subject: Setting Up a Wireless Home Network As Easily As 1-2-3 [print this page] Setting Up a Wireless Home Network As Easily As 1-2-3
Imagine yourself sitting on your living room couch while sipping coffee or maybe a soda. Can you also imagine yourself browsing the Net at the same time through the laptop or netbook sitting on your lap? A little more than a decade ago, people could hardly imagine such a scenario. Then came a revolution in networking that allowed people to connect to networks without using wires. The best router capable of creating such networks is called a wireless router.
These days, wireless home networks are commonplace. Every modern household connected to the Internet almost always has a wireless network in place. The dwindling prices of the required hardware and equipment have made this possible. More importantly, the struggle to find the best router for a home network is no longer that much of a struggle. Thus, the Internet and the World Wide Web have become more accessible to many homes today.
Setting up a wireless home network has become easy, too. In the past, you would need a technical consultant or a geek to set up your home network for you. Today, however, setting up networks is something that you can do on your own with very little help from anyone else. How do you set up a wireless home network? Read further for three easy steps to hook up your home computers to the online world.
The very first thing to do is to acquire the needed equipment, besides getting a subscription for broadband Internet service. For a very modest home network, you will need at least two computers, a wireless network adapter for each computer, and the heart of your network--a wireless router. Most desktop computers don't have built-in wireless networking support, so you will need to install a wireless network adapter for each of them. However, most laptops and netbooks, especially the recent models, already have built-in wireless adapters. Also make sure that you are buying a wireless router rather than a wireless access point; they are both wireless equipment but serve different purposes.
Next, hook up your router to the broadband modem. This is about the only part of your network setup that will involve a wired connection. To connect your router and your broadband modem, first make sure that both router and modem are unplugged from the electric outlets. Then, take one end of the network cable from the modem and plug it into the appropriate slot on the router. The slot will usually be labeled "Internet," "WAN," "WAN/WLAN," or "WLAN." The whole idea at this step is to make sure that your router is between your Internet connection (represented by the broadband modem) and the rest of your home computers.
The last step involves configuring your wireless router. The procedure for doing this varies from router to router. So, your best friend for this third and last step is the user manual of the wireless router that you bought. Generally, configuration will require you to temporarily connect one computer to the router through a network cable. Within the router's configuration interface, you can specify a name for your network (also known as an SSID), enable restricted access through password protection, and configuring the administrative features of your router.
Easy as a breeze, isn't it? Just three simple steps, and you have a wireless home network. Your wireless network will serve you well if your equipment is of top quality. Therefore, find the best router and the best wireless network adapter for your network.
