Router advice

[Paul Martin]

I just purchased a wifi card last night (have not received it yet) and now want to add a wifi router to complete the picture. At home I have a 56k dialup, at work it's a constant connection. Home machine is Win98SE, work is XP Pro. Obviously, I'd like to be able to "surf" wirelessly, but understand this may be more of a challenge on the dialup.

I just saw a great deal on the D-Link DI-514 at Amazon. I've also looked at the Netgear MR814. Any advice, tips, warnings would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[arnage2]

the only way ive seen people get wireless 56k is via a bt modem. you plug it into the jack, and surf wirelessly off of that. http://zodiacgamer.com has a review of one

[Paul Martin]

Thanks for the tip. Well, if 56K is out, how about just an opinion in general (for the work machine). TIA.

[spacerace]

if you're on dialup (56k) at home via your pc, then why not just buy a USB (or PCI) wifi adapter for your home pc, and setup ICS (internet connection sharing)...

you can setup a wifi connection to your home pc, and surf the internet over the shared 56k connection. It won't be fast, but you'll probably only be on 1 at a time anyway.

at work you could do something similar, but i'd check before adding devices and messing with the config of a work machine !

[jake080]

[edited spelling and punctuation errors ;)]
Yeah, adding a wireless adapter to the pc is most ideal to 'share' the connection... at least i think so.
theres PCI wifi adapters and such, but I would suggest getting a USB adapter for the sake of: 'I'm at home I plug in USB WiFi in pc, I now surf slow connection via PPC -- 3 hours later -- I'm at work, I have better connection, but I want to use WiFi and PPC... (ding ding ding, light goes off) -- drive to the house and back -- ahh, my genius is showing... er uh, anyway im now at work, and have my PnP USB WiFi adapter in hand(yes the one that was in my home computer), and will now PnP it with my nice XP Pro maching here.... 5 minutes later... ahh veging on internet via PPC, wirelessly, at work, hope i dont get cought' :P

--hope that was enjoyable, made sense, and will prove helpful!
~Jake
[end -- dang that was filled with errors, sorry]

[Paul Martin]

Jake,

It makes perfect sense! With a normal wi-fi "router", you can set security, wep, etc. Can you do that with a USB one?

Paul

[jake080]

Ouch, i truthfully know not, maybe someone else will know, or point you to a review on some models or something :)

[Paul Martin]

I guess I don't really understand the difference between one of these USB plug-in ones and a "standard" wifi router/hub/etc. Anyone with some good "educational" links?

[CDizzle]

Jake,

It makes perfect sense! With a normal wi-fi "router", you can set security, wep, etc. Can you do that with a USB one?

Paul

Hey Paul,

I think what Jake is referring to is just a USB wifi adapter. Think of it as nothing more than a network card you'd attach to your computer. I'm not 100% sure but I dont believe there is any wep security when you are just using an ad-hoc(peer-to-peer) network which is more than likely what you'd be looking at.

Link for some wifi info. (http://www.weethet.nl/english/network_wifi_intro.php) Theres a section for peer-to-peer.

Geoff

[Paul Martin]

Thanks for the link. Yes, if I were to use this at work, I would absolutely need security. Do you know if WPA is supported in PPC 2002?

[GSmith]

Possibly a better alternative at home would be a wireless access point with a built-in modem. My old Orinoco wireless access point has one, but I can't find where to purchase it today. A quick search revealed that Netgear may supply this kind of product.

[paulzazzarino]

Routers will give you NAT (Network Address Translation) Which keeps your IP addresses on your side of the network. You can also run more devices though a router for future expandability. Linksys has a good router for the price $55.

PPC 2003 typically has LEAP/EAP support. This depends on the HW manufacturer and or WiFi card.

[Paul Martin]

I decided to go with a router for max expandibility. Actually, got 2 items...a combo deal. The second is a USB wifi adapter. I'm hoping to be able to do some ad-hoc with the adapter, and use the router where I really need it. Thanks!

[upplepop]

The Apple Airport (http://www.apple.com/airport/) is a wireless router that includes a modem. The features talk about using it to recieve connections, but I think it may be able to make a dial-up connection as well(correct me if I'm wrong guys). It's uses the 802.11 standard, so it will work on Windows.

[Paul Martin]

I've heard that the airport can be used with a PC, but didn't know it had dial-up built-in. Thanks!