hi... i've been wanting to start a network for a while now, but have been going back and forth between wired and wireless.. i've finally made up my mind, and want wireless... but however, i am very confused on what equipment to actually get. I want connect a laptop, desktop, and xbox to my network, but am not entirely sure on what to get. Does anyone have any suggestions?
First you need a wireless router which is connected to the cable/dsl modem which is more likely connected to your desktop. Then you need a wireless card for your laptop, and for your xbox you need an ethernet cable which you connect from your xbox to the wireless router, so you want to have them in the same room. I connect a DLink Wireless Router (DI-614+) that is connected with my cable modem with my desktop and use a Dlink Wirelss card (DWL-650+)with my laptop, and I have a PS2 which is connected with an ethernet cable, same as Xbox. The ethernet cable is connected directly to my Router, both desktop w/router and modem are in the same room as my PS2. You can pick up an ethernet cable anywhere, i got mine at walmart. Let me know if you need anymore info, hope this helps, and its also really easy to set up.
yea... thanks a lot for the info and everything.. but... there are a lot more products out there that i've heard of... like... access points? and printer servers? what are those used for, and would i need them? another thing i found is the different wireless formats... 802.11b, a, and g.. what are those? i have no idea which format to get, and it seems to go in b, a, g order from least expensive to most. also.. what brands should i consider?
alright, access points allow you to expand your wireless area, you can expand the routers reach for wireless connectivity; however, you wont need any since this is for your home, usually colleges and businesses use access points, for the home theres no need since the area is small. okay so you dont need any access points, just a router. now a printer server is a computer that allows other computers to communicate with it and print, basically you share one printer with other computers, and one computer (the printer server) handles all print jobs and is the only one connected to the printer. if you want to share your printer than you must setup one computer as the printer server, i dont know how to since i never tried, but i'm sure you can find some information if your interested. okay, the wireless format you would want to get is the 802.11b since it is compatible with most pc and macs, also with the 802.11b you can mix brands because they will all work with each other, 'B' is typically used for the home, 'A' is for business use, 'G'is also for the home but offers more speed but 'B' will work fine, unless you want to pay more then go with 'G',i personally use a 'B' and dont have any slow connections things run really smooth. okay brands, really dont matter considering you can mix and match if using 'B', they all offer the same no one has any special feature, but the software maybe slightly different from each but basically run the same. some brand names are DLINK, Linksys, Belkin, theres more and you can see them at any electronic store, such circuitcity or bestbuy etc. heres a link to a website that offers information about wireless networks browse through it maybe you could find more info there, theres also a forum there so you may want to check that out if not keep asking questions i'll try and answer the best i can if not someone here can, hope this helps To the website http://www.homenethelp.com/ To the forums http://forum.homenethelp.com/
alright... thanks a lot for the help... one more thing tho... would i need to get a router AND an ethernet hub, or does the router act as the same thing, for sharing internet as well as files?
HUB = takes any incoming signal from any of the ports and sends it to all the other ports (the other comps ignore that data if it is not expected). Active hubs only send them to the destination computer. SWITCH = a fancier hub ROUTER = SWITCH + DHCP Server (something to give IPs) What you need is a router.
But the difference (and this is important) between a router and a switch/hub is that the router has a built in DHCP server and NAT
I got a Dlink di-514 which is a wireless AP/4 port switch/router. So my main computer and PS2 is wired to the ports than in the near future when i get a laptop i can go wireless with that and nothing else to buy.
