Wireless router to use with cable modem....help please

[Rave]

I went round to a colleague of my mum's today to set up his new DVD-A player and amp for him. After I'd got it firing on all cylinders, he mentioned that he'd just got a new computer and wanted to connect that, and his older laptop, to his NTL broadband which he gets through his set top box. Trouble is, he wants to set them up in the next room; previously, he had the laptop plugged in to the ethernet port of the STB with a (wired) USB network adaptor.

Now I know sod all about networking and even less about wireless, but I reckon what he needs is a wireless router (like maybe this) and then wireless nics for his two computers (presumably PCMCIA for the lappy and USB for the desktop. Is that right? Is there any advantage in getting a faster version of that for sharing a standard cable connection (I'm assuming it's 1Mb or less)?

I'm not quite sure how computers on wireless networks speak to each other....do they still have to be routed through a switch or can they all talk to each other direct? If so I presume I can get the slow router for the internet connections and then get him a couple of 54Mbps or better NICs to speed up any file transfers he needs to do between the two computers?

TIA,

Rich :¬)

[Byatt]

Your basic assumptions about how to do it are correct - but I'd get the linksys one, it'll have the same functionality but it'll be 9 billion times easier to set up.

Your idea for file transfer - I think I'm interpreting this correctly when I say you're suggesting buying a 802.11b (11Mbps) router and two 802.11g (54Mbps) WNICs - well, this will work, but every time he wants to transfer a file between the two computers he'll have to fiddle about with changing the network mode from "infrastructure" - through the access point - to "ad hoc" - direct between the two computers. From your description he may find this a little tricky, so I suggest that it'd be simpler just to get either a "g" router (faster, pricier) or two "b" WNICs (slower, cheaper).

[Rave]

Oh righto, the Linksys is only a few quid more I suppose, and I ain't paying. If he wants to do file transfers between the computers faster than 11b then I'll suggest a crossover cable....or a CD burner.

By the way, while I was in PC world this afternoon all the 11g stuff seems to be claiming to be 108Mbps now....is that just because some sneaky marketing bod reckons they can get away with adding the upload and download speeds together?

[DigiGuru]

No, the majority of the 54g cards COULD do it, as they have 54mbs each way. They do it by dropping one side of the bandwidth to almost nothing, thereby having 108mb/s going one way.

But.... correct me if I'm wrong guys

[nichomach]

I'm afraid you are ; wireless card to access point links aren't (usually) duplex in the same way that wired connections can be. That 54Mbps is TOTAL. Wireless access points act more like hubs than switches, i.e. half-duplex. The 108Mbps speeds are genuine, but they depend on either using kit from the same manufacturer (in the same way that you could get "enhanced" 802.11b setups that did 22Mbps), or trusting that the manufacturers of all the kit that you're buying are close enough to the draft 802.11n standard (and to each other) for the stuff to work.

[Firelord]

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...tml?NOV-108DSL - cable router and a couple of these ( http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...html?NOV-54USB ) will get you on your way

[Kumagoro]

Like the above sounds like a wireless router is what you are after.

I have myself a dlink 11 Mbps one which works great, my bro got a linksys which
looks horrendus and the signal doesnt seem to even go a couple of bedrooms (my dlink goes 50 metres down the road)

Also my other bro recently got a belkin (g version) 125 Mbps one which looks quite nice is smaller than the standard g one and that i can get a signal from far away too.

[Rave]

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...tml?NOV-108DSL - cable router and a couple of these ( http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...html?NOV-54USB ) will get you on your way

That looks like a good setup but it'll cost about £30 more than plain old 11b and I'm not sure this chap will notice the difference. If I ever need a wireless network I'll stump up the extra though.

Cheers for the help all. From a security perspective, do I just need to set up WEP encryption to protect him from viruses etc. and people freeloading his connection? Will whatever router I choose act as a firewall?

[Barry]

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...duct_uid=45023

works with adsl/cable had one myself for a while and top stuff

[Byatt]

That looks like a good setup but it'll cost about £30 more than plain old 11b and I'm not sure this chap will notice the difference. If I ever need a wireless network I'll stump up the extra though.

Cheers for the help all. From a security perspective, do I just need to set up WEP encryption to protect him from viruses etc. and people freeloading his connection? Will whatever router I choose act as a firewall?

Whatever router you choose should have NAT on it, which gives as much protection as most folks need (it won't allow incoming connections to any of the PCs on the network without the PC inside the network requesting it first, this will cause issues with certain apps like bittorrent though) - some better ones will have SPI (stateful packet inspection) firewalls, which are as good as it gets in terms of protection if set up correctly. Personally, I am perfectly happy sitting behind NAT.

In terms of WEP encryption - I'd advise restricting the use of the router by MAC address, WEP has a tendency to utterly kill the range of most wireless kit. If he has sensitive data which substantially clever people may be trying to steal with an aerial outside his house, however, you might want to use wep .

[Rave]

Heh....o.k. then, I'll give him the choice if it comes to that.

[Kumagoro]

def put WEP or another encryption on as peoples cards just automatically connect to
whatever and they might not even knowing they have.

[Firelord]

For my wireless networks from a security standpoint I do the following ->

Run MAC filtering to the allowed devices and then WPA-PSK with TKIP (standard when selecting WPA) with a key comprising of alphanumeric word for instance if they lived at 39 Albert Road I would do something like 39a1b3rt or something memorable such as a pet name ie cuddles = cuddl35,