Answers - 4
Source: Tom's Guide US | Keywords: wireless, faq, setup, and, configuration
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5. Answers - 4
• Can a wireless access point be a client of a wireless router?
Yes, but only if it supports AP client mode.
• Can I use an access point to wirelessly share my Internet connection?
Access points do not perform any Internet sharing functions. If you already are sharing your connection with a router, then you can add an access point to connect wireless clients.
But if you currently have only one computer using an Internet connection, you'll need to add a wireless router, even if you want to connect only one wireless computer. This is because the access point itself uses an IP address, which is all that most ISPs provide.
• Is it possible to disable my AP's beacon?
No. Beacons announce the AP's prescence and are an essential part of 802.11 network management. Many APs allow adjustment of the Beacon period, but do not allow it to be disabled.
• Is it possible to store setups for multiple wireless networks, i.e. profiles if I'm not using WinXP?
It depends on the features provided by the client utility that comes with your wireless adapter. However, most utilities have the same ability as WinXP's built-in "Wireless Zero Configuration" utility to remember multiple network SSIDs and any WEP information required to access them.
• What are the rules for entering SSID / ESSID names?
SSID (Service Set Identifiers) have a maximum of 32 case-sensitive characters. Which characters can be used, however, gets confusing.
Most references say SSID's must use alpha-numeric characters, but that term is somewhat ambiguous.
You should be fine if you stick with using only letters and numbers with no spaces in your SSID's. If you want to separate phrases, use a dash - or underscore _.
• How do you set up a wireless router to allow wireless computers to get their IP addresses from a different DHCP server?
The wireless router's NAT firewall is properly blocking the broadcast of DHCP requests to the WAN side of the router where other DHCP servers are located. If you don't really need to have your wireless clients on their own private network created by the wireless router, you can convert the router to operate as an Access Point. This will remove the blockage caused by its firewall. See this FAQ for the how-to.
• Is one channel better to use than another on a wireless network?
The best channel to use is the one with the least interference. Use the client application supplied with your wireless card to see if you can detect any other wireless networks and note the channel that they are operating on.
Set your access point or wireless router's channel to either Channel 1, 6 or 11, choosing a channel that is not being used.
If all three of these channels are in use, you'll have to experiment to determine the best channel to use. See the TomsNetworking When Wireless LANs Collide! for more info.
• I use my wireless notebook on multiple networks. How can I connect to them without having to keep changing my network settings each time I switch networks?
Windows XP's built-in Wireless "Zero Configuration" utility and most client programs that come with wireless adapters allow you to establish multiple "profiles" for each network that you connect to. The profiles typically contain SSID, Security (WEP, WPA, etc.), authentication and even network type (Ad Hoc or Infrastructure) information.
What the profiles don't contain, however, is other network-related information such as TCP/IP setting information, Windows domain, SMTP (outgoing mail) server, etc. Mac users can use the built-in Network Switcher capability to handle this chore, but Windows doesn't have an equivalent. However, for $20 Netswitcher will perform these duties for all versions of Windows.
• How can I share a remote wireless connection with all my LAN's wired computers?
The easiest way is to use a wireless bridging device that can mimic a wireless client. Linksys' WET11 [reviewed here] and WET54G [reviewed here] can both operate in this mode. You just set the device's SSID to match that of the wireless network that you want to connect to and, assuming that the network isn't protected by WEP, WPA or other wireless security, the device should establish a link to that network.
There are two options for connecting the Ethernet side of the device. Assuming that the remote network has a shared Internet connection and is running a DHCP server, you should be able to plug the wireless bridge into an Ethernet switch to which your LAN's computers are connected. Set their TCP/IP properties to be DHCP clients ("obtain an IP address automatically"), run a DHCP release / renew (or network "Repair" in WinXP) and you should be good to go. Although this option is easy, your computers are now part of the remote (and perhaps unknown) LAN, which means your shared files and printers are now visible, and accessible, to that LAN's owner. Highly insecure and not a good idea unless you own both the remote and local LAN.
The safer thing to do is to plug the wireless bridge into the WAN port of a router that is set to a static IP address compatible with the network that it is connected to. Connect your computers to the router's LAN switch ports and they will now be safe behind a firewall and inaccessible to the remote LAN's computers.
One other tip is that you should also set the wireless bridge's IP address to a static IP address and make sure both the bridge and your router's WAN IP address are set outside the range of the remote LAN's DHCP server. You may have to guess about this, but if you assign addresses starting at X.X.X.254 and work down, you probably won't cause an IP address conflict with the remote LAN.
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