[Sussex] My Home WiFi Network

[Steve Dobson]

Tom

On Sat, Nov 02, 2002 at 04:54:32PM -0000, Tom Ellis wrote:
> 
> >  * Friday - decided to get a WiFi set up for home.  Thanks for all the advice
> >    guys.  So on the way home on I popped into a PC World and bought:
> >      1 x NetGear MA401 PCMCIA NIC (£100)
> >      1 x Belkin Wireless Cable/DSL Gateway Router (£130)
> 
> I've setup and used a belkin AP before but with out built in router.
> Seemed to produce quite a good signal strength around clients house.
> 
> What kind of features does it have?

Here is a list of the screens tht you can configure - hope it helps:
   Initial Setup 
     Static IP Settings
     PPPoE 
     MAC Cloning/Entry
     DNS Address Entry
   Security 
     Firewall
     Security Log
     DMZ
     Virtual Server
     Special Application Ports
     LAN Client Restrictions
   Services 
     LAN Services
     NAT Enable/Disable
     Set Time Zone
     Change Password
     Remote Management
     MAC Filtering
   Wireless 
     Channel and SSID
     Encryption

> One of the reasons for getting the linksys wap 11 was that it had mac restrictions and
> disable ssid, for when i want to have the network private :)

Seems to have the features you wantted.  

> Although, another clients linksys ap with switch and router, doesn't have mac restrictions
> in the way of only allowing said mac addresses, it has block said mac addresses.
> Blocking mac addresses' seems a little dumb to me as only allowing certain ones would
> be a much more useful feature.

I have set mine up so it only allows the MAC address I have in the house.

> > The MA401 is listed in the kernel docs (2.4.17) as a supported device and was
> > recommended by Neil so that looked like a good choice.
> >
> > Neil had also said that most base stations needed a Windoz box to configure
> > them, which was going to be a problem as my home network is a Windoz Free Zone.
> > I do use the work's laptop but only stand-a-lone or dialled into work, it never
> > get connected to my home network (well almost never).  So (although more
> > expensive [~£250]) the Apple Airport Airport was better as it could be
> > configured using its Java based config tool.
> 
> AFAIR the most Access Points come with crappy 'doze software on cd's that you never
> really need to use :)
 
Not with a HTTPS config setup system.
 
> > I've now been using it for a while now and the link just drops ever so often.
> > Doesn't appear to be a loading problem.  I have managed to install a number of
> > packages (one at a time) over it.  Also the link as been dropped when I'm just
> > doing a little light (ssh) work.  But pulling and pushing the card re-establish
> > the link every time.
> 
> Hmm strange, do you have any linux utilities to tell you signal strength? there must be
> some on freshmeat somewhere ;)

Good call.  Hadn't got around to checking out the monotor software (wavemon - who
needs this graphics suff anyway).  The signal to noise ration isn't good down here.

This is about the best I'm getting down here in the living room.
   link quality: 32/92
   signal level: -60 dBm (0.00 uW)
   noise level: -94 dBm (0.00 uW)
   signal-to-noise ratio: +34 dB

And the signal/noise value can go down to -20 dB.

Can you help explain how to read these values - I've forgotton all that
physics stuff I did at school.

Steve