Best solution for Home Internet Sharing?

[Akaz1976]

I have four PCs at home and one @home connection. None of the PCs are networked and nor do we need networking. But internet access is a pain to share on one computer.

So what would be the simplest, most hassle free way to share our @home connection? I was thinking routers but i dont know much about them and there is something to do with router with switches and some with non switches.*shrug*

Any advice or suggestions?

OS on the 4 comps are: 98se (on 1), XP (on 1) and 2000 (on 2)

Thanx

Akaz

 

[RaynorWolfcastle]

Get yourself a nice 4-port broadband router. I hear a lot of good things about the Linksys ones. I personally picked up an SMC Barricade from futureshop during their boxing day sale. Worked fine out of the box and was hassle-free to install.

Hope this helps

-Ice

 

[CraigRT]

I've done the Router and the Sharing and from a cost standpoint the sharing is better, also, for me, the sharing was easier to setup and use. since I leave my PC on all the time I have no problems with the sharing at all.. the POS Linkysys router I had was junk.. I definitely prefer the sharing method, but to not have a dedicated server sharing the connection, the only thing you can do is get a broadband cable/DSL router.. I'd recommend either Netgear or 3COM.

 

[Akaz1976]

any models #s? would i need any software? or would it be just the router and cables going to various PCs ethernet cards and i install/setup @home software on all computers separately?

Akaz

 

[MrBond]

The router is indeed your best bet.

As far as configuring it, might try the networking forum, there's lots of people in there who have done the same thing you're looking to do and they should be of help

 

[salsal]

I use D-Link DI-704 4 port router with my @home cable internet sharing. It works great. Setup is a snap. Set all computers (NIC installed) and router to dynamic connection, plug computers into router, plug cable modem into WAN on router, voila all computers are online. (For @home you need to type in your user name, CCxxxxxx-X, in host name and check renew forever in router settings.) No software or anything else needed.

 

[r0tt3n1]

Well, first off you have to network the computers together somehow. Each needs a NIC card, how you choose to connect them, wireless, ethernet, power line etc...... is up to you but has to taken care of first. I used a cheapy $20 4-port hub and ethernet cables at first and Internet Connection Sharing(ICS) which is built in to Windows, almost all versions have it. The machine that has the broadband connection needs 2 NIC's if using ICS. Using the machine that is connected to the broaband modem, you simply run the ICS applet on it and it will walk you easily thru the steps needed to share the connection. This assumes you have an external broadband modem, if using an internal card, it can get more complicated, such as IF the internal broadband modem allows sharing........... not trying to scare you off, it can be simple as pie or , well, not.............. I currently use the Linkys BEFSR41 router. External broadband modem(SpeedStream 5260) plugs in to router, as do all the computers thru ethernet cables and it has worked flawlessly out of the box. Keep us posted.

 

[Richard98]

I didn't know anything about setting up a network until a couple of months ago. I got a wireless SMC router with a couple of Orinoco Silver cards. The wireless route is probably more expensive, but it is easy to set up (no wires to run or holes to drill). I have win98 on 2 computers and win2k on 1.

SMC Wireless Router at Amazon.com

 

[SaturnX]

Going the Router route is probably your best bet, I personally use the SMC Barricade 7004ABR router (4 port) all that needs to be done is hook up my cable modem to the WAN port, each PC to one of the 4 ports and everything is automatically configured through the use of DHCP. Then its done, simple and no one computer needs to be on all the time for the other PCs to internet access.

--Mark

 

[edjam]

I have recently networked also for ICS. I would go with a switch, not a router, but that's just me. Also, networking can provide other benefits, one of which is the point that you only need one printer as all the computers can share the one.

 

[charlesincharge]

It depends from one user to the the next. I had a linux box running NAT forever cause i was running a game server off it, then i got rid of the game server. So i just had a NAT box.....Then i got an xbawx, I wanted to run game servers for my xbox and i couldnt with a non routable ip(all the computers behind the NAT machine had non-routable ip's). So i am in the process of selling the NAT box and i just use my primary machine for ICS (internet connection sharing). I leave my computer on all the time (3x a week i do a quick reboot) and it runs flawlessly. All you need is a hub and some rj-45 (NIC's also of course).

Good luck in your decision, just remember that if you get a router and your a n00b, your gonna have to do some reading. At first its a pain in the arse, but then again its knowledge that will help you in the future.
-Chuck

 

[Akaz1976]

Thanx for the info all. and yes i am a n00b and particularly dislike networking (as in maintaining a network), cause i can never figure out the what causes it to stop working and why it starts working again without any change to anything.

And all those problems with networking interfer with my primary activity on the computer and that is playing games (mostly online). I was looking at a US robotics cable/DSL router at downstairs compusmart (C$120) and it said that i had a integrated print server.

So from what i understand here is what i have to do:

1. Buy a Cable/DSL router and 4 Cat5 cables.
2. Hookup the wire from cable modem into the router. (currently going into my PC from cable modem)
3. Take 4 cat5 cables and hook em up from the router to NICs in my 4 PCs.
4. Set up (the network settings) all 4 PCs as i would if they were hooked indivdually to the cable modem.

Did i get that right?

Akaz

 

[lozina]

Yeah that's right. It's really very simple. If you will drill holes and put the wires in the wall, then I'd play it safe and buy CAT5E, which will support the 1Gb/s transfer rate you might want to have in a year or two

Just hook up your cable/dsl modem to the WAN port of the router, then you plug in your machines to the other ports number 1 to 4 in no particular order. You do not have to set the settings one each machine as if it were directly connected, you only set the router with these settings, the other machines I think you will probably not need to do anything! It will find out it's connected to a network, and provided you're not trying to designate certain ips to the machines, you're all done.

 

[GreenGecko]

That's right. I'm using an SMC Barricade 7004ABR and had no trouble setting up my PCs (I have 3 of them). The SMC had a COM Port as well as a Print Server, and installation was a piece of cake, once I got all of the machine hooked up.

Good Luck.

 

[Akaz1976]

I am getting a good deal on U.S. Robotics 8000 (Broadband Router - Web Exclusive). Would this do?

Akaz

 

[DrZone]

<< I use D-Link DI-704 4 port router with my @home cable internet sharing. It works great. Setup is a snap. Set all computers (NIC installed) and router to dynamic connection, plug computers into router, plug cable modem into WAN on router, voila all computers are online. (For @home you need to type in your user name, CCxxxxxx-X, in host name and check renew forever in router settings.) No software or anything else needed. >>



I'm using the same one. It's a great router. Easy setup !

BUT !.. you may need to get some background in networking if you want to change some advanced settings. Such as setting up ftps and using irc and things like that

 

[evergreen96]

Here a link for you that probably answer your questions.


Internet Connecting Sharing(ICS)

You have 2 options:

1. Broadband Router
2. ICS

Broadband Router:
Pro

All PC can go online indendpent of each other
"Hardware Firewall"

Cons

Cost


ICS:

Pro
Cost effective

Con
Host PC must be on to do NAT


The Quick list..

 

[MrTux]

<< any models #s? would i need any software? or would it be just the router and cables going to various PCs ethernet cards and i install/setup @home software on all computers separately?

Akaz >>



You won't need @home's software. (Hey, arent they dead??) Anyway, you don't even need that stuff on your main PC. It's just for bringing in additional advertising revenue for them.

 

[cleverhandle]

First of all, I agree with the others - getting a router is definitely the way to go. If you've already four computers, a $100 router is not that huge an investment for the convenience. I setup the Linksys 4-port model for my parents, and it was a snap - took about 5 minutes to setup. The ICS built into Windows can be a huge PITA - especially if you have multiple versions of Windows on your network. OK, so you said...



<< So from what i understand here is what i have to do:

1. Buy a Cable/DSL router and 4 Cat5 cables.
2. Hookup the wire from cable modem into the router. (currently going into my PC from cable modem)
3. Take 4 cat5 cables and hook em up from the router to NICs in my 4 PCs.
4. Set up (the network settings) all 4 PCs as i would if they were hooked indivdually to the cable modem.

>>



#4 is not quite correct. You'll be configuring the PC's to connect to the router's local IP address - usually something like 192.168.0.10. This is different than the address assigned to the cable modem from your provider. That's the router's "external" address. The internet (and your ISP) only see that address - not the local IP's of the individual machines. The router's job is keep track of which incoming packets on the external address go to which local IP's. As far the "setup" goes, it's very simple. The router should act as a DHCP server, so just set up each NIC on the machines to detect its settings automatically.

 

[Akaz1976]

Well i bought this and some Cat5e RJ45 cable.

Thanx for all the advice. i will post how things work out

Akaz