Best way to add an 802.11g access point to a place where a single computer lives?

by philg

Suppose that you have a single computer in a room somewhere.  This plugs into an Ethernet jack in the wall.  At this point you want to add a wireless access point in case someone with an 802.11b/g laptop walks into the room.  Upstream is a router that provides DHCP to whoever asks.  What is the best way to add wireless access to this room?  My initial idea was that the simplest configuration, leaving all computers on the same subnet, would be to add a hub or switch and then plug both the existing computer and a new wireless access point into the hub/switch.  This would seem to be kind of annoying, though, requiring two little boxes and two little wall transformers.  A quick scan of the Linksys Web site doesn’t turn up any boxes that have just the switch and the wireless access point but not the router.  Is it easy to configure a Linksys router/switch/WAP box so that the router doesn’t actually route?  Is there some other company that makes a simple one-box solution?

21 thoughts on “Best way to add an 802.11g access point to a place where a single computer lives?”

  1. Would Apple Airport Express work? It’s a standard “wall wart” transformer that plugs directly into the electrical outlet. You plug the ethernet cable into it. It knows how to obtain IP addresses from a DHCP server (my DSL modem is the DHCP server). It’s simple, small and not too expensive. It supports 802.11g.

    You’d have to check if it can be administered from a non-mac, in case you don’t have a mac handy.

    Cam

  3. You didn’t give any details about the “single computer in a room”. Perhaps you could add a wireless card to it and run bridging software on it. If it’s a Mac you should be able to just use “Internet Sharing”. Windows probably has something similar.

    Otherwise, try the Linksys WET54GS5.

  4. I have a first-generation Linksys BEFW11S4 (802.11b) Wireless Access Point + Cable/DSL Router with 4-Port Switch that I purchased a couple years ago.

    I’ve been using it at school in the exact same way that you want to.

    Instead of plugging the cable from the Ethernet jack in the wall of my school apartment into the WAN port on the router, I plug it into the “uplink” port on the router (which is shared with port 4). Then, through the administration interface, I disable the built-in DHCP server and NAT routing. This lets me easily connect to the Internet with my Powerbook wirelessly, using an IP address assigned by the school’s DHCP server.

    And since I am using port 4 as an uplink, I still have 3 remaining switch ports to connect other machines, such as the box sitting on my desk.

    It looks like you can do the same exact thing with their latest WRT54G product which supports 802.11b/g.

    According to the following site, you can uplink the WRT54G, disable the DHCP server, and disable NAT routing.

    http://www.tomsnetworking.com/ProductGuides-Router-Details-ProdID-WRT54G.php

    A quick google search shows that port 4 of the WRT54G is the uplink port. So you would connect an Ethernet cable from your wall jack into port 4, instead of the port labeled “Internet” on the back of the WRT54G. Then just disable the DHCP/routing functionality through the router’s web administration interface.

    I have no personal experience with the WRT54G, but it definitely looks like you can use it the way I have used one of the older Linksys router models.

    Anyway, let me know if you have any questions about my setup.

  5. The WRT54G (which I’ve got) contains a wireless interface and a 4-port 100Mbps switch, and its software bridges the two by default. You can thus plug the wall socket and the computer into its LAN ports, and they’ll automatically be bridged to the wireless network — all you should need to do to configure it is to turn off its internal DHCP server (and configure the wireless security bits to taste). Works nicely for me, and they’re pretty cheap and fun to play with.

  6. I dont get it.. the “el cheapo” wireless router I have allows for HW connection and 4 cable ports….

  7. Philip:
    I will second Adam’s recommendation. The WRT54G is a fairly inexpensive box (less than $50 after rebates) depending on where you buy. Plug the wall connection and the pc into it. Do not use the wan ports. Disable NAT & built-in DHCP server, configure Wireless settings.

  9. Thanks, folks. The computer in question is a friend’s Windows XP machine. Some sort of Dell I think.

    To the Apple enthusiasts: That Airport thing seems like canonical Apple product. It looks sleek. It costs 3X as much as the Linksys router. It does a lot less (it has only a single Ethernet RJ45 jack so it could connect to the existing computer’s Ethernet cable but there would be no way to hook up that hard-wired computer once the Airport was hogging the connection). And though it isn’t adequate for the job in question it will be recommended by anyone with a Macintosh 🙂

    I think I will get the Linksys and suck it up with some config time. I am surprised that in a market glutted with little boxes for networking there isn’t something out of the box that does what my friend needs.

  10. Perhaps you’re being a bit quick to dismiss the Apple product – because it’s an Apple product? The AE does have some downsides, but it also has a lot of upsides:

    * Easy administration with a desktop app and “wizard”
    * Wireless music streaming and wireless printing – you may not be looking for these features right now but they can come in handy sometimes (I love the wireless music control)
    * Extremely portable
    * Wireless network bridging / range extending

    You can easily disable the AE’s NAT and DHCP server and use it as a compact portable wireless access point with some bonus features. I’ve had one since it was first released and have been very pleased with it. As for the computer that will no longer have an ethernet jack to plug into, you could install a PCI WiFi adapter for $20 or so.

    Still, I’d like to think I’m not an Apple zealot, and I can see that $125 for the AE plus $20 for an adapter, plus the time to install the adapter, may not be what you have in mind. If not, I have some other suggestions:

    * The soon-to-be-released LinkSys WTR54GS Travel Router has a similar form factor to the AE with the addition of a single LAN port, obviating the need for a wireless adapter for the existing client. It should be available any day now for around $85. (It’s listed in many online stores but none seem to be in stock.)

    * If you don’t want to wait for the WTR54GS, you may want to consider the WRT54GC, available now for around $50. It’s a compact version of the standard WRT54G with an internal antenna and a 4-port switch.

    Hope this helps!

    (BTW you may want to change your comment forms to either add an explanation of what HTML is permissible, or a preview button. I wasn’t sure whether I could use UL/LI tags, and no way to check.)

  11. Avi & Mac fans: Sorry to disappoint Steve Jobs and his need for $130 in revenue for the little Airport cube (plus another $20-50 and admin/install time for the wireless card for the desktop PC). And that Linksys Travel Router sounds like just exactly the right product but my neighbors need their Internet now.

    I ended up going into the dog-friendly Harvard Square Radio Shack and buying a D-Link clone of the Linksys WRT54G. Between the sale price and the rebate the total cost is $20. (And I can’t change the comment form because I don’t have any control over this server (thank God).)

    [Computer Nerd Thought for the Day: Maybe buying Apple products is a yuppie dating thing. It signals to potential mates that the buyer is rich enough to throw money away.]

  12. I don’t know about Linksys, but Apple’s access points can be setup as routers or as hubs. The Airport Express is a nice option because it is so small. The admin tool is pretty straightforward, too.

  14. >> Maybe buying Apple products is a yuppie dating thing. It signals to potential mates that the buyer is rich enough to throw money away.

    More uninformed OS bigotry.

    I have an Airport extreme device, yes it is more expensive, but I have just the arrangement you describe – a landline connection coming out to a desktop computer, and laptops and other desktops in the household connect via wireless card (which come standard on Macs now, though I had to buy one for the sole remaining Win box).

    And I was sorry that I didn’t take this approach right off the bat as initially I went with a D-Link clone that did not work with all the machines and was incompatible with the Win box card. The Apple setup took a matter of seconds. And there is a printer that hangs off the USB port that all the machines can use. I’ve never had a problem with Airport “hogging internet connection” from the desktop machine. For such an intelligent man, you sound like a real dufus at times. Maybe it isn’t the best solution for your needs, but it does offer advantageous “solution space” over equivalent products. Price != total value quality.

    I estimate since converting my household to Macs, it has saved 10-20 hours a month in “system administration” time, and even at a low conservative $20 per hour estimate (basing on average U.S. worker wage), I estimate those Macs paid for themselves (in the extra cost) in a matter of a month or two.

  15. naum, you anticipate spending 10-20 hours a month in “system administration” time just to keep a non-Apple networking setup happy? Where on earth do you live–in a network closet or compute center?

    Apple makes nice products for people who aren’t particularly price-sensitive, but that doesn’t mean everything else out there sucks. I’ve bought cheap-o Airlink wireless networking stuff for two people this year and set it up with their equipment and it has taken less than 10-20 hours total, with zero maintenance required on their part.

  16. A bunch of the various Linksys boxes will do this–look for the “hub + wireless” models rather than the DSL firewall routers. (I presume the latter work fine, too, but you probably need to mess around more.)

  17. >>naum, you anticipate spending 10-20 hours a month in “system administration” time just to keep a non-Apple networking setup happy? Where on earth do you live–in a network closet or compute center?

    No, I was tallying entire Win OS “sysadmin time”, not just networking…

    And I did try going the el-cheapo route initially, but had compatability problems.

  18. If you have a spare PCI card slot on the PC, just add a 802.11 card back there and do connection sharing.

    I believe that’s cheaper than any of the other solutions proffered. The PC will have to be on, but it’s simple as hell.

    That this thread devolved into Mac bashing and bigotry is typical. Perhaps there should be a hardware corrolary to Godwin’s law wherein we know the discussion is over when someone is inpugning the motives and demography of the Mac solution proffered.

    I love my Mac products, but for $20 plus or minus $5 or so my solution kicks ass.

  19. Actually, if I would have replaced the desktop machine first, I would never have needed the Airport device, I could have just utilized the built-in airport cards in the Macs that are now propagating over my household.

  20. Good luck with the D-Link access point — you’ll likely need it. I’ve been through two, and am not impressed. They will just stop working after a while, and need to be rebooted. (I’m using 802.11g, WPA-Personal).

    I’ve had good experiences with Linksys, Belkin and Apple products.

  21. My original Linksys wireless 4 port router died after a couple of years. A new one was cheaper than the old but the antennas were not BNC.
    I went wireless cause I didn’t want to meet and greet the black widow spiders uner the house. Since a rat took up residence under the house and died in his nest next to a heater duct I had to screw up my courage and craw under. Now the house is Cat5 but I still use the wireless to connect to a desktop, two laptops (all win xp) and an old G3. The G3 would be more useful as a boat anchor but as it is paid for and has a 21″ monitor so it is still above water.
    The linksys system was dead easy to install and get working, in fact it was the first piece of hardware/software that installed and ran straight out of the box. I was impressed.
    The only problem, if you want to call it that, is that everyonceinawhile you have to power down/up the rounter when it hangs. Not a very frequent experience.
    What I like is that with DHCP and NAT, ZoneAlarm and Netscape 7.2 we havent had any experieces with virui bad stuff and the Netscape junk controls work well.
    The Win xp os seems to finally deliver what Bill has promised.
    I would like to get a Apple mini to repace the G3 as I like to play with stuff.

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