click ‘allow’ in settings… my fault entirely!

[Luke 43213]

Thanks for following up.

[Aleaha 0]

I take it back!

Remote connections are failing again... The server is running on ports 8080 and 8096, both forwarded at my router. I disabled the VPN even though it hadn't been an issue after I enabled the split tunneling. As I'm typing this, I'm streaming to another screen over the local network, so the server is running and the system has connectivity out. I'm at a loss. 

[Luke 43213]

Hi, if you disabled the VPN then you need to use a different remote address now, right? Are you sure you're trying to connect with the correct address?

[Aleaha 0]

As mentioned, the server has been set up and running properly for a while. When I added the VPN, I thought I had set up split tunneling, which would allow the Emby server to bypass the VPN altogether which would mean I could still use my originally reserved ports and IP addresses. When I initially made the post on here it was because I hadn’t finished setting up the split tunneling, meaning it was looking for a different remote address. Once I discovered that Surfshark was waiting on me pressing a button, the split tunneling set up was complete and for a day the Emby server was running as it had for over a year. I checked it the next day and wasn’t able to connect remotely, so I disabled the VPN entirely but the reserved IP address and reserved ports have not changed from day one and I’m not sure that they would have to under these circumstances. My ISP provides me a dynamic IP address so the external IP doesn’t matter so much as long as it’s listening to the proper external port and communicating to my system on its reserved local IP address and port. The reason I logged into my VPN on this system was because I thought I’d be able to bypass it using split tunneling.