[plug] Wireless newbie questions

[James Budworth]

I have (minimal) wifi setup myself and I'm intending on expanding it in
the future. At the moment it only consists of a B/G type WAP and an
iBook (which only uses B).

I would probably recommend a seperate WAP over using a card in a
machine.  You can get a B type WAP from Hardly Normal for $130, this is
a little more expensive than a card, but then you don't have to worry
about drivers or software config for the card. G type WAP are a little
more expensive but worth it in the long run.

Once you have the WAP setup, one way to connect multiple machines
wirelessly would be an ethernet-wireless bridge.  These are more
expensive than any single card, however you can connect a switch to them
and have multiple machine connected to a single bridge. 

This is the next stage I'm going to be doing (when I have the money).
The WAP is in another room with the server.
At one end of the house my GFs computer is located, along with a network
printer - connect a bridge to the uplink on this switch
At the other end of the house is my office with 3-4 computers at any one
time (just across the hallway from the server room) - connect these
machines to a single switch then to a bridge.

This seemed like a better solution to me seeing as I had machines
clustered around the house.  There are still cables, but no long runs to
trip over, they are isolated to their own rooms. The advantage here is
that there is no need to worry about drivers, as well as the fact that
you can plug things in that normally there would be no way of fitting a
wifi card to eg PS2 or <shudder>X-Box</shudder>.  This also helped solve
the problem of fitting wifi to my mini-itx (there isn't enough room in
the Sparcstation IPX case for a PCI card.)

As I said, I haven't actually done this yet, so I'll let people know how
well it pans out.

On Fri, 2004-01-23 at 18:18, Derek Fountain wrote:
> I want to switch at least part of my LAN to wireless. I have so many long 
> cables around the place it's just not funny any more!
> 
> I'd like to have the linux firewall box have a wireless card in it, so I can 
> stick it in the corner near the phone socket and leave it there. I have two 
> main boxes which would probably remain on cables for the time being, and then 
> one Windows2000 laptop and one Linux laptop which I'd like to be able to use 
> without cables. The laptops would need to be able to see the main machines, 
> since that's where their files are, and everything needs to be able to see 
> the firewall to get to the 'net.
> 
> Initially speed isn't a priority, but I'd like to be able to have a high speed 
> option for the two main machines should I choose to make them wireless later 
> in the year.
> 
> I haven't a clue about wireless. Can anyone suggest the hardware I would need 
> to make this setup - preferably stuff I can wander out and buy in Perth 
> tomorrow? :o)
-- 
James Budworth <tsuki_yomi at zephilia.dyndns.org>