Another Wireless Question... Sorry!

Hi folks,

Apologies if this kind of thing has been asked before - I've trawled
Google Groups but I've found so many conflicting answers it has left me
very confused!

I live in in an old farmhouse in Wales which consists of the main house
and a 'granny annexe'. In the main house we currently have a wireless
ADSL modem which allows us to connect to the net from our two laptops
around the house. All works fine and dandy.

In the near future, a relative will be moving into the granny annexe.
I'd like for her to be able to join our wireless network and therefore
use our broadband connection. The bad news is that between the main
house and the annexe is an old stone wall that's about 3ft thick. The
good news is that there is space enough, in one part of the wall, to
feed a CAT5 cable through. However, we'd like the annexe to be a
wireless area, rather than wired.

My thought was that I'd therefore be able to get a set of devices to
join two wireless areas together using a crossover cable, e.g.:

WALL
||||||||||||||||||||
Wireless DEVICE A-----------------------------DEVICE B Wireless
MAIN HOUSE |||||||||||||||||||| ANNEXE


I suppose my first question should be "is this possible?".

Secondly, if it is, what devices should I be using - two wireless
bridges or two access points? This is the issue that has left me most
confused.

Hope somebody can help - many thanks in advance for your time!

All the best,

Chris Wood

On 4 Jun 2005 02:19:12 -0700, 553-(E-Mail Removed) wrote:

>I suppose my first question should be "is this possible?".

Anything is possible, it's only money! most of the time anyways.


>Secondly, if it is, what devices should I be using - two wireless
>bridges or two access points? This is the issue that has left me most
>confused.

You need two Access Points that are capable of doing bridging. Not all
of them do, but some models yes.

In addition, u need to attach these to 2 high-gain unidirectional
antennas. U will have to find the antennas yourself. Google.

At the end, if you are not comfortable taking apart the AP or have to
build these antennas yourself, then perhaps it'd be easier just to run
the CAT5 u are trying to avoid.

Thanks for the response, bobb!

Unfortunately, I'm not sure I made my problem clear enough.
Essentially, what I'd like to do is use a wired bridge to bridge two
wireless areas. The wireless network should all use the same SSID.

Maybe this image would explain things a little more clearly:

http://chris.wood.name/wireless.gif

Same question again: is this possible and, if so, what devices should I
use?

Thanks again!

Chris

On 7 Jun 2005 05:30:56 -0700, 553-(E-Mail Removed) wrote:

>Thanks for the response, bobb!
>
>Unfortunately, I'm not sure I made my problem clear enough.
>Essentially, what I'd like to do is use a wired bridge to bridge two
>wireless areas. The wireless network should all use the same SSID.
>
>Maybe this image would explain things a little more clearly:
>
>http://chris.wood.name/wireless.gif
>
>Same question again: is this possible and, if so, what devices should I
>use?
>
>Thanks again!
>
>Chris

An interesting question. I think what you want is an access point on
one side that connects to a repeater on the other using a wired
connection; only that's not how its usually done. Maybe an access
pont connected to a bridge with the WiFi card on the bridge's side set
to ad hoc? Can someone else here confirm this?

I don't see why this can't be done with the right HW, perhaps some
experimentation with some combo accesspoints that support Access
point, bridge, repeater mode & WDS. Give it a try or ask some
manufacturers. Tell us if you find the solution.