Wireless bridge recommendations
 

I have a locked down work laptop which has no wireless access.

As such its a pain to work at home because I have to be right at my access point.

I would like a buy a wireless bridge to plug into the ethernet port.

Any recommendations? I see low prices of 30 dollars for some SMC *bleh*
up to 99 dollars. And the ones designed specifically for gaming consoles seem to be a bit cheaper (duopn't know why).

see http://shop1.outpost.com/product/536...H:MAIN_RSLT_PG

instead of

http://shop1.outpost.com/product/4621548

It depends on what you have for a wireless router at home is it G or B also could you use a usb wireless connection instead? How locked down is your computer? The reason I ask is the AP will need power so you'll still be attached to an outlet.

Could you ask work to install the drivers of a usb wireless card?

I bought an SMC bridge for my replayTV - it was cr*p. I trashed it and then bought a Netgear - have had it ever since and it works great. Sorry I can't recall the model number.

I have netgear bridges. They are older ones and don't support WPA, so I have to run WEP only.

You might consider that when looking for one and also make sure it can be connected to a switch as well as direct connected to a computer. The 2 that I have work fine most of the time. One is direct connected to the family computer in the living room. The other is connected to a netgear switch in the office. For my wireless router, I finally gave up on netgear.

-David

I have a super-cheap Airlink I bought at Fry's for under $30. It works fine, although the transformer brick is huge. WPA and related security is supported.

I run a 54G wireless netgear router (used to have a buffalo, but someone else has it for the moment). No n spec for me in the near future.

need to support WPA.

I don't mind being tied to an outlet. I just need to be able to work in another room.

No usb option for me. I can't install any system level or system wide stuff. :(

You could also do the entire outlet thing, where you pass the ethernet over the power line in your house. That would work anywhere (most of the time depending how your house is wired) so you could work in any room at all.

My guess would be sales volume. :)

I have never used a device, however even though it is a bridge, you'd still have to set the SSID, etc, correct?

If your laptop is locked down, I'm not sure you could do this... It depends on how 'locked down' it is.

just a note to think about

Couldn't I set the SSID through another computer? or even through a web browser interface?

I tried the powerline stuff. either I got bad equipment, or it doesn't run at my house.

I'm loving the buffalo wireless products. They do have a bridge, but their G base station can be turned into a bridge by replacing the firmware... I haven't tried it in some time, but I recall it being fairly easy.

Almost definitely the first, probably the latter as well.

(I could see a even-further locked-down machine having a fixed assigned-at-work IP address, but then it probably wouldn't work on your home network at all, even on a wired connection.)

I can't imagine that the computer would be tied down to a specific IP address. If it was made to only work at one location then one wouldn't need a laptop. But even if it is, as long as it is an ip that starts with 192.168 you can configure it to work at home.

I personally would go with a netgear product.

Depending on the network setup, "only work at one location" could mean "this one desk", "anywhere in this building" or "anywhere on our gi-normous worldwide corporate network."

Given enough work, of course, you could make it work on a home network with ANY IP address -- while you're supposed to use private IPs, in practice it's pretty doable to make your NAT-space on someone's public IP range (although it does then limit your ability to get back to that address or those addresses)

I can VPN no problem onto the corp network, its just that they lock it down so its hard to install drivers etc.

Any other suggestions than netgear?

I like netgear, but all I see is this

WGE111 which I think is discontinued and expensive...

Speaking of VPNs....

My work VPN does not work with my home wireless network, but it does work with (every) other wireless networks...

HOWEVER, if I use my wireless bridge as an access point client and connect my laptop to it, the VPN does work -- using my same home wireless network. Which means the problem isn't the wireless network, router or firewall.

It's just weird, and I've never been able to figure it out, and I'm fairly advanced at this stuff.

Netgear and Linksys are both good. You might also check Outpost.com (or your local Fry's) to see what they have on-sale. The more obscure brands (Airlink+/TrendNet/etc and Fry's house brand "Great Quality") are sometimes WAY cheaper.

Is it correct to say that you're making two NAT traversals when it doesn't work and one NAT traversal when it does work? That could be related. Anyway, I think troubleshooting this problem could be interesting, but I don't really understand the topology. Could you tell us what equipment type and manufacturer you're using? Please correct this diagram:

A-B-C-D-E

A: Cisco VPN client
B: Netgear wireless bridge
C: Linksys wireless router
D: 2Wire DSL Modem
E: SBC

A = Cisco VPN Client
B = Airlink Wireless Access point, configured as a client
C = Motorola Wireles Surfboard Gateway (combination cable modem, firewall router & wireless router)
D = Comcast Cable

I also have a second wireless network (the Motorola runs WPA2, I need a WEP one for an old TIVO) which is a Linksys router connected wired via a Netgear switch wired to the Motorola Gateway. I also tried using this router as an experiement, and it behaved the same as directly going through the Motorola.

If I use the wired network port of either router, the VPN works.

The whole thing is a puzzle to me. I've tried ever router setting I could think of. I've even disabled the firewall as a test. But, since the wired works through the firewall, that made little sense.

Four questions:
What error message do you get from the CVPN client?
True or False: VPN doesn't work if wirelessly connected to EITHER Linksys or Motorola, but works (if wired) to either box.
On the Motorola, what class C network are you vended if you connect wirelessly?
On the Motorola, what class C network are you vended if you connect directly?

1). No error message. It connects "successfully", but, once connected I have no access to the work network (e-mail, shared drives, intranet, internet). I do get an IP address. The only meaningful operation I can do is disconnect.

2) True. The above symptom does not happen if I am wired (or, if I use another wireless network outside my house, like T-Mobile or Google Wi-Fi).

3). 192.168.0.x, 255.255.255.0. (The Linksys router uses 192.168.1.x).
4) Same.

Interesting. So when you're VPN connected via wireless, have you tried to traceroute to, say, the work mail server? Can you ping destinations along the way to the mail server? This could provide some problem isolation.

I can't ping, but I haven't tried tracerouting.