another newbie - simple q

stanbowles

have eircom bb for a few years now with a cayman 3300 adsl modem
have just purchased a s/h old sony vaio with a D-Link AirPlus G DWL-G630 wireless card adapter and want to get it to share my bb connection wirelessly in the house

can anyone on Boards
1/ recommend a decent router that I can simply attach to the Cayman adsl modem (see that Linksys WRT54G
recommended in another thread...sound?)
2/ advise re any potential pitfalls (i am bald from tearing out my hair when trying to upgrade computer / comms facilities at home) and specifically if there likely to be any compatibility probs say getting a Linksys router attached to a Cayman Adsl modem to communicate with a D-Link wireless card ...?

Thanks for any feedback. You will have made a bald man very happy.

Stan

KdjaCL

Just buy a Modem/Router

I have the Dlink bundle €90 in PC world with 1 USB dongle or 100 in Argos.

Easy to setup for Eircom (its inc in the setup disc). Its as simple as plug in and go.


kdjac

MunsterCycling

Welcome to Wireless stan*bald*bowles...;)

Do you have the exact model number handy there stan? Just flip the modem and it should be on the info plate underneath.

If not, how many ports are on it (usb, ethernet), does it have a DHCP server, NAT server etc. If this sounds like chinese then don't worry it did to me too. :eek:

stanbowles

thanks munster cycling and kdjac,

to answer munster's qs:

The adsl modem is the standard Cayman Netopia 3341 that they used to give a few years ago to everybody who went broadband. Slotswise, it has
1 phone jack slot, currently wired to my main phone line junction
1 USB slot, currently wired to back of my main PC
1 empty ethernet slot ... can I connect a wireless router to this in order to beam wireless signal throughout the house?

Re DCHP, NAT server, not sure...

Stan

dub45

stanbowles wrote:

thanks munster cycling and kdjac,

to answer munster's qs:

The adsl modem is the standard Cayman Netopia 3341 that they used to give a few years ago to everybody who went broadband. Slotswise, it has
1 phone jack slot, currently wired to my main phone line junction
1 USB slot, currently wired to back of my main PC
1 empty ethernet slot ... can I connect a wireless router to this in order to beam wireless signal throughout the house?

Re DCHP, NAT server, not sure...

Stan

Unless you are into getting cable anytime soon an all in one would be a better buy I think - (a router offers more flexibility obviously for future change) but given the relatively small difference price wise nowadays the all in one makes more sense and is much easier to set up.

Something like the links wag54g or netgear 834gt would be worth looking at.

MunsterCycling

stanbowles wrote:

thanks munster cycling and kdjac,

to answer munster's qs:

The adsl modem is the standard Cayman Netopia 3341 that they used to give a few years ago to everybody who went broadband. Slotswise, it has
1 phone jack slot, currently wired to my main phone line junction
1 USB slot, currently wired to back of my main PC
1 empty ethernet slot ... can I connect a wireless router to this in order to beam wireless signal throughout the house?

Re DCHP, NAT server, not sure...

Stan

To update the 3341 has DHCP and NAT.
Use 192.168.1.254 to load the default web-config page.

You can connect the ethernet socket to the wireless router and use wireless to connect around the house, you will need to turn off the NAT and DHCP in the 3341 and use these functions in the router otherwise you will have conflicts.

Plug your computer that you have connected via usb to the 3341 into the router via ethernet and that should be that. Depends what router you get of course, would reccomend a Linksys WRT54G.


Note: Do not have both the usb AND ethernet plugged in to the same computer.

You should have no probs connecting the D-Link AirPlus G DWL-G630 to any wireless router as it supports 802.11g and so do most wireless routers like the WRT54G.

If I've missed anything then remind me, and any probs then post them up.

http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=317 D-Link AirPlus G DWL-G630

Linksys WRT54G

stanbowles

thanks Munster! will order the linksys and get to work
hv a nice day, stan

MunsterCycling

stanbowles wrote:

thanks Munster! will order the linksys and get to work
hv a nice day, stan

Neh prob, let us know how you get on.

stanbowles

bought a linksys adsl home gateway wag354g yesterday in Argos, Dundrum SC and bring it home with view to replacing existing Netopia adsl modem (non gateway) with the linksys

only problem: my machine does not have an ethernet port so I cannot hook up the linksys to the back of the machine using the cables supplied. I have a five year old Dell, Pentium III but had not even considered the possibility that it did not have an ethernet port. It has a phone jack port that I thought was an ethernet port, doh.

Two queries: 1/ if I want to use the Linksys to replace the Netopia, is my only option to have an ethernet card / port put in the back of my computer?

2/ can I hook up the Netopia (which has an available ethernet port -as it is connected to the computer via USB cable) to the Linksys via ethernet cable in order to just use the wireless router capacity of the Linksys. That's all I want it for in fact?

Any assistance appreciated.
Stan even balder Bowles

MunsterCycling

stanbowles wrote:

bought a linksys adsl home gateway wag354g yesterday in Argos, Dundrum SC and bring it home with view to replacing existing Netopia adsl modem (non gateway) with the linksys

only problem: my machine does not have an ethernet port so I cannot hook up the linksys to the back of the machine using the cables supplied. I have a five year old Dell, Pentium III but had not even considered the possibility that it did not have an ethernet port. It has a phone jack port that I thought was an ethernet port, doh.

Two queries:
1/ if I want to use the Linksys to replace the Netopia, is my only option to have an ethernet card / port put in the back of my computer?

2/ can I hook up the Netopia (which has an available ethernet port -as it is connected to the computer via USB cable) to the Linksys via ethernet cable in order to just use the wireless router capacity of the Linksys. That's all I want it for in fact?

Any assistance appreciated.
Stan even balder Bowles

Do you want to use the linksys via wireless with the Dell or is it just the Vaio using wifi link? Does to sony have an ethernet port? (Need this to config router, can be done over wifi but can prove tricky)

Answer to 1/:

Well the best option would be to install an network card as it will allow you to drop the Netopia out of the equation, really simple to do, did it myself on an old Dell about 2 months ago. What OS are you using and what spec is the PC? Cards come with driver cd so anything from 98SE to XP Pro covered. Can't believe that your PC came with USB but no network port. You sure it doesn't have onboard lan port?

If you are at all anxious about doing this yourself then ask around, surely there is someone on boards.ie who will fit it for you for free but maybe for the cost of a pint or two.

Cost of network card 8.95 in Maplin for a White Box version (Maplin own non-brand) was just looking at them this afternoon which will be grand, no need to spend bigger money on a card.


Answer to 2/:

Short answer is.... Ummmm Dunno actually, seeing as this is a Modem/Router then I presume it has a phone line WAN socket rather than the ethernet WAN that you get on a BB router, just having a quick glance at the installation guide...

stanbowles

thanks Munster,

no ethernet port nowhere I'm afraid, will bring it into work and have an ethernet card installed ... and take it from there

i will get this to work:o

stanbowles

ethernet card installed yesterday in my old dell and today, have managed to install the linksys wag354g to replace the old netopia adsl modem (eventually, what a mullarkey ... failure messages all over the place with their easy install, telling me that no internet connection could be made when I was already online etc)

so internet on the dell desktop is working fine via the linksys gear

also the laptop sony vaio picks up the linksys signal fairly reliably but...

cannot do anything with the signal as the router configuration does not seem to have worked and as a result IExplorer just gives the usual error messages when I try and open webpages on the sony vaio

SO MY QUESTION: given that there is a wireless signal, is there a manual way of configuring both the dell desktop and the vaio portable (I guess this is a matter of IP addresses, DNS server names?, DHCP settings etc) so that the vaio can see webpages

thanks folks for any feedback
stan

MunsterCycling

Emm would you by any chance have encription turned on and forgotten to setup this on the sony or have you made sure the network key is correct on the sony???

Sounds like an authentication problem.

Try turning off the encription on the router to check this if the vaio connects then you have sourced the problem. Re-enter the net key in both the router and laptop making sure you observe caps etc (easiest way is to use copy and paste from .txt file.

stanbowles

hi munster,

managed to sort it out in the end .though not really sure how!.. i think the problem was that I was trying to set up IP addresses rather than let the machines talk to eachother and sort this out themselves

on the nth time reinstalling from scratch everything seemed to work out and I am happily typing this note downstairs on the little sony vaio in front of the box

grma

stan

MunsterCycling

Ah the glory that is DHCP, when it works it works but when it doesn't your bollix'd!