What’s needed to share Broadband wirelessly?

You have your desktop online through a broadband modem and you want to connect a laptop by wireless.

There are 3 ways to set up what you want -

a) Wireless adaptor in laptop and wireless adaptor in main PC. Main PC connected to internet by modem. This is called an Ad Hoc Wireless Network

b) Wireless adaptor in laptop, network card in main PC. Main PC connected by network cable to wireless modem router connected to internet. This is called an Infrastructure Wireless Network

c) Wireless adaptor in laptop, wireless adaptor in main PC. Wireless modem router connected to internet. This is also an Infrastructure Wireless Network

a) is cheapest but means that the laptop can only connect to the internet if the main PC is running.

b) is dearer but allows either PC to connect to the internet at any time (so long as the router is on) and allows for future expansion of laptops or fixed PCs all of which can access the internet at any time.

c) is a little bit dearer still, gives you all the benefits of b), but also allows you to move your desktop around without worrying about network cables.

The wireless adaptors can be either:
a) built-in (most new laptops, some new desktops)
b) PC Card (for laptops only)
c) USB adaptors (for laptops or desktops)
d) PCI adaptors (for internal installation in desktops)

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Setting up an Ad Hoc (peer to peer) Wireless Network – Part 1

Overview

An Ad Hoc Wireless Network does not need a Wireless Router but it does need a Wireless Adaptor for each participating PC.

An Ad Hoc Wireless Network might be suitable for someone with a cable broadband connection to their desktop PC who wants to be able to connect their laptop to the internet and perhaps share files between the two PCs as well. The restriction is that the laptop can only connect to the internet if the desktop PC is running.

Any number of PCs can be connected together with an ad hoc wireless network.

Each PC needs a wireless adaptor. In a desktop PC these can be either an internal PCI card or an external USB adaptor. A laptop can also use an external USB adaptor or an external PC Card (PCMCIA) adaptor or can have a factory installed internal card.

One of the PCs needs to have some other network adaptor (ethernet, broadband, Dial-up, Firewire, or even another wireless adaptor) and acts as the Host computer.
If the host computer is connected to the internet through the other adaptor then all the members of the ad hoc wireless network can share that internet connection.
Curiously the network will still work if the host computer is not actually connected to the other network, it just needs to have that network adaptor installed and shared.

The basic procedure is as follows:

a) Install wireless adaptors and drivers in each participating PC

b) Use Windows to configure the wireless network on each PC -give the network the same name and settings on each PC.

c) Switch on Internet Connection Sharing on the host PC.

d) Make sure that each PC is connected to the network correctly by rebooting the wireless connection as necessary

e) When you are happy that the network is working, switch on encryption, starting with the Host PC.

f) Ensure that the Host PC is always switched on first and off last, otherwise the others will get confused!

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Setting up an Ad Hoc Wireless Network – Part 2

Installing Wireless Adaptors

If a PC running Windows XP needs to have a wireless adaptor installed, don't follow the instruction book and install the software first. This will load additional proprietary software that is not required – Windows XP has its own Zero Configuration utility.

Just connect the adaptor, wait for Windows XP to try to install the drivers and when Windows asks for it, insert the CD that came with the adaptor. The PC will then just load the drivers and not the extra software.

But you will need to load the manufacturers software for earlier versions of Windows.

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Setting up an Ad Hoc Wireless Network – Part 3

Setting up each PC

There should be an icon in the notification area (rhs of taskbar) for the wireless connection (with a red cross on it). Right click it and left click View Available Wireless Networks.

Left click Change advanced settings
Left click Wireless Networks tab
Make sure that there is a tick against Use Windows to configure my wireless network settings

Left click the Advanced button (not the Advanced tab)
Select Computer to Computer (Ad Hoc) networks only
Make sure that there is no tick against Automatically connect to non-preferred networks
Left click Close

Left click the Add button
Type a Network name (SSID)
Network Authentication should be set to Open
Set Data encryption should be set to Disabled
Make sure that there is no tick against The key is provided for me automatically.
Make sure there is a tick against This is a computer-to-computer (Ad Hoc) network; wireless access points are not used (this should be grayed out)

Left click the Connection tab
Make sure that there is a tick against Connect when this network is in range
Left click OK
Left click OK

You need to repeat the above procedure for each PC, ensuring that you type exactly the same Network name for each one.

And don’t worry that you still have the red cross on the Wireless icon in the notification area – you haven’t finished yet.

Once you have setup each PC as above, shut them all down except for the main PC – the one that is probably connected to the internet. I will call this the Host PC.

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Setting up an Ad Hoc Wireless Network – Part 4

Setting up the Host PC

Right click the wireless icon in the taskbar and left click Open Network Connections
The Network Connections Window will open

Right click Local Area Connection (NOT the wireless connection) in the list
Left click Properties
Left click the Advanced tab
Put a tick against Allow other network users to connect through this computer's internet connection
Left click OK
Close the Network Connections window.

A box will tell you that “….your LAN adaptor will be set to use IP address 192.168.0.1…….” – left click the Yes button.

Close the Network Connections Window.

Now boot up the other PC(s) and watch as the little wireless icons lose the red cross and tell you that your PC’s are connected.

If they don’t connect, left click the wireless icon and left click Repair.

If they say that they are connected but the connection doesn’t actually work, left click the wireless icon and left click the Support Tab. If the Address Type is “Automatic Private Address” then click the Repair button and check again when it has finished. The Address Type should then be “Assigned by DHCP”.

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Checklist for Troubleshooting a Wireless Network

This is not for beginners – it is to ensure that absent minded old engineers like me don’t forget a step!

1. Has each PC got an IP address? -
  i. Win9X – run, winipcfg
  ii. WinXP – cmd, ipconfig or Network Connections,
    Local Area Connection, Status, Support, Details
2. Check connections – ping IP address of Router/other PCs
3. Check Internet, ping 194.70.234.209
4. Check DNS, ping www.computershopper.co.uk
5. Network:
  i. Win9X -Network Neighborhood, Properties,
   Configuration – Client for Microsoft Networks? 
   File and Printer Sharing on?
  ii. WinXP – Network Connections, Local Area
    Connection, Properties – Client for Microsoft
    Networks? File and Printer Sharing?
6. Computer name and Workgroup:
  i. Win9X -Network Neighborhood, Properties,
   Identification.
  ii. WinXP – System Properties.
7. Firewall should be off for Network, on for Internet connection:
  i. WinXP – Network Connections, Local Area
   Connection, Properties, Advanced.
  ii. Checkout third party firewalls
8. Make sure that something unique and identifiable is shared on each computer – else it won't show in Network Neighborhood.
9. NET VIEW – to list PCs in workgroup
10. NET VIEW \\PCNAME – to view shared resources – "Access Denied" – check user accounts.
11. Spyware damage – use WinsockxpFix or LSPFix

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Router playing up?

Some computers are required to run all day every day – or as the Americans say, “24/7”. Most of these computers are servers (the ones that form the Internet) and don’t run the domestic versions of Windows. In fact most of them don’t run Microsoft at all, they run Unix/Linux.

That’s because the domestic versions of Windows won’t run 24, let alone 24/7, without needing a reboot to clear accumulated errors from memory and start afresh.

Even servers will eventually need a reboot – there are always bugs that will cause problems to accumulate until they start misbehaving.

Routers are computers too, and although much simpler, they also need a reboot now and again.

Domestic Wireless Modem Routers are sometimes left on permanently, but in my experience they will eventually start playing up. And a reboot normally sorts them out.

The best way to keep them going is just to switch them off at night (mine is on a time switch). When they boot up in the morning they are refreshed and ready to face another day!

Sometimes Routers can be affected by electrical storms or other factors that cause spikes through the mains supply. They only have cheap and basic power supplies which can’t stop spikes like the bigger PC PSUs can.

The all powerful IT solution of “Have you tried switching it off then switching it on again?” definitely applies to Domestic Wireless Modem Routers.

Sometimes, if that doesn’t work, they can be sorted out by resetting to factory defaults (it’s one of the options in the Router control settings). But before you do that make sure that you write down the settings that you will need to reinstate (ADSL user name & password, wireless channel and encryption settings).

I had one the other day that was connected to one PC wirelessly but wouldn’t connect to any others wirelessly.

Resetting to factory defaults sorted it out.

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Laptop won’t connect to home Wireless Network

My friend’s daughter had a new Dell laptop to take to University.

Her daughter had it set up by a new student friend to connect to the University wireless network. But when she brought the laptop home the daughter couldn’t get it to connect to her family’s wireless router.

I tried all the obvious things but couldn’t get the router to allocate an IP address to the laptop. Even though there was another laptop in the same house that was connected quite happily to the router! I thought it might be a weird fault with the router that I had never come across before.

But it wasn’t – when I rebooted the laptop I noticed a “splash screen” saying Odyssey during startup. Although I could not find an Odyssey entry in All Programs I eventually noticed an Odyssey Icon on the desktop. And when I clicked on it I discovered Odyssey Access Client.

This is a piece of software (from Juniper Networks) that had been put on by the friend at University to enable a connection to the University servers. It is an extra layer of software on top of the normal wireless connection software. And it was stopping the connection to the home network.

All I had to do to get the thing to connect was to set up a new “home” connection within the Odyssey Access Client, and put in the router’s security key.

I just wonder how many other “freshers” will have trouble connecting their laptops to their home wireless networks?

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Wireless Network – Limited or no connectivity

When a wireless network connection has a status of “Limited or no connectivity”, that means that the wireless is working on both the devices, but they can’t talk to each other.

This is usually because the network key has been typed incorrectly on the computer that can抰 connect.

When you set up the wireless router you should have carefully written down the network key. If not you need to access the router through it抯 web page and write it down.

Now, on the computer that you are trying to connect, right click on the wireless network icon in the notification area, left click on Open Network Connections, right click on the Wireless Network Connection and left click Properties.

Left click the Wireless Networks tab, left click the name of the network involved and then left click the Properties button, then the Association tab. Carefully type in the correct network key for the router (you wrote it down just now) and then repeat it in the box below, left click the OK button and then again for the next box.

In a few moments you should get a balloon to tell you that the network is connected.

Close the Wireless Network Connections box.

If that didn’t work, try the next tip or this tip.

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Wireless security key

A lot of wireless routers are now being supplied by ISPs with pre-configured security settings. These can sometimes be altered by the user (BT, Tiscali) or sometimes not (Sky).

The pre-configured wireless network name (SSID) and wireless key (WPA key) are usually printed on the bottom/back of the router and sometimes also on an accompanying card.

Take great care when entering the key – it is probably case sensitive. In other words, if it shows an uppercase letter then enter it as an uppercase letter.

Don’t blindly assume that the whole key is hexadecimal and therefore that the case of the letters doesn’t matter. Bitter experience says that it does!

I think that this only really applies to WPA (rather than WEP) security, but play safe, just copy the key exactly.

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