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BUYING A WIRELESS ROUTER

You might be asking what features should I look for in a wireless router. You will have to ask yourself some questions first.

1. Do you currently have a 802.11b or 802.11g wireless adapter?

2. Do you want to connect remotely to your office network?

3. Do you live in an apartment or house?

4. What security features are you looking for?

5. Do you have desktop computers to connect also?

If you currently have a 802.11g wireless adapter you will want to purchase a 802.11g wireless router so you can maximize your network speed at 54mbps. 802.11g adapters will also connect to 802.11b wireless routers but you will only have a network speed of 11mbps. This speed you still be fine for the majority of users, most public wireless access points use 802.11b.

Connecting securely to your home office will require a technology called a VPN or virtual private network. Most routers will claim to have the ability to use VPN’s but when you attempt to connect you receive nothing buy errors. So you will want to purchase a wireless router that will specifically designed for wireless and VPN technology. Once you have purchased your wireless router you need to get the latest firmware updates from the manufacture.

Wireless router security could fill up volumes so I will keep it as “simple” as possible. The following are some basic features that are on most routers:

1. Disabling SSID broadcasting

2. Change your default SSID

3. Enable WEP encryption

4. Enable MAC address filtering

If you enable the above you will discourage most “hackers” from even looking at your wieless network. There are too many wide open networks that don’t need any brainwork to get into.

The following are some of the more advanced Security features on newer routers with updated firmware.

1. WPA - WPA is the solution to all of WEP’s security flaws. WEP uses one key to for all network traffic. A hacker can exploit this by using a network analyzer to capture the key. WPA changes the key with every data frame so once a hacker captures the key it has already been changed by WPA. WPA uses tools such as TKIP and AES encryption.

2. WPA-PSK (Wireless Protected Area pre shared key) This is really easy to set up just copy your shared key to router and adapter and your set.

3. TKIP - The second best version of encryption for WPA

4. AES - This is the highest version of encryption for WPA

5. WPA -RADIUS uses a RADIUS server to authenticate users which adds another layer of security. Linksys does offer a service to for $5.00 month per user to use their RADIUS server. If you have no clue what you just read then don’t worry about it.

Wired security will include NAT ( Network Address Translation) this takes your public IP address and converts it into multiple private IP addresses. Some people consider this a firewall but it isn’t because it doesn’t block unwanted outgoing addresses.

Another newer feature is Called MIMO (Multi in Multi out) the basic concept of this your router or access point has more that just two antennas which enables your router to receive and send information at a greater rate. This creates signal reflections which could reduce dead spots in your network. Add on top of this SRX technology will automatically have your router switch to the clearest channel instead of staying on a channel with interference. The above will increase your range greatly and the increase the power of your signal.

Another router feature is POE (Power over Ethernet) this is a really good feature for business environment because you power your router through the Ethernet cable, which means you don’t need a power outlet.

One feature which is often over looked but one of the coolest features of a wireless router or access point is the ability of act as a wireless bridge. If you have a huge ware house and you need to connect computers on either end of the warehouse you can use a wireless bridge to connect both ends with out running wires.

The main things to remember are: 802.11g is faster than 802.11b, enable the basic security features and finally choose the router that will fit your needs.

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If you already have a wireless network for your computers, you may be very interested in what’s coming next. Would you like it if your PDA, your mobile phone, your mp3 player and almost everything else you connect to your computer could be wireless too? It’s already a reality…

Personal Area Network.

Using wireless networking with your personal gadgets is often called PAN, which stands for Personal Area Network. The idea is that, in the future, we’ll all have laptop computers with their batteries charged and no more need to connect any wires to them at all — you just place your Bluetooth device near the computer, and the computer sees it and can use it straightaway.

Bluetooth has been around and in-use since 1999, and it’s only getting more popular. It was designed to be secure, low cost, and easy to use from day one.

There are two classes of Bluetooth that are in popular use: class 1 and class 2. Class 2 is the most common and cheaper standard, allowing you to use a device that is up to 10 metres (32 feet) away. Class 1 is rarer, but you can still find devices that use it easily enough, and it has ten times the range: 100 metres or 320 feet.

How Does It Work?

Bluetooth is more flexible than 802.11 wireless networking, in exchange for the shorter range. Essentially, a Bluetooth-enabled computer has one Bluetooth receiver installed in it, and this receiver can then be used with up to 7 nearby Bluetooth devices. On the other end, wireless devices do not need to have Bluetooth installed if they support it — it is already integrated.

Like 802.11, Bluetooth works by using radio signals to create bandwidth. It is not, though, the same thing as an old-style wireless mouse or keyboard, which required a receiver to be plugged into one of your computers’ ports, and didn’t have range or stability anywhere near that of Bluetooth.

Many computers now come with built in Bluetooth, especially Apple Macs. If you want to add Bluetooth to a computer that doesn’t come with it pre-installed, you should probably use a USB to Bluetooth adapter, although internal Bluetooth devices to install in your computer are available. If you have a laptop and a spare PCMCIA slot, you can get Bluetooth cards for that too.

What Can You Do With Bluetooth?

Mobile phones with Bluetooth are very popular, and so are PDAs — the instant synchronisation of addresses and calendars to a computer is a useful feature. Other than that, almost anything that would usually use USB can be done using Bluetooth, including digital cameras, mp3 players, printers, and even mice and keyboards. If you take a look through the comprehensive list of Bluetooth ‘profiles’ (kinds of devices that could, in theory, be Bluetooth enabled), it includes cordless phones, faxes, headsets, and even video.

Basically, more than anything, Bluetooth is a replacement for USB: some say that while 802.11 wireless networking is wireless Ethernet, Bluetooth is wireless USB.

Not Just for Computers.

Part of the power of Bluetooth is that it isn’t just used to connect things to computers — it can be used to connect almost anything to anything else, if both things are Bluetooth-enabled and recognise each other.

Mobile phones, in particular, take advantage of this. Hands-free headsets often use Bluetooth to communicate with the phone. Some cars, for example, now have on-board computers that will connect with a Bluetooth phone and allow you to make hands-free calls, regardless of where the phone is in the car (even if you’ve left it in your bag in the trunk!)

On top of that, of course, Bluetooth devices can communicate with each other. This has led to some people sending messages from their Bluetooth PDAs to others in close range — not an especially useful feature, but quite fun. This is called ‘bluejacking’, and the first recorded instance of it was a man who sent a Bluetooth message to another man’s Nokia phone while they were in a bank together. What did the message say? ‘Buy Ericsson’.

Since then, it has become possible to send images by bluejacking, and it is widely believed to be the newest advertising medium — yes, it lets billboards send messages to your phone, a practice known as ‘bluecasting’. Whether you think that’s cool or annoying, of course, is your choice.

Joe Byrne is a computer specialist specializing in network communications and Voice over Internet Protocol. Click on Voice over Internet Protocol for more information on VoIP.

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