wireless at office 2

[Murugs]

hello all
we have a wired network at our office with windows 2000 server running DHCP and a T1 line with pix firewall and cisco router.

When some one walks in with a laptop he connects to internet using a netowrk cable into any one of the data ports and he is immediately connected. Is it possible to make it wireless. I donot want to disturb the router firewall setting etc..and I want to leave it intact.

Not sure whether my idea will work..i.e
Can I connect a wireless router to one of the data ports and trigger a wireless network..probably a dumb idea..Please advise

 

[paulbenn]

Hi,

Yeah, get a Wireless Access Point and install it, make sure you apply security to it and dont leave it wide open for people to hack about.

Then put the Wireless Network cards in the Laptops and set the security permissions and then whenever teh user comes in to the office he sits down, and connects to the network.

Most Access points allow the DHCP to still be your server and this would not change any or your settings for connecting to the internet.

I use the Cisco Access Points (more expensive but very good) and I like the 3COM because the ariel retracts out f the way.

Good Luck.

Kind Regards, Paul Benn

**** Never Giveup, keep trying, the answer is out there!!! ****

 

[manarth]

Hi Murugs: simply plug an AP (Access Point) into a spare network socket, do a little bit of configuring on the AP, and you'll be away.

You should configure
- SSID (the 'id' of the wireless network)
- a WEP key (encryption is good, right?!)
- possibly an access control list (you type in the MAC address of the laptops that can connect).

The AP will pick up an IP from the DHCP, and pass DHCP through to wireless clients, so they'll be apparently no difference between wired and wireless clients.

An AP is purely a wireless to wired bridge: a router can do more - in your case it's unnecessary, but most routers can act as an AP equally well, and there's little cost difference. Implementation can be slightly different for routers.

Basic information, but it's enough to get you going - post back if you have a specific question you'd like addressed.

<marc> i wonder what will happen if i press this...[ul][li]please tell us if our suggestion has helped[/li][li]need some help? faq581-3339[/li][/ul]

 

[Murugs]

Hi guys
thanks for the answer. does a wireless access point differ from a wireless router.

Also I have 2 printers...is there some stuff like wireless print server..Could you shed some lite on this..

regards
Murugs

 

[manarth]

An AP is like a network switch. Anything connected to it (wirelessly or wired) plus into the same network.

A router (wireless or otherwise) has 2 seperate sides, with 2 seperate IP spaces.

Typically, a SOHO router connects a load of PCs to a WAN using NAT.

Internet -- modem -- WAN|router|LAN -- switch

The WAN side has a public, normal IP, and the LAN side uses a private IP (e.g. 192.168.x.x). If your printers are happily wired, I would leave them that way. Wired is generally faster, more secure, more stable, and easier to configure than wireless. Only go wireless with those systems that will be truly mobile.

<marc> i wonder what will happen if i press this...[ul][li]please tell us if our suggestion has helped[/li][li]need some help? faq581-3339[/li][/ul]

 

[Murugs]

Thanks for the helpful posting.
Also I see there are lot of products in market for wireless access points. Could you suggest me one with specific features and also If some one does not have a wireless network adapter , I guess I can buy one or two external USB wireless network adapters..right.

regards
Murugs

 

[Murugs]

Also on security aspect...
When I secure the wireless access point
and
When some one connects, will the Access point ask for some password so that it will authenticate and allow the user to connect to internet.

regards
Murugs

 

[manarth]

> When some one connects, will the Access point ask for some password so that it will authenticate

The WEP key is one way to secure the network: no WEP key, no dicey
It's a 26 hex-character string. Everyone on the wireless network shares this key, so it's by no means a unique 'secret'.

Other ways to secure the network exist, and involve spending more money

You'd probably need Cisco technology for this (OK, there are others, but the average SOHO gear won't handle this). Look into WPA and EAP (PEAP, LEAP...)

You could also put a HTTP proxy between the internet and the LAN, and all users on a wireless IP address have to authenticate to the proxy.

You can buy some external USB adapters, but then you have a possible driver issue. You don't want to accept responsibility for installing a driver on someone elses machine, do you?! It's worth keeping some in case, but generally I'd suggest offering a wire instead. If the user doesn't have a wired or wireless NIC, then I'd generally offer the services of my CD-RW to copy networked resources.
I won't install or configure anything on a clients machine (except when working in the capacity of sysadmin, of course!)

<marc> i wonder what will happen if i press this...[ul][li]please tell us if our suggestion has helped[/li][li]need some help? faq581-3339[/li][/ul]

 

[Murugs]

Some update here-
I brought a D-link 900AP+ access point and set it up and also brought a external USB wireless adapter to test the wireless connection. Everything worked fine.

I have another laptop with inbuilt wireless adapter atheros5001x AR. This laptop (toshiba - win xp home) is not detecting the wireless connection. I tried inserting the external USB wireless adapter to this laptop and it was able to detect the wireless connection. Do I need to change some setting with this atheros one so that it detects my network.

Thanks for the wonderful info guys and I am hooked immediately today with the help of you people...

regards
Murugs