External Wireless Network Adapter

Where can I find one?

[DCHWeb]

I am looking for an External Wireless Network Adapter so that I can use an external firewall to route my internet connection to different pcs on my network. What I need, i suppose would be the wireless equivalent of a cable modem. I need it to be external, not like a Wi-Fi PCMCIA or PCI card. I have my network set up that way currently, but i need to be able to make my linux box be the server rather than my WinXP. Any advice would be appreciated.

[Dreamquick]

There are loads of them - best advice I can offer is find a good computer hardware website and type in "wireless adapter" and see what they have in stock... If you've got time to kill find a good wireless only hardware site - they offer the most indepth advice on each of the items in my experience.

There are a number of ethernet-to-wireless cross-over adapters on the market at the moment, from what I've seen if you just want to hook an existed wired network and link it wirelessly to an existing wi-fi network these are the way to go for pure simplicity.

If you have a system that can deal with ethernet then these will work for you without any incompatiblity problems because as far as the computer is concerned it's dealing with an ethernet device - the wireless aspects of the device are silently-managed by the device itself, if you need to reconfigure the device it's very similar to how to manage a cable or adsl modem setup.

On the other hand if you aren't wireless yet most decent wi-fi access points offer ethernet connections as part of their router abilities, so it could just be as simple as get one of those and plug it into the existing network.

...at the moment my bits are being brought to you via a 802.11b USB wi-fi network adapter.

- Tony

[DCHWeb]

What I really need is a way for my linux box to be the webserver on my network, even though it isn't directly connected to the internet. My ISP said to use an external wireless network radio, like a cable modem to connect to the internet, and connect it to an external firewall that will assign an ip to each workstation on the net and direct ports to speciffic machines. I think I have got it though, I am currently working on a way to make my Linux box share its internet so i won't have to change much. If you have any other suggestions, please post them.

[bill]

Sounds like you're in the market for a Wireless Router. Some of the popular brands include Linksys, DLink, Corega, and a bunch more. You connect your cable/DSL modem to the router and it acts as DHCP server to dynamically assign IP addresses to your LAN machines. The routers have settings where you can put any machine into a DMZ for purposes of running a web server or opening other ports. You can run a firewall directly off the router in some cases but once your machines are behind one you're a lot safer.

[anallawalla]

Your "external" threw me for a while, as I subscribe to a wireless mesh list where people mount access points in plastic boxes on top of their roofs. :)

The other confusion is about your wish for the Linux box to be the "server".

I think that you merely need a box that sits on a table, has an antenna and either a WAN connector to link to a cable/DSL modem, or a built-in modem. These boxes are sold as router/firewalls and have DHCP, so they are the "server", at least in terms of the Internet access point. They tend to come set up as 192.168.0.1 but can usually be set up for other addresses.

There are few such devices, usually one per manufacturer for a given speed, i.e. 11, 22, 54 Mbit/s.

Search for "wireless modem router firewall" and you will see the options available to you.

[DCHWeb]

I must not be making myself clear. I know where to find wireless routers and hubs, etc. What I need is an "EXTERNAL" Wireless card. You know, you can get PCI and PCMCIA cards that you connect to an antenna for your wireless network. My ISP toldme to get an"EXTERNAL" one of these, a radio that connects to the antenna and has an RJ-45 port that can connect to an ethernet card on a workstation or a firewall/hub/switch for a network. Where can I find such a thing?

[Macro]

DCHWeb, there are such devices that plug into a USB port. Is this what you are looking for?
[google.com...]
or maybe:
[google.com...]

[DCHWeb]

I guess I am not good at explaining, so here is a really crappy drawing from paint. http://www.dchweb.com/diagram.gif [dchweb.com]. The big square box in the middle is the wireless radio that I am looking for. The rest should be self explanitory.

[Macro]

I know you said you aren't looking for a router but to help me understand... Why doesn't something like this do the job?

[netgear.com...]

[storevalley]

I am currently working on a way to make my Linux box share its internet so i won't have to change much

If you use a wireless access point like the Netgear shown by the poster above, the access point itself shares the Internet connection.

I have a similar setup running here. The setup procedure was really easy ...

• The access point is set up using a browser. Give it a username/password to connect to your ISP.
  
• Give the access point a network ID and security key (SSID and WEP key) for the wireless network.
  
• Set the access point to act as a DHCP server.
  
• Go to each computer and enable DHCP (involves selecting a radio button)
  
• That's it ... done! All computers should now be able to see each other (so long as OS security allows this) and connect to the internet
  

I'm not a Linux person, but I can't believe that setting up DHCP on a Linux box is much trickier than it is on a Windows machine.

... a radio that connects to the antenna and has an RJ-45 port that can connect to an ethernet card ...

It's probably also worth noting that most access points also have a number of LAN ports in the back. So you can connect to them either wirelessly, or using a standard RJ45 network cable.

This is probably what your ISP was talking about.

[DCHWeb]

Well, I'm getting closer to understanding you guys, or vice versa, but I would like to reiterate the fact that my ISP is the wireless access point. You know how you used to be a ble to get external 56K modems that connect the the serial port and you can get external HDDs and CDROMs, well I need an external Wireless Lan CARD, not hub or basestation, but a card, like an external version of the Cisco Aeronet 350 Series PCMCIA cards. Will the device in the above link work for that? What I need is a way for All the computers on my network to connect to the same object, possibly using the uplink jack on my ethernet switch, that connects to my isp. You know how a cable modem works, the cable comes in and then either a usb or ethernet jack comes out to connect to the computer or a router, well, I need the wireless equivalent of this. I don't want a wireless home network, I just need to connect my existing home netowrk to the wireless network of my ISP. I hope you understand, or you can help me understand how your sufggested device(s) can accomplish this.

Thanks

By the way, my ISP was the one who gave me the idea, except the device he sells, which is what I am looking for costs way too much, so I am looking to find a more reasonable price.

[edited by: DCHWeb at 8:39 pm (utc) on Dec. 28, 2003]

[storevalley]

DCHWeb ... I'd suggest that you visit your local PC World store (or similar) and find a sales person that knows about networks. Then explain to them exactly what you would like to do, and let them tell you about the technologies available.

This will be the quickest way for you to get where you want to go here ...

[Dreamquick]

I don't want a wireless home network, I just need to connect my existing home network to the wireless network of my ISP. I hope you understand, or you can help me understand how your sufggested device(s) can accomplish this.

If this was just a typo then storevalley's response is probably a good idea as you're just in the market for some internet connection sharing, but if you really are trying to connect to an ISP over wireless this a bit too tricky to be covered with sufficient depth here.

My advice is to talk to your ISP again and ask if they have recommended hardware - I'm sure they will have looked at similar problems before and will be able to suggest either the right hardware or at least point you in the right direction.

The danger with taking advice from us on a wireless ISP link is that we don't know the ins and outs of your ISPs wireless network and the requirements to connect to it (ie what distance are you expecting to cover? would you get a strong enough signal? does it need a specific brand of hardware to support connect? which version of wifi is it using - "a", "b", "g" or something else?)

For what it's worth it sounds like you are looking for a wireless ethernet bridge (an external device with a wireless card inside and an ethernet port), but that's just my opinion based on the contents of your posts rather than actual technical requirements.

- Tony

[Macro]

I'd suggest that you visit your local PC World ...and find a sales person that knows about networks

Best joke I've heard so far this year :-)