How can I connect a laptop wirelessly to a homepna network?

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I have 4 PCs networked via homepna. One of the computers PC1 - the gateway or internet server - has dial up access to the internet. The other three (PC2, PC3, PC4) connect to this PC for internet access via homepna 2 (10 mbps). PC1 is running Linux and has DHCP setup to assign IPs to the other PCs. I am planning on adding a laptop to this setup and thinking about wireless options. I am still fairly new to this. Can I just connect HomePna to ethernet bridge to a phoneline and connect its ethernet port to a wireless access port to transmit to the laptop? Will this work? Will I be able to file and print share and internet share with this setup?
Alternatively, I think from my research on the internet that I can connnect a serial modem to an smc barricade and have one of its ethernet port connect to a wireless access point to transmit to wireless clients(laptop) and have another one of its ethernet ports connect to a homepna to ethernet bridge which will connect to the other PCs via homepna. This is a more expensive solution which makes the PC1 gateway setup unecessary. If the first option above does not work , I wonder if this will.
Also I have another question for you guys. I have found out that my linux PC will print to a Windows ME printer via cups and samba but I cannot print to a PC with Windows XP installed. File Sharing and internet sharing works though. Does anybody know what is wrong with the Linux-XP setup?
Thank You Very Much for any insights suggestions you can offer.

 

[rw120555]

Your setup is a little more complicated, or at least different than mine, but yes, I was able to add a WAP with no problem. My current setup is, I have a router with built-in Homepna bridge (Netgear RP334). In my office off in the distance, I now have an hpna/ethernet bridge. On one end, the bridge plugs into a phoneline, on the other end the ethernet cable connects to a switch. Connected to the switch via ethernet are a pc, a laptop (sometimes, when I want high speed file transfers) and a WAP. You could, of course, just plug the bridge directly into a WAP.

And yes, you could have a setup where the WAP is connected via an ethernet port directly to your router. That is what I had at first, but the WAP location was poor so I figured out how to move it. It seems a little weird, using hpna to improve your wireless, but in my case it worked fine.

Incidentally, when my laptop and desktop are connected as described above, they say they are connected via ethernet. Because of the bridge, I don't think they even know hpna is involved. The way I think of the bridge is that it converts your phone jack to an ethernet jack, and makes your phone wire work like ethernet cable. So, whatever you could plug into an ethernet jack, you could plug into an hpna/ethernet bridge.

As for specific bridges, options include the Netgear PE102 and the Linksys hpb200. As I mention in another thread, there is a way to make a 2wire homeportal 100 act as a bridge -- I'm currently using it just because I got one really cheap on Ebay, but I may break down and buy the netgear someday since I hear it is the best. The cheapest price I've seen on a new PE102 is $100 + shipping, direct from Netgear.

 

[rw120555]

Incidentally, if you were so inclined, you could probably figure out an alternative where the WAP connected via crossover cable to the ethernet card in one of your machines. Could get a little complicated but would also be cheaper.

Also, what you are proposing very closely parallels how my network has developed. I started off with an always-on PC server running ICS-type software. It had an HPNA card in it. I then went to a router with built-in hpna/ethernet bridge, and sold the no longer needed server PC. This worked far better for me, but since you have a Linux box, maybe your setup works better than mine did.

 

[cisip]

If I understand you correctly, I can do away with PC1 and just get a router with hpna bridge. This router will connect to a serial modem to connect to the internet via dialup. The router will also connect to the phone line via the builtin homepna-ethernet bridge. All PCs connected to the phoneline will then have internet, print and file sharing. I can connect a WAP on one of the routers ethernet port and then transmit wirelessly to a laptop. The router will then act as the DHCP server and I should disable the DHCP server on the WAP if it has it built in. Of course all the PC's and laptops will have to be configured as DHCP clients.
or ....

I can connect to the internet via PC1 dial up modem and then have its Homepna card connect to a phoneline. The other PCs will then be connected to the phoneline. I can connect an ethernet homepna bridge to a free phoneline and connect a WAP to its ethernet port. PC1 maintains the role of DHCP server. All the others will be DHCP clients. I should disable the DHCP server on the Homepna-ethernet bridge if it has one built in. Did I understand this correctly? Option 2 seems to be the cheaper alternative but I might find a router with homepnabridge built in at a comparable price. Plus not having a PC on all the time is convenient. Thanks.

 

[rw120555]

If I understand you correctly, I can do away with PC1 and just get a router with hpna bridge. This router will connect to a serial modem to connect to the internet via dialup. The router will also connect to the phone line via the builtin homepna-ethernet bridge. All PCs connected to the phoneline will then have internet, print and file sharing. I can connect a WAP on one of the routers ethernet port and then transmit wirelessly to a laptop. The router will then act as the DHCP server and I should disable the DHCP server on the WAP if it has it built in. Of course all the PC's and laptops will have to be configured as DHCP clients.

Correct, except the bridge can be either internal or external to the router. If you got something like the PE102 (external) you would attach it to an ethernet portt on your router and then plug it in to a phone jack. I'm not aware of any routers with built-in hpna bridges that also support serial modems & dialup, so I suspect you want an external bridge.

One other wrinkle: There was a question the other day about whether these dialup router setups actually work. See the Dialup Router thread. You would think they would work ok but I have no experience with them.

I can connect to the internet via PC1 dial up modem and then have its Homepna card connect to a phoneline. The other PCs will then be connected to the phoneline. I can connect an ethernet homepna bridge to a free phoneline and connect a WAP to its ethernet port. PC1 maintains the role of DHCP server. All the others will be DHCP clients. I should disable the DHCP server on the Homepna-ethernet bridge if it has one built in. Did I understand this correctly? Option 2 seems to be the cheaper alternative but I might find a router with homepnabridge built in at a comparable price. Plus not having a PC on all the time is convenient. Thanks

Again correct. Also, depending on the placement of your machines, consider hooking the bridge up to a switch, and then having the WAP and other PCs connect to the switch. You can then disable or take out your current HPNA cards. The advantage of this is the switch-connected machines will communicate much more quickly with each other. The way my network has evolved, I'm sorry I ever bought an HPNA card. Instead, I wish I had bought hpna/ethernet bridges along with switches. If you just have one pc all by itself, an hpna card is cheapest, but if you've got multiple machines in a location the bridge + switch setup is nice because it makes for faster communication in that part of the LAN.

In other words, suppose there are a bunch of machines in an upstairs room and a bunch of machines in a downstairs room. WIthin each room, machines could be connected via a switch (or router with built-in switch). To connect the two floors, you can buy two hpna/ethernet bridges, one fo reach floor. On each floor, the machines will communicate with each other at 100MB. Across floors, the machines will communicate at 10MB, which is the current limit of HPNA.

 

[cisip]

Option 1 with a router/switch with a serial port for dialup access is very tempting but from the forum seems risky. Hate to spend all that money when my current system does work. I think option 2 would be better. I have three rooms. Room 1 has a PC1 and PC2. Room 2 has PC3 and Room 3 has PC4. 10 mbits is fast enough for me right now but 100 megabits is an upgrade path that I am thinking about for the future. An ethernet homepna bridge connected to the phoneline with a WAP connected to its ethernet port seems to be the cheapest solution that I can integrate into this system. I am still confused about routers and switches. But if I am correct I dont need one anyway with the setup I am describing. I do want to open up an upgrade path to 100 mbits for the future between PC1 and PC2 and wondering which product to buy that I can use for that future setup and current setup. It probably involves a switch/router type device that would connect PC1 and PC2 via 100 mbit ethernet and still connect to the phoneline to allow PC3 and PC4 to connect and still allow PC1 to act as the internet gateway. I dont know if that is even possible. Maybe by then we will have cable/dsl here and the choices would be simpler since PC1 would just be a client. Can you recommend to me any product or products that will allow for the upgrade path and still work with my current setup. I am not very crazy about the upgrade path and it might not be possible. In that case any recommendations about which WAP and ethernet bridge to purchase I would appreciate. Also It might help to mention that my Homepna cards are Diamond Homefree 10 mbits PCI. Thanks

 

[rw120555]

For now, I would suggest buying the Netgear PE102 or maybe the Linksys hpb200 hpna/ethernet bridge. Last I checked, netgear itself and buy.com had the best prices on the pe102. For a WAP, I like my Netgear ME102, but I know many have the linksys wap11.

Getting to 100MB for machines in the same room is easy if you have a router --- connect the 2 pcs and your bridge, and all is well. You can also do it with a switch. But pm me in a week if you want more details, right now I am stuck with a dialup connection that costs $6 an hour (even though my wireless detects a nearby WAP, but which some cruel and uncaring person has enabled the security on!)

 

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Thank you very much for your time and expertise.

 

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Looking at various scenarios and prices of equipment I decided that PC4 will be removed from the network to cut costs. I projected the cost for a mixed ethernet /wireless ; mixed hpna / wireless ; and purely wireless solution. They all amount to roughly 250 dollars worth of upgrade. The mixed ethernet/wireless will be fastest but the purely wireless solution provides a lot of flexibility. Is a wireless network unstable? I think I can convert my current setup by replacing the homepna card in my linux box with an ethernet card. The linux box will still be dhcp server. The ethernet port can then be connected to a wireless access point. I have to buy a couple of pci wireless cards and a pcmcia card ( the ethernet is cheap at 10 dollars). The total cost (excluding the wireless access point) is slightly higher than the cost of a homepna ethernet bridge. I use the network to stream videos from 1 PC to another (PC2 is like the video server) and I can play the videos on any of the other PC. A 1mbps network is too slow. My current setup with the 10 mbps homepnas is adequate. Will a wireless solution (i know it is advertised at 11 mbps) be adequate as real world performance is usually slower than advertised specs? Thanks

 

[rw120555]

How well wireless works depends on your physical surroundings. I wouldn't trust an all-wireless setup in my house but I have a big older house. It may work fine for you. In my home network, I find the ethernet part works best, followed by hpna, followed by wireless.

As I mentioned at one point, you could probably work out something with a crossover cable that would be cheaper while keeping your hpna stuff. Does Linux support bridging connections, like WinXp does? If so, it would be easy. Otherwise, with one of your Winxp machines, do this:

* Install ethernet card. Keep current hpna card.
* Go into network connections. Select both the hpna and ethernet. Right click. Choose bridge connections.
* Hpna and ethernet will now behave as a single network.
* Connect WAP to ethernet card. Get wireless card for laptop.

Total cost should be under $200. HPNA machines continue to connect via hpna, Laptop connects via wireless, no need to get rid of pc4. Main downside is your WinXP "bridge machine" (the one with both hpna and ethernet cards) has to stay on all the time, otherwise you'll lose the wireless. A separate hpna/ethernet bridge would be more convenient but would cost more.

Of course, if your Linux will let you bridge connections, that would be great, because this machine has to be on all the time anyway.

Of course, you may just want to skip all the complexity and go all-wireless. But, it is possible to mix and match different networking technologies, and sometimes you may want to do so if reception or cost are issues.

 

[rw120555]

p.s. everything I just described requires equipment that you would buy anyway for switching to an all-wireless network (ethernet card, WAP, wireless client card for laptop, crossover cable). So, you could always try the above, and then if you didn't like it or it didn't work, you could then go ahead and buy the wireless client cards for your other machines.

 

[cisip]

Thats a great idea. I was thinking about the same thing but dismissed the idea because I assumed it was impossible hence manufacturers came up with the expensive homepna-ethernet bridge. I have Win XP in one machine but it is the home edition. I can maintain my current setup keeping the Linux Box the same and then just turn on the WinXP box (where the WAP will be connected via ethernet) when I want to roam via laptop. If I get this working then my next linux project would be to investigate the possibility of bridging networks like you said then my Linux Box will act like a router homepna bridge. If I understand the terminology right, my linux box is considered a router in my network setup. I will try this first. I am also interested in the use of the crossover like you mentioned. I wonder if its too complicated. Thanks Again for your advice. Price wise I think the Linksys WAP11 is cheaper so I will get that. Staples has an ethernet card for 10 dollars.

 

[cisip]

The MR314 went on sale upto midnight tonight. I wonder if this will work just as well. It seems to be a combination wireless access point and router.

 

[rw120555]

Well actually this solution is more expensive because it requires a $1,000 pc instead of a $100 bridge But since you already have the PC, you're set there. Anyway, if you can get this to work ok, it is a nice intermediate step, because (a) if your laptop gets terrible reception, you'll know you don't want all wireless (b) if you get tired of needing an always-on bridge machine, you can splurge and buy the pe102 or equivalent.

Here is an excerpt from the XP help that explains the logic of bridging -- you can get this and more by searching for help on "Using a mixed network environment." If you were using a winxp server instead of Linux I am sure you could make this work, but I'm guessing you can make it fly anyway. And if not, you haven't bought anything you wouldn't have bought anyway. In your case, you'd be bridging HPNA and ethernet networks (ethernet because your wap plugs into an ethernet card; the wap itself is an ethernet to 802.11b bridge.)

Incidnetally, instead of crossover cable, I think PC1, PC2, and Wap could all be connected to a switch. Main advantage is that pc1 and pc2 would then communicate at 100MB instead of 10MB, in case you want that.

Good luck. Following is the WinXP help excerpt:

------
Using a mixed network environment. When planning your home or small office network, you might want to use a combination of Ethernet, wireless, and home phoneline network adapter (HPNA). For example, you might have two computers in adjoining rooms that are connected using Ethernet adapters and a network hub. If you have other computers in other areas of your home or small office, you can connect those computers to the network using a home phoneline network adapter (HPNA) or wireless network adapter.

In this example, there are two computers in adjoining rooms that are connected using Ethernet network adapters, cables, and a hub. One of these computers is running either Windows XP Home Edition or Windows XP Professional. There is a third computer in your child's bedroom, and a fourth computer in the den. The bedroom and den computers each have a home phoneline network adapter (HPNA) installed and are on a network together. To connect the two HPNA computers with the Ethernet computers, install a home phoneline network adapter (HPNA) in the Ethernet computer that is running Windows XP. If your laptop computer has a wireless network adapter, you can join it to the network as well by installing a wireless network adapter in one other computer on the network that is running Windows XP.

In a mixed network, also called a multi-segment network, one or more computers have multiple network adapters. Windows XP Professional and Windows XP Home Edition have network bridging, which allows the computers and devices on each of the network segments to communicate with each other. Without network bridging, the computers connected using Ethernet can only talk to each other, and the same for computers using HPNA or wireless. Network bridging makes each of these network segments transparent and appear as one continuous network.

By default, the Network Setup Wizard automatically creates a bridge when multiple network adapters are found on a Windows XP computer. The Network Setup Wizard does not bridge a network adapter that is connected to an external DSL or cable modem.

 

[rw120555]

The mr314 might be good because it has built-in switch and wireless. But if you do get it, you'll probably have to disable dhcp, ie. both the mr314 and the linux box can't be trying to assign ip addresses. The mr314 could be handy if you ever get cable or dsl in the future. It could probably all be made to work, but it sure would be easier if you had cable or dsl now! The Linux box and the dial-up are the main things that make me a little uncertain -- I'm thinking this should all work, but I've never tried anything quite like it.

 

[cisip]

I hope your still online. The netgear MR314 just went on sale and I was wondering if this would fit my network. IT is a cable dsl router but If I can connect the ethernet cable from the WinXP box to it and use it as a wireless access point, this kinda expands my options for the future. It has a 4 port switch built in. Thanks

 

[rw120555]

We're just missing each other on our messages! yes, I'm thinking the MR314 can work, with dhcp disabled. Scenario 1: Pc1 (linux) and Pc2 both connect to Mr314 (both need ethernet cards). Then, on either pc1 or pc2, you bridge the hpna/ethernet connection, and that machine will provide th ebridge to your other hpna machines. Pc1 and pc2 now communicate at 100MB.

Scenario 2: Add ethernet card to some Winxp machine besides pc1. This machine has an HPNA card to. Bridge hpna and ethernet. Connect the mr314 to it.

In other words, you could just avoid using all the added features of the mr314 (router with dhcp, built in switch) and use it the same way you would any WAP. Save those features for the future. But, you can probably get some use out of the switch aspect now, e.g. I think scenario 1 will probably work.

Incidentally, even if it costs a little more, I'd rather have separate wap/router, because the wap is then easier to place. But if it is a great deal on the mr314, it may be worth it.

 

[cisip]

Thanks. I jumped on the deal and ordered the MR314 bundle (includes the MA401 pc card). The whole package with shipping and tax is about 160 dollars. I did find out some articles on Linux Network Bridging. I might be able to get it to work there too but it will take more work than in Windwos XP. I have a free ISA slot yet on PC1 (Pentium P200). Thanks Again for your help.

 

[rw120555]

Sounds good. Just remember, my guess is you probably need to disable dhcp on the mr314, otherwise your linux box and the mr314 may get into conflicts. Also, do NOT use the WAN port of the MR314 -- only a cable or dsl modem should be plugged into that port.

If you can get Linux bridging to work, that would be ideal. But, hopefully, you'll get it to work one way or another!

 

[cisip]

I am anxiously waiting for the MR314. Meanwhile I am assembling all the other equipment. I am heaving a hard time finding an isa 10/100 mpbs ethernet card. Neither LInksys or Netgear carry ISA 10/100 mbps. I saw an Intel 100 Pro TX ISA adapter. Do you have any recommendatios for an isa 10/100 mpbs ethernet card ? Thanks

 

[rw120555]

There is always some complication! You might try starting a new thread for this. But I wonder, couldn't you just buy one of those USB/ethernet adapters if you get desperate? Biggest downside is that that machine would be maxed out at around a 10MB transfer speed.

 

[cisip]

I'll take your advice and start a new thread. Although I have PCI slots they are all used up and I dont have any usb. I may just have to pull out the promise ata card and settle for slower hard drive performance if I cant find a 10/100 isa ethernet card. This project can wait though. If everything else works out then I will just be using the WinXP bridge whenever I use the laptop until an ISA card comes up or I get the energy to open my P200 and mess up my linux config. Thanks Again.