In article , wrote: :Also I can see "Data Rate/Channels: 1-54MBps / 14 channels)". What is :the Channels meaning here?. is it Maximum of 14 laptops can be :connected simultaneously?.
No, there are 14 frequency bands allocated, with different subsets of those being legal to use in different parts of the world. My probably incorrect recollection is that channel 14 is only authorized in France (which doesn't allow some of the lower-numbered bands.)
When the radio is transmitting on a particular "channel", then the peak energy is going to frequencies near the official channel. However, with 802.11b there is also significant energy transmitted in the two frequency ranges on other side of the centre. This causes some degree of interference with transmissions on those other channels -- for example, if there is a nearby device transmitting on channel 8 then the energy it transmits in the range allocated to the centre of channel 6 might turn out to overwhelm the energy from a more distant device which is transmitting its peak energy in channel 6.
Because of this overlap and potential for interference, you will often hear the guideline that that if you have multiple devices in an area, you should set them to be 5 channels apart, such as using channels 1, 6, and 11. That should be understood as a guideline and not a hard rule, though: it depends on your antennae and the signal strength from the overlapping chanels -- and there is a lot of redundancy in the transmitted data. Someone did an analysis of the energy patterns and determined that in all but the worst cases (device very close to each other), you could safely use channels that are only 3 apart, thus getting 4 effectively non-overlapping channels in the range of 11 that are permitted in USA/Canada.
802.11g works on similar principles, but is defined in such a way as to effectively "hard-code" the 1/6/11 guideline -- you only have a choice of 3 channels for 802.11g.
802.11a does NOT work on the same principles, and all of its channels can be used without interference.
:I have Netgear WLAN Router (connected to Broadband through DSL), how :can I know howmany laptops can be connected simultaneously to the :Router?. How I will know?.
It depends on -which- Netgear device you have. The reference to 54 megabits per second and to channel 14 lead me to suspect you have one of the 802.11g routers such as Netgear's WGR614. It is often quite difficult to find information about how many devices an AP/router supports. What you are looking for is the "size of the MAC table" or "number of entries in the ARP table".
I happen to have researched this figure a couple of weeks ago for the Linksys WAP54G. Linksys apparently told someone the limit was 5000. One highly respected wireless expert over in alt.internet.wireless (the place I suggest you post nearly all your wireless questions to) tested the Linksys WAP54G and found it can handle 253 clients.
I'm going to hazard a guess that your Netgear might be the WGR614v4. If so, then if you look in the reference manual in the Key Features of the Router section, you will find:
Parents and network administrators can establish restricted access policies based on time-of-day, web site addresses and address keywords, and share high-speed cable/DSL Internet access for up to 253 personal computers.
253 is the same number given in the v1 and v5 reference manual; I'm not going to bother looking at the v2 and v3 reference manual for completeness ;-)