Additional Wireless Router or Wired 5-port Switch

I am considering extending the wired part of my network. I currently have a Linksys 802.11b wireless router with 4-port switch and rather than extending with a wired 5-port switch, I am considering spending just a little bit more for an 802.11g Wireless router with 4-port switch and disabling the wireless functionality of my current wireless router and simply patching it in as a 4-port switch. Netgear 801.11g routers are as low as $39 almost everywhere now, while the wired 5- port switch will probably cost me $20 in either a Linksys or Netgear flavor.

Looking for opinions on this planned router swap or other suggestions. thx

Reply to
gkamieneski
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On 5 Mar 2007 06:33:33 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

I suggest Buffalo instead of Linksys for the new router, making it possible to run DD-WRT should you ever need/want to do so. $38 at

Reply to
John Navas

Actually, I was going to pick up a Netgear 802.11g router, not a Linksys. It's the old Linksys B router that I was going to dumb-down to be just a 4-port switch. The reference to DD-WRT, while I do use a couple of Samba devices, why would I want the Linux provisioning?

Reply to
gkamieneski

On 5 Mar 2007 08:23:15 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

  1. Buffalo is better than Netgear (IMnsHO at least).
  2. DD-WRT is much more flexible and powerful than stock firmware -- check the list of features.
  3. This has nothing to do with running Linux or Samba -- Linux is just the software platform for the router firmware.
Reply to
John Navas

Thanks, John for the clarification. So I should be able to use the old Linksys wireless router as just a 4-port 10/100 switch?

Reply to
gkamieneski

" snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" hath wroth:

Features, monitoring, management, and control (mostly over power output but also settings). Browse through the pages at:

to see what's available.

Features:

The traditional list of features grew so much that it's not being currently maintained:

I suggest the more expensive Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 router instead. The increase in transmit power seems to make a difference.

Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

It just occurred to me that there are 2 ways I can hook this up and 1 may provide better wireless connectivity than another. 1, I can connect my modem to my current wireless-disabled 802.11b router and use a patch cord from one of its ports to the newer 802.11g router, or

2., I can connect the modem directly to the new 801.11g router and then connect a patch cord to the old wireless-disabled 802.11b router being used as a switch. What it comes down to is should my active router be hanging off of the modem or off of the switch?
Reply to
gkamieneski

On 5 Mar 2007 10:16:17 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

Yes -- turn off the DHCP server, and use just the LAN ports.

Reply to
John Navas

On 5 Mar 2007 10:40:04 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

That will work fine _if_ you configure the 802.11g router as a wireless access point, as described in the How To wiki below. (Be sure to turn off the 802.11b wireless.)

That will work fine if you turn off the DHCP server in the 802.11b router and just use the LAN ports.

Either configuration will work, but I would strongly favor #1 since you'd be using newer router firmware.

Reply to
John Navas

Last question. I will be able to use the 3 ports remaining on the first unit and the 4 ethernet ports on the new router for a total of 7 drops, correct?

Reply to
gkamieneski

On 6 Mar 2007 04:38:38 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

Correct.

Reply to
John Navas

I'm using the #1 scenario, but I've left broadcasting intact on the old 802.11b router (that way I can isolate my 802.11b devices to that router). My new 802.11g router is active by a drop from the old router. Now, both routers are broadcasting and they are also both providing DHCP but I think I'm running into some DNS problems and I also wonder if I should be setting up a new subnet. Any thoughts? thx all

Reply to
gkamieneski

On 10 Mar 2007 19:22:03 -0800, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

You can get away with running more than one DHCP server if you're careful to avoid overlap in their assignment ranges, but my general recommendation is to run only one DHCP server on a given network. In that case the g router should be configured as a wireless access point with no DHCP server (as described in the How To wiki below).

Reply to
John Navas

Thanks, I will check it out. I'm getting the ip addresses assigned correctly from both DHCP servers, however DNS seems to be a problem. The client that get's the IP from the g router cannot reconcile URLs. Ipconfig /all shows no connection-specific DNS suffix.

Reply to
gkamieneski

On 11 Mar 2007 06:38:30 -0700, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

Sounds like DNS servers aren't getting set properly, or can't be reached.

The exact actual output from both DHCP servers would be helpful.

Reply to
John Navas

John, I'm getting there. I re-read your WiFi How to Wiki and I connected the new 'g' router to the old 'b' router LAN-to-Lan with a patch cord, rather than from the LAN port of the old router to the WAN port of the new router. Old router is handling DHCP now and DNS is back up. Unfortunately with all the other little quirks associated with DST, I picked the wrong weekend to do this and one of my PCMCIA 'g' cards seems to be fried. I'll let you know if I can get the other devices online. thx.

Reply to
gkamieneski

John, thanks for your help. The wiki was very helpful and it took me awhile for my intuition to accept the LAN-to-LAN connection between the routers. All seems to work well now and I am directing 802.11b- only clients to the old AP and newer clients to the 802.11g AP. Only get 3 ports out of the new router, though, because of the LAN-to-LAN connection.

Reply to
gkamieneski

While things are working o.k. I wonder what would happen if I reversed the routers and used the newer router as the gateway? That way I could get NTP to work on the 801.11g router and reverse which router supplies DHCP.

Reply to
gkamieneski

On 12 Apr 2007 04:49:43 -0700, " snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com" wrote in :

Why not go ahead and try it? If you do it properly, it should work fine. (If not, you can always go back.)

Reply to
John Navas

One thing: I would be thinking about wireless security in this setup. You want to be moving away from WEP and towards WPA if that applies.

The old "B" router probably does not have WPA. Possibly some of your B adapters may have a driver upgrade to WPA and work with the newer "G" router. My Orinoco Gold "B" pcmcia did upgrade, the linksys WUSB "B" did not.

It may be a good time to upgrade some of your adapters. Especially with USB "G" adapters so cheap now. Best thing about "N" is that it renders G stuff "old tech".

Steve

Reply to
seaweedsteve

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