Re: Suggestion on WLAN setup

"contact_mahajan" <contact_mahajan.2vmoic@no-mx.wirelessforums.org> wrote in
message news:contact_mahajan.2vmoic@no-mx.wirelessforums.org...
>
> Hello Friends,
>
> I need your suggestion on WAP to use in office while implementing WLAN.
> I have tried Cisco 1200 Aironets before for public wireless but things I
> want to implement in WLAN are totally missing in these Aironets. Thats
> why I need your help, so please suggest me.
>
> I need WAP which has following features:
> 1. 802.11 a/b/g compatible
> 2. Good Encryption (encryption which can be applied without additional
>
> hardware like WPA-PSK or something you can suggest.
> 3. MAC address filter
> 4. No SSID broadcast
> 5. Monitoring if possible
>
> Thanks in advance.
>
> Gigs

Hi,

What size office? How many computers will be connected?

If you are talking small where consumer hardware will work, I've been very
happy with my 802.11a/gb DWL-7100AP's. They do everything in your list.
I'm not sure what type of monitoring you mean, but if you mean efficiency
monitoring then they also support SNMP. I use an SNMP program to keep an
eye on how they are doing. They do WPA-PSK (TKIP/AES) and even WPA-EAP
(Radius). Like everything else these days, they also do MAC filtering. I
used to use MAC filtering, regarding it at as an additional (paper thin!)
layer of "security", but don't anymore. The extra hassle of having to add
new entries to the MAC table all the time wasn't worth the almost neglible
extra layer of "security" it provides (to me).

Is your reasoning for not wanting to broadcast an SSID for administrative
reasons or for "security" reasons? I guess turning it off is an option if
you don't want every single employee to be able to see it (without extra
effort), but it is really better to broadcast your SSID. There is no
"security" gained by not broadcasting it. In fact, not broadcasting it
could even make it look like more of a interesting "target" for the
passerby...