Yet another computer question!
 

I've aquired a pcmcia wireless network card. It made by Lucnet technologies (forgot to bring it to work with me!!) and all i can remember thats on it is 11mB. The question is can i use this to get myself going on wireless broadband at home? If so i guess i need a router or whatever its called? The box with the aerial on it? Numpty language only please!

What do i need to buy when i go to PC World?

Cheers.

If you are not already signed up to a broadband provider - do that first. Call BT or Telewest and check out the deals. Get that organised first as it will take some time to get you connected, and some areas don't have broadband yet.

2nd start learning about wireless connections and the meaning of the designations. You mentioned 11mb which is probably refering to the older wireless standard of 802.11b which has wireless speeds of up to 11mbits/s. There are higher speeds now (802.11g 54mbits/s being one and becoming the standard). Also learn about wireless security and how to implement WEP encryptions (too much here to go over. Just spend a few nights reading other online stuff)

3rd get down to PC world and check out the 4in1 broadband routers (ADSL modem, 4 port hub, firewall & router & wireless connection). You can get a good one for around £100. I recommend Belkin. Get one that's got at least 802.11g compatiility. Some even come with a wireless card.

4th setup your router and your new wireless network at home - just follow the instructions.

5th wait until your broadband connection is available - plug in your router adsl phoneline and away you go - unlimited adsl for all the family.

[Edited on 11-5-2005 by ziggi]

Cheers Ziggi, already got broadband so thats not a problem. So my card will work but its not as fast as a new one?

If my 2mb broadband connection is only connecting at 576kb will i notice anything? I know thats not the actual data transfer rate but its what comes up when i hover over the two tv's in the bottom right hand corner of the screen.

Yes your 802.11b card will work with any wireless network/router that has that standard (and almost all do), but the transfer rate is not as high as some of the later standards.

If you are showing 576kb on your connection then you are not connecting at 2mb - that's half a mb. It's possible that you've not been upgraded by BT yet (I take it you are with BT on 512Kb unlimited download at the mo - going to 2mb with a free upgrade)

Sorry, as for data transfer with a wireless network - this 576kb figure has nothing to do with it. In a wireless network (or any network) the router will connect onto ADSL at whatever speed it can and then your wireless or cable connection to the network is another connection - there's two difference things here.

Yes i know about the speed thing I on a 2mb deal with wanadoo but its only ever shown 576kb. Its been like that since day one which is about six months ago now. In fairness to them they did say that my line might not be good enough for the full 2mb but i have since moved house and its exactly the same! What i was getting at was would the speed of connection between the pc and the router be faster or slower than the actual broadband connection with my old card? Is the card going to slow things down?

Chances are you would have had a 100Mb network card when you were using a wired conenction.

However, remember that your network connection is only as good as the weakest point, and that would be your Broadband connection at 2Mb (or lower).

So you won't notice any difference with an 11Mb wireless card if all you're doing is surfing the web and the like.

Where you would notice the difference is if you have more PCs on your home network and you start transferring files between them - the 11Mb wireless connections is a lot smaller than the previous 100Mb network card, so they will take longer to transfer.

If you've only got one PC (or laptop) then don't worry about it.

Good stuff Antonye and Ziggi, thats what i needed to know.

Thanks for all the help guys.

P.S. - Don't go to PC World! not unless you want to pay 50% more

Try aria, scan, dabs, or better still broadbandbuyer

PC World has actually come down in price a lot recently. I think they're still overpriced compared to the big online sellers like ebuyer or microdirect (Scam and Dabs as still overpriced, imho!) and obviously don't have the range (or the dirt cheap products) but they do fill the "need it now" niche for a little more than you'd buy online.

Is this what i want then?

BUFFALO - AIRSTATION 54MBPS WIRELESS CABLE/DSL BROADBAND ROUTER

from PC World, £30.13 on line price (collect in store like weeks said!!)

For your network, you need a modem to connect the outside world (your phone line) to your PC and allow you to use broadband.

You already have one of these as you're using broadband.

A router is something which can connect multiple machines together, and then route them on to another destination.

You can buy a combined modem/router which is basically a single box with lots of ports in it, for you to connect multiple PCs into and they all share the internet connection through the modem.

If your modem has the appropriate ports to connect a router to it (usually via an ethernet (aka Network) cable) then there's no reason why the router won't accept the wireless connection and route it through the modem and out to t'intarweb.

You might want to check that you haven't got something silly (ie, cheap!) like a USB modem as you probably won't be able to connect the wireless router to it.

This article explains it all in Microsoft jargon with pretty pictures:
http://www.microsoft.com/athome/more...lesssetup.mspx

Are you on Cable/DSL or BT/Telephone line ADSL?

If Cable/DSL then I'd say that should work, if not you're going to need a ADSL modem/router combo.

54Mbps is OK, but 108Mbps is the current standard, depending on what you're future plans are might be worth looking at that, won't make any odds with your "slow" 11Mbps w/card though, that will be the bottleneck

I have the standard USB modem that wandoo give you connected to the phone line. So i need an ADSL router rather than a DSL router?

Yup ADSL modem/router

Actually I disagree. There's no reason why you can't plug a router into the existing modem - that's what they're for.

Do they have routers with a USB network port? To accomodate this setup? I haven't seen one but it's not as though I'm out looking at these things regularly.

If they don't the combo ADSL modem/router would be my method of choice, otherwise you'd need to use the PC hosting the USB modem as a router. I'd rather not do that.

USB Modem?

Do routers have a USB input? why have two boxes a USB to CAT5 converter, CAT5 cable, when you can have one? and non of the associated problems/compatibility between them....

oops - missed the USB bit. My bad.

I did mention this above before - if it's USB then you'll need to replace it.

I'd recommend one of these - it's a modem/router with built in wireless:
http://www.dsl-warehouse.co.uk/product.asp?pr=DG834GV2