Best home wireless solution?

Hi there, I was just hoping someone could help me out with choosing what hardware setup to do for my home network! If that's not the way y'all work here, disregard this thread

Currently I've got 3 desktops and 2 laptops all wired through a hub. This will soon be extended to 3 laptops and I figure it's time to go wireless because hey, they are laptops.

My internet connection is a 56k connection which comes in through one of the desktop PC's. This is important because any solution I end up with MUST be able to share this internet connection. Also of course, I need to be able to browse/share files and access the printer which is on the same wired desktop as the printer.

I had thought that I could replace the hub with a wired/wireless combination... thing, but I hear they have DHCP which could mess up the DHCP provided by Windows Internet Connection Sharing. This way is good because that way I could get coverage over my entire home.

The other solution I thought of would be getting a USB wifi adaptor for the desktop machine with the Internet Connection and using it as a network bridge. Is this doable? I want to hook up 3 laptops at once (and more devices, DSs, PSPs, phones etc...) to it so I think what I need is an Access Point, is there such a thing as a USB access point?

Any help is greatly appreciated.

You could get a wireless access point and plug it into the hub, and add USB adapters to all of the laptops. The design of a hub means you will probably want to replace it with a switch in order to achieve the best performance, especially with the wireless network otherwise it will receive all of the traffic sent between the desktops. Access points simply bridge your wireless clients into an existing network, and while most are able to run as a DHCP server, they do not usually have it enabled by default.

An alternative and probably better method is to buy a wireless router. This is essentially a four port switch, access point and router in the same box. You could use this to connect your desktops, and also provide wireless access to the laptops. Because you are on dial-up, just leave the WAN port disconnected on the router and if you ever get broadband down the track you already have a suitable router to use.

Routers include a DHCP server and it is usually enabled by default, but once you configure it just turn this feature off to stop interfereing with Windows ICS. They also ususally cost less than an access point and switch put together, plus have less boxes and cabling to worry about.

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Jeremy

Marlborough WiFi Project

Thanks a bunch NZLamb! I'll go with the combo router idea.

While I'm here though, do you have any good suggestions for brands? Initially I had chosen out some D-Link products but I've had people suggest Linksys to me, but I've had just as many people tell me to steer clear of Linksys.

Also, I decided to go with PCMCIA wireless cards for the laptops because they will be used at libraries, universities, etc, and I wanted something that was as unobtrusive as possible. Is this a good idea?

Linksys, D-Link, Netgear are all pretty reasonable and recommended. Stay clear of the really cheap obscure brands like 'Pheenet', etc.

PCMCIA wireless cards are also fine, I personally think they tend to be more reliable than USB ones.

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Jeremy

Marlborough WiFi Project

I ended up getting a D-Link DSL-G604T router and DWL-G630 PCMCIA cards for the laptops and everything is working great (after a bit of fiddling) Thanks for the help!