[PLUG] wireless question

[Jon Scully]

On Nov 20, 2007 2:02 PM, Rogan Creswick <creswick at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Nov 20, 2007 10:15 AM, User Iam <vramnum10 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > HI
> >
> > Setting up my wireless....
> >
> > Have a couple of questions...
> >
> > What I am doing is connecting two machines via wireless...
> >
> > MY DSL comes in on my Cisco DSL box..
> >
> > I want to connect my computer in the other room to this computer...
>
> By computer do you mean the DSL modem, or is there another
> windows/linux/mac/bsd/etc.. machine on that end too?
>
> > I bought two G routers...
>
> You really probably only need one router, just use a wireless card in
> the remote machine(s).  As Nick mentioned, the routers generally
> aren't set up to be used to create a wireless bridge, and while it may
> be possible to make them work that way, it's going to take a *lot* of
> effort compared to the ease of using wireless cards with one router.
>
> The standard configuration is to plug one router into your dsl modem,
> and put wireless cards in each of the machines that you want on the
> network.  Alternatively, you could build a router / firewall with two
> wired nics and put that between the dsl modem and the wireless router,
> also using wireless cards in the other machines.

In a small or home network environment, it would be simpler to use the
DSL router as *the* router (including DHCP services) and to configure
both WiFI routers to be simple Access Points (AP).  Most WiFI routers
offer this configuration option.

In fact, it used to strike me as odd that an simple AP could cost the
same as a WiFI router -- but sometimes (e.g. Best Buy) they do.  I
suppose the electronics are identical in each case, the AP just has
some features turned off.  Old hardware design tricks never die ;-)

(Usually a "bridge" means a device that "bridges" two disparate
networks.  For example, 192.168.0.255 would need to be bridged with
10.255.255.255, etc.)