Wireless Router Help

[skymouse]

(maybe this should be in a different section ? ?- if so . sry!)

I am about to decorate where my PC lives and therefore must move it for a good few days. As i need email etc everyday, how bout this:
Buy a wireless router and connect to Cable modem ( which has to stay in decorated room) then get wifi card for laptop and be able to access elsewhere in house.
So , i guess the question is, does a wireless router need a PC connected to function, or will it work as specced?
Thanks

[tim1234]

Yes that will work.


The Linksys wireless G rocks! Dead easy to set up. I got it from Amazon.

Be sure to set up WEP security and/or a MAC address filter, though, unless you want your neighbours to share your internet connection and/or your files.

[nffc]

If by "connected" you mean wired, no you don't... we have a WLAN router and the only wired connection is to the SACM- and we probably don't even need to connect that by wire...

WLAN is Ethernet in that the manner of connection doesn't matter, merely the fact that there's a connection there. This makes in Ethernet terms the actual architecture the same whether the connection is wired or wireless...

IIRC

[ZrByte]

Yeah that setup will work fine, though normally you will need to hardwire it to your PC first in order to set up the router, once this is done everything will work fine wirelessly.

I recently bought an Origo Wireless G Router (Branded as Ebuyer), good quality and very cheap, is also capable of 108mbps if your wireless network card supports it (thats actually 8mbps faster than most wired connections).

[Matth]

I've set up a wireless router wirelessly - one caveat - where with wired roters, you may be recommended to CLONE the MAC address of the PC in order to avoid having to register a new MAC address, if you connect wirelessly - do NOT clone, as you'll be setting the address from the WIRELESS adapter - instead of cloning the MAC, you would read it from the original adapter / connection properties, and find an option to SET the MAC, rather than clone it.

I'm saying that, because I wasted a hell of a lot of time on just that mistake!

[nffc]

MAKE SURE you turn on things like MAC filtering (obviously you need to input the MACs of your lan cards), WEP/WPA, and turn off SSID broadcasting (AND CHANGE THE SSID) before you pull off the wired connection- these things aren't ever enabled by default and if they're not on mean people can access your network...

[Tezcatlipoca]

Originally Posted by tim1234

The Linksys wireless G rocks! Dead easy to set up. I got it from Amazon.

Yep, I've got one too. Great router. Only £55.54 at Amazon.co.uk.

Originally Posted by tim1234

Be sure to set up WEP security and/or a MAC address filter, though, unless you want your neighbours to share your internet connection and/or your files.

Very good advice.


There is actually a detailed thread here at CF all about securing wireless networks:

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/showthread.php?t=8435

Definitely worth a read