On 20 Oct 2005 07:51:21 -0700, "brendacchio" <brendan@email.it> wrote:
>Hello all,
4 newsgroups? I just love to participate large cross postings.
>I am running a small wireless network (30 users) at my school and it
>seems that my D-Link 624 Wireless Router just can't cut it anymore.
How can you tell? Have you measured the reouter thruput? Have you
sniffed the traffic between the unspecified broadband connection and
the DI-624? Do you have *ANY* idea what's moving on your network?
>I am getting about 5-10 outages a day when the lab fills up.
Outages or spectacular slowdowns? There's a big difference.
My rule of thumb for wireless loading is:
100 light web and email users.
10 business type users.
1 file sharing user or worm infected computer.
How many *ACTIVE* laptops are running? Are you sure there aren't any
users that you don't know about such as students in the parking lot or
nearby neighbors? Have you looked at the log files or syslog? Do you
have
>I am
>thinking I need to upgrade to a more powerful router.
Powerful? Is the processor overloaded? Got any numbers as to how
many bytes/sec is going in each direction? Is your unspecified
broadband connection shared with other users or wireless contrivances
in the skool? Are they hogging the bandwidth?
>I tried to take
>an old PC, install FreeBSD (failed!) and Ubuntu (failed!), and get it
>to do NAT and Masquerading but I wasn't able to figure it out and I
>don't have the time to do all of the research. Perhaps Suse would be
>a viable option?
That's a little like polishing the chrome to make the car go better.
Perhaps you had better take a close look at what's moving on your
network, who's on your network, what's causing the slowdown, and
what's buried in the log files, before you tilt at windmills.
>Does anyone know how I can use this old computer as a simple router and
>hook up an access point?
If you insist, I use Freesco.
http://www.freesco.org
>What about the Apple Airport Extreme? Should
>that be able to handle the load? What's a good high-powered router
>that I can find in the €500 range? The students do not do anything
>out of the ordinary besides downloading and uploading photos and
>printing.
Incidentally, the DI-624 can do about 35Mbits/sec TCP thruput LAN to
WAN connection. If your unspecified broadband connection is that
fast, you might consider a different router. Meanwhile, Yves Leclerc
has the right idea. Go shopping for 2 more access points (or routers
configured as access points).
--
Jeff Liebermann 150 Felker St #D Santa Cruz CA 95060
831.336.2558 voice
http://www.LearnByDestroying.com AE6KS
http://802.11junk.com Skype: JeffLiebermann
jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us jeffl@cruzio.com 
Wireless Network with 30 clients 
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