Networking an Apartment using 802.11a AND 802.11b ..let's have some fun...

[Goosemaster]

At the moment there are 6 of us sharing our place, and i have an SMC barricade 4 port router.

Unfortunately, routing through walls and having cables alll over the place serves mainly to depreciate the view, so I was looking into wireless.


Most likely I'll buy the Access point myself as I love new toys and will eventually give it to the folks, so I will probably get them to pitch in to buy me a card in exchange for using to share out dsl or t1 connection


My question is concerning the dualband equipment. Out of all the dualband access points, which to you see as the BEST.


linksys's offering is nice while I am more inclined to bet on Netgear's "BayNetworks" reputation...


Anyone car to help out?


by the way.....wireless 72Mbps would be WICKED!!

 

[Goosemaster]

appearantly all of them are just access point so I guess I'll just keep the 4-port router and use the other ports for the DMZ game server and such

 

[Goosemaster]

By the way, I am looking for an 802.11a AND 802.211b router if there is such a thing...


access points are fine though...


By the way, Netgear makes dualband pcmia cards now




One last question I did have was concerning the adapters. Should I expect crappy performance with the adapters without an antenna?



Most likely I will be getting the 54Mbps adapter as I need to access the server all the time (I use it for work and website stuff) so everyone else might just get 802.11b cards

 

[Goosemaster]

I was looking at gettingThis card for myself etc.

Scratch the router idea...$400 is WAY too much....I think the Linksys seems to be the only dualband router available so far

 

[JackMDS]

Some of the new cards like the Netgear WAB501, and SMC2335W, are 802.11b, and 802.11a bus cards.

They will work with either the old 802.11b AP at 11Mb/sec. or with the new 802.11a AP at 72Mb/sec. The Cards are coming this month into the market with price of about $120-$140.

However I should suggest you rethink the idea.

From a point of view of Interent, and games it make no difference as long as only 2-3 people use the AP Connection at the same time.

If you plan for more then 3 people on the AP, or if you are involved in heavy LAN work with the other computers you will need to spend the top $$$$.

 

[Goosemaster]

thanks

 

[Goosemaster]

we are still thinking about it....since I will be buying the AP, I was going to get something GOOD..real good

and some/just me if not all of us will use 802.11b cards..for the mean time


WE might be sharing alot of files in the future too....so that would clog up everything....



A question I did have was about the bandwidth...


72Mbps to whom...everyone? can the AP really handle 72Mbps(9MBps) x 64 = 576MB/s



That is unbelievable

 

[Aquaman]

Any good 'guides' on how to set up a wireless network?

Cheers,
Aquaman

 

[Garion]

The 72Mb/s (or 11Mb/s) is shared among all the users of the wireless network, and, in some cases, you won't get the full bandwidth available. Remember that 802.11a is very sensitive to walls and obstructions whereas 802.11b penetrates much better.

- G

 

[JackMDS]

Originally posted by: Aquaman
Any good 'guides' on how to set up a wireless network?

Cheers,
Aquaman

You can start here: AnandTech - FAQ. What do I need for wireless Networking?

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Garion
The 72Mb/s (or 11Mb/s) is shared among all the users of the wireless network, and, in some cases, you won't get the full bandwidth available. Remember that 802.11a is very sensitive to walls and obstructions whereas 802.11b penetrates much better.

- G

so basically it will suck somewhat in an apartment..there is NO line of sight.....just a maze of walls...there will be no doors, so can it bounce off the walls?


Also, after checking benchmarks, it seems that 20Mbps is basically what I can expect, which is fairly reasonable I think.



Thanks

 

[Aquaman]

I think it depends on what the walls are made of. I have a friend who has concrete walls and his is not as far ranging as a friend who has wood & drywall walls

Cheers,
Aquaman

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Aquaman
I think it depends on what the walls are made of. I have a friend who has concrete walls and his is not as far ranging as a friend who has wood & drywall walls

Cheers,
Aquaman

WE have drywall


Sharing a dsl lone SUCKS though....



Might need to use QoS

 

[Goosemaster]

now DSL REALLY sucks....pings of 1000ms+ and everyone on the line gets at max 10KB/s

 

[Garion]

Originally posted by: Goosemaster
now DSL REALLY sucks....pings of 1000ms+ and everyone on the line gets at max 10KB/s

Good money says someone's got a P2P app running in the background and is hammering your upload and download caps. You shouldn't see pings that high!

- G

 

[Goosemaster]

Originally posted by: Garion

Originally posted by: Goosemaster
now DSL REALLY sucks....pings of 1000ms+ and everyone on the line gets at max 10KB/s

Good money says someone's got a P2P app running in the background and is hammering your upload and download caps. You shouldn't see pings that high!

- G

Actually, DSL went down today, and whosever computer it was was on the subnet, which got disconnected and did not reconnect automatically....


Pings of 35ms from yahoo...not bad

 

[Goosemaster]

No one is home right now, and on the line, 128/640, I am getting an average of 1.3 Mb/s





heh



I have a lot of 0c3's at work though