What is a wireless access point?

[VERT]

I'm looking at networking our house by wireless, it is currently cabled and cables get in the way and seem to get damaged all the time so I thought wireless would be a good option.

Now I know preety much nothing about wireless networking. I see you can buy a thing called a wireless access point, what is this? is this like a hub? can I connect other PCs to it via wireless and how many (these ads I read never say).

And are their any good guides out there about wireless networking explaining this good

[osprey4]

HomeNetHelp is a good place to start learning about this. Keep in mind that wireless networking is slower and a little more quirky than wired. Most people prefer to buy wireless routers with wired ports to combine the benefits of both.

[Bill in SD, CA]

The Ins and Outs of Building a Home Network

I have a wired router and an access point.

Works well.

Have two systems on the access point.

Don't know how many they will take though.

Bill

[captainjrl]

Originally posted by Bill in SD, CA
Have two systems on the access point.

Don't know how many they will take though.

Bill [/B]

Supposed they will work with up to 25 machines accessing them, although when I have tried that many the access points get very quirky. With 15 machines I have had no problems other than the usual wireless hiccup.

Anybody had any experience with having more than 2 WAPs in the same room?

I have tried it recently and it failed miserably, using 3 Linksys WAP11's.

here is some wireless standards information

i havent looked recently but last time i checked wireless access points were more expensive that wireless routers.

from what i understand and read a wireless B can handle up to 30 clients?

in other words in a home enviroment you most likely wont reach the maxuim number unless you have some room with computers that you test on.

basically an AP gives any wired network instant wireless capabilities.

thats all

captainjrl have you tried changing each WAP to different channels? Curious on what you are trying to do.

[paul9]

http://www.techimo.com/forum/t108938.html
it is VERY IMPORTANT that you see this thread and understand the security implications of wireless networking BEFORE you buy any parts for a wireless network.

[captainjrl]

GroundZero - Yes, I made sure that all three were on different channels. When I only have two WAPS I use channel 6 &11, When I tried to put in the thrid I used channel 1 on it.

[kwebb]

Now I know preety much nothing about wireless networking. I see you can buy a thing called a wireless access point, what is this? is this like a hub? can I connect other PCs to it via wireless and how many

It's just access point, or AP. You will see WAP however that is incorrect. Niether here nor there really, just a pet peeve I occasionally correct. Your right on the money. An AP is a wireless hub in essence. You can associate multiple wireless clients to it. How many in theory depends on the firmware. For an 802.11b AP you wouldn't want to have more than a handful of clients if your transferring files. You'd bring it to its knees long before you hit the client association limitation. For internet sharing, as many as you'd want to share the pipe it's connected to. Many SOHO ap's limit to 32, perhaps 64. More than you'd put on one AP. 802.11g raises the bar as it provides significantly higher bandwidth numbers. If you plan on having a large number of users then running a multiple AP WLAN is preferable. You can use the three non overlapping channels 1, 6, and 11 so that they don't interfere with each other. Load balancing is pretty much non existent with budget wireless gear though so engineering that up front is a good idea. Different SSID's for each AP and manually enter that into your client configs. Tada, manual load balancing. The AP's, in a perfect world, would communicate over the wire and drop and add clients according to the load of the other AP's. Enterprise level gear does this pretty good. For 100 bucks you get what you pay for however. There are numerous turtorials on wireless LAN's. So many in fact I wouldn't even know where to begin recommending. Google I guess. If you have specific questions then feel free to ask here.