Best wireless router & cards for high-speed cable connection?

I have just received a new Dell 8400 WinXP Media Center system (3.4
GHz, 2 GB RAM, TV tuner card). I have a fast (~4600 kbps) cable
connection (Adelphia internet and TV).

My main need is to connect my old computer, now in an adjacent room,
to the Internet. Am guessing that the best way is through a wireless
router. The walls are not thick, and should not be a problem.

If a wireless router is the best solution, what is the best one? There
seem to be three good deals available online, but am not sure which,
if any, would be the smartest purchase:

ViewSonic 802.11b/g 125HSM Wireless Network Router (Mfr# WR100) » only
$29.99 Shipped

D-Link DI-524 802.11G 54Mbps Wireless Cable/DSL Router 4-Port Switch »
only $19.99 + Free Shipping

Buffalo Airstation 54MBPS Wireless Cable/DSL Router (Mfr# WYR-G54) »
only $18.10 + Free Shipping

Also, what card(s) would be needed for both computers?

Thanks for all suggestions.

P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
(http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
wrong, of course).

Check to see that the routers are WIFI Certified (for interoperability
between brands).

I have seen issues where a DLINK router has had problems maintaing a
connection with an Intel wireless card that was integrated into a Toshiba
Laptop. Changed the router out with a WIFI certified router and all worked
consistently since...

ChrisS.

"newbee" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have just received a new Dell 8400 WinXP Media Center system (3.4
> GHz, 2 GB RAM, TV tuner card). I have a fast (~4600 kbps) cable
> connection (Adelphia internet and TV).
>
> My main need is to connect my old computer, now in an adjacent room,
> to the Internet. Am guessing that the best way is through a wireless
> router. The walls are not thick, and should not be a problem.
>
> If a wireless router is the best solution, what is the best one? There
> seem to be three good deals available online, but am not sure which,
> if any, would be the smartest purchase:
>
> ViewSonic 802.11b/g 125HSM Wireless Network Router (Mfr# WR100) » only
> $29.99 Shipped
>
> D-Link DI-524 802.11G 54Mbps Wireless Cable/DSL Router 4-Port Switch »
> only $19.99 + Free Shipping
>
> Buffalo Airstation 54MBPS Wireless Cable/DSL Router (Mfr# WYR-G54) »
> only $18.10 + Free Shipping
>
> Also, what card(s) would be needed for both computers?
>
> Thanks for all suggestions.
>
> P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
> connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
> in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
> (http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
> wrong, of course).

I find wireless way to flakey a connection. Do yourself a favour and punch a
small hole in the wall and run some ethernet wire in there. You'll save
yourself a lot of headaches.

"newbee" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have just received a new Dell 8400 WinXP Media Center system (3.4
> GHz, 2 GB RAM, TV tuner card). I have a fast (~4600 kbps) cable
> connection (Adelphia internet and TV).
>
> My main need is to connect my old computer, now in an adjacent room,
> to the Internet. Am guessing that the best way is through a wireless
> router. The walls are not thick, and should not be a problem.
>
> If a wireless router is the best solution, what is the best one? There
> seem to be three good deals available online, but am not sure which,
> if any, would be the smartest purchase:
>
> ViewSonic 802.11b/g 125HSM Wireless Network Router (Mfr# WR100) » only
> $29.99 Shipped
>
> D-Link DI-524 802.11G 54Mbps Wireless Cable/DSL Router 4-Port Switch »
> only $19.99 + Free Shipping
>
> Buffalo Airstation 54MBPS Wireless Cable/DSL Router (Mfr# WYR-G54) »
> only $18.10 + Free Shipping
>
> Also, what card(s) would be needed for both computers?
>
> Thanks for all suggestions.
>
> P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
> connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
> in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
> (http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
> wrong, of course).

On Sun, 15 May 2005 01:42:04 GMT, "Cats Ass"
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I find wireless way to flakey a connection. Do yourself a favour and punch a
>small hole in the wall and run some ethernet wire in there. You'll save
>yourself a lot of headaches.

Agreed, that is the "best way".

Any of the routers he listed should work though, and then
any decent name-brand card in the remote system. That's bad
for filesharing and backup purposes though, the wired option
is again the best when possible.

On Sun, 15 May 2005 00:59:35 GMT, newbee
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:


>P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
>connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
>in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
>(http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
>wrong, of course).

The best solution there is to forget that you have the media
center PC and connect the other one to the TV via video card
with TV-Out, and connect the two systems by wire, not
wireless. Wireless will inherantly be slower and suject to
occasional dropouts. The slower part also reduces the
quality you can send to the TV from the media center PC, but
is again a reason not to use low-quality high compression
rather pulling the files across the wired lan to be played
by the PC next to the TV.

The other thing about wireless, it it's often left "unsecured". They did a
news story here where a reporter and a guy with a laptop drove around
various areas looking for open connections.. It was quite interesting.

A chunk of enet cable won't be hacked unless someone's in you house and not
a 100' away.


"kony" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> On Sun, 15 May 2005 00:59:35 GMT, newbee
> <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>
> >P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
> >connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
> >in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
> >(http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
> >wrong, of course).
>
> The best solution there is to forget that you have the media
> center PC and connect the other one to the TV via video card
> with TV-Out, and connect the two systems by wire, not
> wireless. Wireless will inherantly be slower and suject to
> occasional dropouts. The slower part also reduces the
> quality you can send to the TV from the media center PC, but
> is again a reason not to use low-quality high compression
> rather pulling the files across the wired lan to be played
> by the PC next to the TV.
>

Check out US Robotics. Never had a problem with them. Also they had a
firmware upgrade a while back bringing speeds from 100mbs to 125mbs. You
should be able to find the 8054 for under $70. Security is TOP NOTCH. Here's
a link.
http://www.usr.com/products/networki...sp?sku=USR8054

--

/\/\UF/-\S/-\
"ChrisS." <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:muKdnUQcKZadOBvfRVn-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Check to see that the routers are WIFI Certified (for interoperability
> between brands).
>
> I have seen issues where a DLINK router has had problems maintaing a
> connection with an Intel wireless card that was integrated into a Toshiba
> Laptop. Changed the router out with a WIFI certified router and all
worked
> consistently since...
>
> ChrisS.
>
> "newbee" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
> news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> >I have just received a new Dell 8400 WinXP Media Center system (3.4
> > GHz, 2 GB RAM, TV tuner card). I have a fast (~4600 kbps) cable
> > connection (Adelphia internet and TV).
> >
> > My main need is to connect my old computer, now in an adjacent room,
> > to the Internet. Am guessing that the best way is through a wireless
> > router. The walls are not thick, and should not be a problem.
> >
> > If a wireless router is the best solution, what is the best one? There
> > seem to be three good deals available online, but am not sure which,
> > if any, would be the smartest purchase:
> >
> > ViewSonic 802.11b/g 125HSM Wireless Network Router (Mfr# WR100) » only
> > $29.99 Shipped
> >
> > D-Link DI-524 802.11G 54Mbps Wireless Cable/DSL Router 4-Port Switch »
> > only $19.99 + Free Shipping
> >
> > Buffalo Airstation 54MBPS Wireless Cable/DSL Router (Mfr# WYR-G54) »
> > only $18.10 + Free Shipping
> >
> > Also, what card(s) would be needed for both computers?
> >
> > Thanks for all suggestions.
> >
> > P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
> > connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
> > in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
> > (http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
> > wrong, of course).
>
>

/\/\UF/-\S/-\ wrote:
> Check out US Robotics. Never had a problem with them. Also they had a
> firmware upgrade a while back bringing speeds from 100mbs to 125mbs. You
> should be able to find the 8054 for under $70. Security is TOP NOTCH. Here's
> a link.
> http://www.usr.com/products/networki...sp?sku=USR8054
>


I own a USR 8054, and a pair of 5416 PCI cards. The router & PCI cards
have fantastic range and a good strong signal, but the downside is the
firmware from USR never seems to really resolve the problems. The
"125Mbps" hack is basically combining jumbo frames and bleeding over the
bandwidth of other neighboring channels, you wont see actual 125Mbps
numbers of course as all network numbers are grossly inflated, but
relative to without it it is an improvement.

There are the usual limits of the firewall in it, is does not do
stateful inspection, & limited number of firewall/forwarding rules "20",
not as much of a problem if you use WinXP and plug-n-play aware aps, but
I have to use severial proxies for my windows 2000 network to get around
its limitations. *No syn/ack flood protection*, extremely limited lookup
table memory, very easy to kick offline if you know how to attack it.
Hardware wise its a Dlink Di-624, and there is a hack to run their
firmware with it (not supported of course) that claims to take care of
some of the stability problems with the penalty of losing turbo mode (I
haven't used it myself). The Dlink Di-624 users are sometimes using the
8054 firmware to get the speed boost. Pick your poison I suppose.

I had to RMA the first one I got after about 9 months, it had always ran
much hotter than the replacement so maybe it was just defective from the
get-go, no problems RMAing with them (2 weeks turnaround). At that time
they advertised WPA & 100Mbps and it didn't do either, even with the
firmware update. They did fix speed issue within a few months, but it
was almost another year before WPA support became available. Currently
WPA-PSK is so hopelessly broken & unstable that I can't use it, and I'm
not the only one having problems. The forums at broadband reports are
full of the same complaints: Router resets randomly, frequent reboots,
WPA-still-broken-after-XXX-& XXX-firmware update, Odyssey drivers for
the 5416 & 5410 unstable and wont reconnect even after reboots of the
computer (in WPA mode).

My opinion is, if you need WPA or WPA-PSK get something else. If you
aren't using windows, get something else - though most of the rules can
now be changed within other browsers, it still doesn't behave correctly
for all function outside of IE, aside from which the only driver support
for linux is through a third party wrapper for their PCI/PCMIA cards. If
you can live happily with WEP 256 bit security till/if they finally get
WPA right, it isn't a bad choice for what you get considering its cost.
I wont be buying another one though, I've had far too many headaches
with this one.

Cat5 cable is faster, more reliable, and more secure than wireless.
How well wireless works depends a lot on the environment; distance, proximity to interference, etc.

newbee wrote:
>
> I have just received a new Dell 8400 WinXP Media Center system (3.4
> GHz, 2 GB RAM, TV tuner card). I have a fast (~4600 kbps) cable
> connection (Adelphia internet and TV).
>
> My main need is to connect my old computer, now in an adjacent room,
> to the Internet. Am guessing that the best way is through a wireless
> router. The walls are not thick, and should not be a problem.
>
> If a wireless router is the best solution, what is the best one? There
> seem to be three good deals available online, but am not sure which,
> if any, would be the smartest purchase:
>
> ViewSonic 802.11b/g 125HSM Wireless Network Router (Mfr# WR100) » only
> $29.99 Shipped
>
> D-Link DI-524 802.11G 54Mbps Wireless Cable/DSL Router 4-Port Switch »
> only $19.99 + Free Shipping
>
> Buffalo Airstation 54MBPS Wireless Cable/DSL Router (Mfr# WYR-G54) »
> only $18.10 + Free Shipping
>
> Also, what card(s) would be needed for both computers?
>
> Thanks for all suggestions.
>
> P.S. Second question, please: What would be the best way to not only
> connect that 2nd computer to the Internet but also to connect the TV
> in that room to my main Media Center computer? Dell offers a solution
> (http://snipurl.com/ewgq), but the $399 seems excessive (perhaps I'm
> wrong, of course).

--
Mike

There are a ton of issues to watch out for with wifi.
The distances/ construction materials, the inerference in the 2.4 ghz
band (cordless phones, microwaves etc) not to mention the security issues.
At least look into using WEP 128 on the device at minimum.
And as mentioned above look for a wifi certified Rtr/AP and cards so
they should play nice together.
Speeds will be nowhere near a cabled connection, but those are the
drawbacks of wireless....

Jason