Providing connectivity to a Sony Bravia with a burned-out dongle

[Markbnj]

Hey guys. My old man has a Sony Bravia with a failed wireless dongle. The dongle is no longer sold by Sony, and although it appears to connect to a standard USB port he was told that an off-the-shelf dongle will not work.

The TV has an ethernet port, but is too far from the router/cable modem to run wire. A Crutchfield tech recommended a powerline ethernet solution, but I was fairly sure we must be able to find an external wireless adapter of some kind that we could plug ethernet into.

Based on some research I advised him to try a TrendNet TEW-637AP, because it seemed that it could operate as a remote base station in WDS mode, allowing the TV to cable in to the LAN port and bridge over to the wireless router. However we haven't even been able to get through the config procedure. The procedure is centered around the extension use case and asks for the unit to be cabled into the router for the second phase of the setup (the first being connecting it to a laptop and running the supplied CD). For whatever reason it seems to find the unit but the configure function remains disabled. Not sure if that is because of the odd (to me anyway) 10.0.0.x subnet his Comcast router has set up, or some other reason.

Has anyone used this unit who can advise whether our use case is actually possible? Is there another solution I haven't stumbled on yet?

Thanks!

 

[Fardringle]

Do you know the exact model number of the TV?

 

[KingFatty]

Can't you use a spare wireless router, set it in the mode where it can pick up the internet wirelessly from your original router, and then distribute the internet from that spare router to your TV that would be plugged into a LAN port of the spare wireless router via a cable? As in, put that spare wireless router right next to the TV to serve as a giant dongle, and then run the cable from that router to the TV. Perhaps set that router as a switch/access point so your original router will do the routing.

 

[Markbnj]

Fardringle, I can get the model of the TV tomorrow. The model of the dongle is: Sony Model UWA-BR100 USB USB Wireless LAN adapter.

KingFatty, my Dad doesn't have a spare router. He could get one, but I think that scenario is basically what we were hoping to achieve with the Trendnet AP.

 

[Eug]

Can't you use a spare wireless router, set it in the mode where it can pick up the internet wirelessly from your original router, and then distribute the internet from that spare router to your TV that would be plugged into a LAN port of the spare wireless router via a cable? As in, put that spare wireless router right next to the TV to serve as a giant dongle, and then run the cable from that router to the TV. Perhaps set that router as a switch/access point so your original router will do the routing.

Yes use a WiFi to Ethernet bridge, or else a router configured as such.

Or else try powerline.

I'd try the bridge route first though if you can get a decently priced one. If he's doing it himself, and isn't that tech savvy, it can be confusing trying to configure a router to do this. Ironically though, a cheap router is usually cheaper than a dedicated bridge.

Powerline is dead simple though, when it works. Just plug it in and go. True plug and play.

BTW, I was looking through the description of the TEW-637AP. I couldn't find any mention about support for what the OP trying to do. Are you sure it's built for that?

 

[ch33zw1z]

worst case scenario, I would use a DDWRT compatible router and set up a client bridge. I used this for many hardwired devices in the past (mostly xbox 360's)

Or just buy an "off the shelf" bridge

something along these lines: http://www.amazon.com/Belkin-Univer...8&qid=1408191522&sr=1-9&keywords=wi-fi+bridge

not specifically that one, but something like that.