Gary Kjos
garykjos at hotmail.com
Wed Mar 10 10:07:08 CST 2004
>>>>If Mr. Wu and I are interfering with each other (I'm going to go across >>>>the >street and meet him in a bit) would changing to 11g solve the problem?<<<< I can't guarantee it but I would guess that the 11g would be better able to handle outside interferance. It is my understanding that it has a much larger working range and that for it to be able to do that successfully it would need to be able to ignore other stuff more than the shorter range 11b equipment does. It is also my understanding that there is increased security capabilies with the 11g equipment. >>>>>Would securing my wireless with encryption and changing the SSID >>>>>(whatever >that means) and limiting the MAC address (whatever that is), solve the >problem on 11b?<<<< MAC is the address of the network card itself. You would think that limiting your router to only talking to specific MACs would be very good security - BUT suppoedly the MAC can be spoofed too. So while it would be good for keeping the less savy hackers and your neighbors out, a real hacker dude could still get in. SSID is "A 32-character unique identifier attached to the header of packets sent over a WLAN that acts as a password when a mobile device tries to connect to the BSS. (Also called ESSID.) The SSID differentiates one WLAN from another, so all access points and all devices attempting to connect to a specific WLAN must use the same SSID. A device will not be permitted to join the BSS unless it can provide the unique SSID. Because an SSID can be sniffed in plain text from a packet, it does not supply any security to the network. An SSID is also referred to as a Network Name because essentially it is a name that identifies a wireless network" This, the SSID, would seem to be the key - it is the id of your wireless LAN. So if you and your neighbor both have lans on the same frequency you would both be able to still function. It will be interesting to find out if Mr Wu has set up a Wireless Network and is also experiencing difficulties. And I must tell you that I don't have a wireless setup myself - yet. I have been looking at getting one though. But I have no hands on experience, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. ;-) Gary Kjos garykjos at hotmail.com _________________________________________________________________ One-click access to Hotmail from any Web page – download MSN Toolbar now! http://clk.atdmt.com/AVE/go/onm00200413ave/direct/01/