Wireless Network Setup
Choose your wireless equipment
The first step is to make sure that you have the equipment you need. As you're looking for products in stores or on the Internet, you might notice that you can choose equipment that supports three different wireless networking technologies: 802.11a, 802.11b, and 802.11g. We recommend 802.11g, because it offers excellent performance and is compatible with almost everything.
Shopping list
Broadband Internet connection Eastserve
Wireless Cable router like ones at www.aria.co.uk and www.microdirect.co.uk
*Make sure you get a router for a cable network Eastserve is a cable network
A computer with built-in wireless networking support or a wireless network adapter
In this tutorial, I will explain how to build your wireless network using a LinkSys router in very easy steps.
Eastserve does not give and support for home networks set by the customer, we do give limited support for networks that have been set by Eastserve. Prices
Wireless networks became more popular these days since mobility is a key aspect in any environment, even for home users. This tutorial will show you how simple it is to setup a small wireless network to share your Internet connection for fixed and mobile users.
Typically, a wireless router has two types of interfaces: classical, RJ45 for fixed stations (at least 4 usually) and a radio antenna that supports multiple clients.
For this tutorial, I used a LinkSys wireless router, It's a small office/home user type of router.
You first have to get the network cables correct
As you can see the cable that was coming from are equipment now has to go in the internet port (Wan Port) .The other cable that came with the router goes from any of the other 4 ports on the router to were the cable came from your computer
Also you do not have to run any cd software to get the router up and runing it will run straight out of the box however you will need to ring Eastserve (0161 230 6346 ) to register you router on are network we will need the WAN MAC address of the router this is normaly found on the status page of the router , you will may have to install drivers for any wireless device you plug in to you computer or laptop ( wirless pci card or usb dongle).
As it comes out of the box, the router has some default settings that help you set it up really quick.
First of all, it has a DHCP server turned on so your PC will receive an IP address automatically.
So this is the first step you should make: connect a PC to one of the router's LAN ports using a cross-over UTP cable (of course, after powering on the router..).
Get the IP address from the "default gateway" since that is the router's LAN address. Of course, you can get this address from the user's manual supplied with the router too.
Open a browser and type in that address in the Address field (in my example, it's 192.168.1.1) to connect to the router's graphical user interface.
As shown bellow, you will be asked for an authentication to access the router for security reasons. The factory default username and password depend on the vendor and model; for Links it's generally
Username: (leave blank)
Password: admin
This information too can be found in the user's manual, on the vendor's web site.
After logging, you will see the router's menu. This indeed depends on the vendor and/or model, but the topics are quite the same for all.
The first screen brings up the basic router configuration, like WAN and LAN IP addresses. The "Internet Setup" part should be configured using (DHCP).
The Network Setup refers to your Local Area Network. I recommend you to leave the DHCP Server as enabled to allocate IP addresses automatically in your network; this is applicable to both wired and wireless interfaces. If you don't have any special needs, you can leave all fields here to the default ones, since it works perfectly for a network up to 50 clients.
Next it's time to configure your Wireless settings. Go to the Wireless tab, and select the Mode your want your antenna to work: 802.11b, 802.11g or both.
802.11b is not commonly used anymore, since it has a maximum transmit rate of 11mbps, best case scenario, in comparison with the G standard which works at 54mbps. You can use mixed if you know you will access the wireless networks with older laptops or so which only have 802.11b wireless interfaces.
Next fill in the SSID of the network; this is the name of the wireless network itself and should be set to something that describe your network (like Private-home for example).
The SSID Broadcast should remain enabled even though it's a fair security risk. SSID Broadcast is a service that sends some signals called beacons periodically so new devices can see there is a wireless network available; this is a security risk since an attacker can discover the network - but by disabling it, a new device will not see the wireless network at all automatically.
Save your settings and go to the Wireless Security tab:
The default is disabled, but that's an invite to anyone who wants to connect to your network. Leave it that way only if you are building a so called "hotspot" offering free internet services for the costumers in your range. Otherwise, i recommend you to set the security mode to WPA2 Personal which uses a fair AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) cryptography mechanism to protect your wireless data. The Pass phrase you enter here must be from 8 to 63 characters (as longer, the better). The key must have a logic since you have to remember it easily for entering it when connecting a new client.
Save your setting and your ready to go.
After connecting your clients, you can also use the "Wireless MAC Filter" tool for better security. This feature will learn the MAC addresses of the clients you select and allow traffic from those wireless interfaces only after enabling it.
For better security, change the router's administrator password too, from admin to something more complex to prevent unauthorized access.
Tutorial Network Sharing Learn how to connect to printers and computers on your new home network.
