Wireless

[Allan]

I have just recieved a new laptop as part of an insurance claim. It has a 802.11g card fitted, which I plan to use on WiFi systems. In the meantime I will be buying a base station to use it wirelessly at home. Does anyone have any recommendations as to what to buy or where from? If I buy an "N" base station, would it be wasted by using a "g" card?

 

[adrianb]

Honest answer, not sure............but I have a customer cancelled order for a wireless router, that's in stock. I'll pm you the part number, from memory it's a Netgear something or other.Defo. wireless.


Adrian

 

[BrendanS]

'n' router with 'g' laptop means it will only communicate at 'g' speeds. It does mean that you have some future proofing built in if you buy other computers or cards with 'n'

 

[Talbot]

Best reports (and least problems ) seem to be with Linksys (sp) gear.

Belkin appears to dominate the other end of the spectrum.

 

[gianenrico]

My choice was USRobotics card and router: stable configuration, pb is you have a router to manage, that is you must know how to deqal with a net; not impossible but harder than just a plug&use modem. Had some pbs with apgrading SW for router and card: if You start upgreding one, then the other may become incopatible. I can imagine cubed pbs with different makes of elements.
Cheers

 

[Magic]

Okay, N is the new but as yet not approved standard. Unless you like playing (fixing) new technology I would suggest you stick with a G based device.

My recommendation would be a NetGear DG834GT or similar. What ever you select make sure it has at least 4 UTP ports on the back as if you can its always better to wire the connections.

 

[BrendanS]

pre-n and more recently draft n approved have been around for ages, so are hardly new or leading edge technology, and are perfectly fine to use.

Not sure what you mean about ports being better. He wants to set up a wireless network, not a wired one?

 

[tangofour]

802.11 b ( the first stuff we all had ) gave you 11 mb / second
rev g gives 54 mb / Second
rev h adds a layer of transmission control, depowering transmitters when not in use. Aimed mostly at reducing interference of the multitude of devices that have flourished in the real world.
Unless you are transferring big files to and from your laptop across the wireless to some network attached storage device then even the original 11 mb rev b is not going to be the bottleneck in your system, After all few broadband connections are bigger than 2 mb in reality.
If you are primarily browsing then rev g is already overkill.
To transfer a really big PDF or document from one PC to the laptop on rev G will take perhaps 2 or 3 seconds.
The rev h base station will provide some future proofing, perhaps 12 months worth.

 

[BrendanS]

True if your browsing. However, I sync several computers with Gb's of data on occasions. And now as more people move to home entertainment systems with music and video streamed around the house, then wifi speed requirements are going to become independent of broadband speed to outside world. Tho, I know many people with connections well in excess of 2Mb (real world, not stated max)

 

[Magic]

[ QUOTE ]
pre-n and more recently draft n approved have been around for ages, so are hardly new or leading edge technology, and are perfectly fine to use.

Not sure what you mean about ports being better. He wants to set up a wireless network, not a wired one?

[/ QUOTE ]

Draft being approved does not make a difference in my opinion.

I say make sure it has ports on it because although you may want to use it wireless I can pretty much say without any doubt you will end up wanting to plug something into it, even if its only for setting up or trouble shooting.