Rob Morley wrote:

Thanks for your input - it's quite educational! There are a
few more questions below but if you are growing weary of
responding, not a problem.

On Fri, 18 Jul 2008 09:48:51 +0100
Ted wrote:

Rob Morley wrote:

Just set up the encryption (WPA is more secure than WEP),
Sounds good. What exactly is it that is being encrypted?

The data content of each packet sent over the wireless connection.

Right. So does that mean that the router encrypts the
packets and that some decryption software is required to be
installed on the laptop receiving the packets?

One other security measure I forgot to mention: change the SSID
that your router uses from the default to something obscure - hackers
may scan for default values as a quick way of finding networks that
have had SSID broadcast disabled (lots of hardware comes configured with
values like 'wireless', 'WLAN', 'linksys' etc.)

So this would mean the router of the network to which I
connected was broadcasting SSID and my laptop automatically
picked it up and joined in the network?

Is there a way of preventing the laptop from connecting to
broadcasting foreign networks?

If I turn off SSID broadcast on my router, presumably I need
to configure something on the router together with a
matching counterpart something on the laptop so that the
laptop will find and connect with the router.

Ted

On Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:48:32 +0100
Ted wrote:

Right. So does that mean that the router encrypts the
packets and that some decryption software is required to be
installed on the laptop receiving the packets?

The network driver handles the encryption and decryption - all you need
do is set the encryption key on the router and any wireless clients.

So this would mean the router of the network to which I
connected was broadcasting SSID and my laptop automatically
picked it up and joined in the network?

Yes.

Is there a way of preventing the laptop from connecting to
broadcasting foreign networks?

You can set it to only connect to your network (somewhere in the
wireless network preferences). I think you can also set it to always
offer you a choice before connecting to anything.

If I turn off SSID broadcast on my router, presumably I need
to configure something on the router together with a
matching counterpart something on the laptop so that the
laptop will find and connect with the router.

Change the SSID on the router from the default that it comes with to
something less obvious, and put the new SSID in your laptop wireless
preferences. If you can't figure out where to put it I can have a look
on an XP laptop, but I don't normally use either Windows or wireless.

Thanks for all that - very helpful.
One last(?) question: Will replacing the wired connection
with a wireless change the settings that applied to the
wired connection, that is, if I decided to abandon the
wireless and revert to the wired connection, would it just
be a matter of plugging in the wired modem again or would
setting up the the wireless connection have changed the
wired connection settings in the process? I am just trying
to understand what's required for a fallback plan.

Ted



Rob Morley wrote:
On Fri, 18 Jul 2008 11:48:32 +0100
Ted wrote:

Right. So does that mean that the router encrypts the
packets and that some decryption software is required to be
installed on the laptop receiving the packets?

The network driver handles the encryption and decryption - all you need
do is set the encryption key on the router and any wireless clients.

So this would mean the router of the network to which I
connected was broadcasting SSID and my laptop automatically
picked it up and joined in the network?

Yes.
Is there a way of preventing the laptop from connecting to
broadcasting foreign networks?

You can set it to only connect to your network (somewhere in the
wireless network preferences). I think you can also set it to always
offer you a choice before connecting to anything.

If I turn off SSID broadcast on my router, presumably I need
to configure something on the router together with a
matching counterpart something on the laptop so that the
laptop will find and connect with the router.

Change the SSID on the router from the default that it comes with to
something less obvious, and put the new SSID in your laptop wireless
preferences. If you can't figure out where to put it I can have a look
on an XP laptop, but I don't normally use either Windows or wireless.

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 10:42:20 +0100
Ted wrote:

Thanks for all that - very helpful.
One last(?) question: Will replacing the wired connection
with a wireless change the settings that applied to the
wired connection, that is, if I decided to abandon the
wireless and revert to the wired connection, would it just
be a matter of plugging in the wired modem again or would
setting up the the wireless connection have changed the
wired connection settings in the process? I am just trying
to understand what's required for a fallback plan.

Do you mean will it have changed the settings on the laptop? The
Ethernet and WiFi interface each have their own settings, so if you
switch off the wireless hardware (most laptops have a switch on the
side for this) and plug in a cable it will use that connection. If
both are active at the same time I don't think there's an easy way of
telling which connection will be used, but one or the other will be.

Rob Morley wrote:
On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 10:42:20 +0100
Ted wrote:

Thanks for all that - very helpful.
One last(?) question: Will replacing the wired connection
with a wireless change the settings that applied to the
wired connection, that is, if I decided to abandon the
wireless and revert to the wired connection, would it just
be a matter of plugging in the wired modem again or would
setting up the the wireless connection have changed the
wired connection settings in the process? I am just trying
to understand what's required for a fallback plan.

Do you mean will it have changed the settings on the laptop? The
Ethernet and WiFi interface each have their own settings, so if you
switch off the wireless hardware (most laptops have a switch on the
side for this) and plug in a cable it will use that connection. If
both are active at the same time I don't think there's an easy way of
telling which connection will be used, but one or the other will be.

I wasn't clear - I meant the pc. To set up the wireless lan,
I need to connect the wireless router to the pc via cable in
place of the cable connection the pc now has to the modem. I
was wondering what would be entailed in terms of setting
changes etc if I later wanted to change back from a wireless
router connected by cable to the pc to a modem connected by
cable to the pc.

Re your reply above, I had tried connecting the laptop to
the modem but I couldn't get an internet connection. However
I wasn't aware there was a wireless switch but I've now
checked and I see there is and it was 'on' so that probably
explains why I didn't get a connection (at least I hope it
does)!

When I turn on the laptop (still as out of the box), I have
3 adapters showing in Network Connections:

- Wireless
- 1394
- Local Area Lan (ethernet)

The first 2 are showing as 'connected' (from someone's
leaking router somewhere) and the last one is showing as
'unplugged'. I can understand the Wireless and Lan but am
not clear what the 1394 connection is and why it is showing
as connected along with the Wireless.

Ted

Ted wrote:


am
not clear what the 1394 connection is and why it is showing
as connected along with the Wireless.

Ted

Type 1394 in to Google.

Chris

--
Remove prejudice to reply.

Chris Whelan wrote:
Ted wrote:


am
not clear what the 1394 connection is and why it is showing
as connected along with the Wireless.

Ted

Type 1394 in to Google.

Chris

I did.

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 17:54:32 +0100
Ted wrote:

I wasn't clear - I meant the pc. To set up the wireless lan,
I need to connect the wireless router to the pc via cable in
place of the cable connection the pc now has to the modem. I
was wondering what would be entailed in terms of setting
changes etc if I later wanted to change back from a wireless
router connected by cable to the pc to a modem connected by
cable to the pc.

Assuming the PC is using DHCP in both cases you won't have to change
anything. Basically the PC broadcasts a request for connection
information, and the DHCP server replies with the settings it needs,
the PC doesn't care whether it's talking to a modem or a router. You
will need to reboot the PC when you switch between the two, so it gets
its settings again.

Re your reply above, I had tried connecting the laptop to
the modem but I couldn't get an internet connection. However
I wasn't aware there was a wireless switch but I've now
checked and I see there is and it was 'on' so that probably
explains why I didn't get a connection (at least I hope it
does)!

Did you reboot the modem then the laptop after you connected it? As the
modem only expects to talk to one machine it won't have issued new
network settings to the laptop because it thought it was still
supposed to be talking to the PC.

When I turn on the laptop (still as out of the box), I have
3 adapters showing in Network Connections:

- Wireless
- 1394
- Local Area Lan (ethernet)

The first 2 are showing as 'connected' (from someone's
leaking router somewhere) and the last one is showing as
'unplugged'. I can understand the Wireless and Lan but am
not clear what the 1394 connection is and why it is showing
as connected along with the Wireless.

IEEE1394 is FireWire, it's sort of like USB and is commonly used for
connecting to digital video devices or external hard drives. The main
difference from USB is that it's peer-to-peer rather than
client-server, so you can hook two PCs together using FireWire as if it
was a regular network connection. I guess it's showing as connected
because the interface is active. You can disable it in BIOS or Device
Manager if you're not going to use it.