I've got a home network with a few boxes on a wired network and a few more on a wireless network. They are all the same "logical" network. To bridge the wirless/wired media I'm using Lucent Technology's Orinoco Residential Gateway. For the wireless clients I've got:
1 laptop with an Orinoco PCMCIA wireless NIC 2 Desktop PC's with linksys USB wireless network interface. The linksys USB clients work with the Orinoco RG, they are all 802.11. Linksys has a good example of how to configure their stuff to work with the Orinoco RG on their web page. Here are some of the pluses and minuses not in any particular order, just as I think of them sort of ad hoc. o The Orinico stuff is more expensive. It's also more difficult install in a desktop. The client NICS are 'PCMCIA' cards which require a PCMCIA thingy to be installed first. Not a big deal, but, you will needs tools and a some knowledge of how to work on a PC without making it worse. I would also say that the Orinico stuff is generally better. Not just because I work for Lucent, the range is measureably better with my PCMCIA client as opposed to my linksys USB clients. There is a lot of discussion to this effect on news groups. The Orinoco stuff is very stable. I've never had a case where it mysteriously stopped working. I would say that for serious work, the Orinoco wireless stuff is definitely usable. Oh, and it works with linux. o The linksys USB stuff is very easy to get going on a desktop. I bought two of them for my kid's PCs, both of which had USB ports. Just plug in, load software, use it. At least that was the theory. It took me a while to find out how to make them work with the Orinoco. If I were to do it again, it would be very very easy; no tools or major reconfiguration required. Because they are desk top PCs which don't move around and they are very close the RG, they work OK. At first, the RG was on the other side of the house and the linksys clients had some performance issues. Moving the RG to a room under the kid's rooms helped a lot. There have been times when doing a large file copy that the linksys interface seemed to just stop working and required a reboot to get it back. I would consider this to be stability problem that for serious applications is unacceptable. I can't say for sure if it is a problem with the linksys hardware/firmware/software as they are both windows boxes. Who knows what's going on under that hood. For my kids (who just use them to goof around) computers, I don't care -- ____ __ | 0|___||. Andrew Gaunt *nix Sys. Admin., etc. _| _| : : } [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://www-cde.mv.lucent.com/~quantum -(O)-==-o\ [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://www.gaunt.org "Tilly, Lawrence" wrote: > > Good morning, all. > > A coworker and I were just discussing home networks. We both work at home > regularly and use our cable (AT&T) for VPN connection to work. My coworker > is curious about the wireless routers on the market. Her biggest concern is > if they are stable enough for business critical work (ie, if she's in the > middle of running a remote installation or configuration, we cannot have a > lost connection). Now, I know nothing's 100% stable (we have each lost our > cable connection at the worse time) but it should be pretty reliable. If it > matters, she's looking to connect a total of three computers, all on the > same floor. > > I (we) would appreciate any input from the group that have experience with > the wireless home network systems. If you could please let me know the > brand/model you use and your opinion / experiences. > > advTHANKSance!!! > > Lawrence Tilly > Middleware Support > Liberty Mutual Insurance Group I/S > * [EMAIL PROTECTED] > * 603-245-4246 > > ***************************************************************** > To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > with the text 'unsubscribe gnhlug' in the message body. > ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the text 'unsubscribe gnhlug' in the message body. *****************************************************************
