Setting up your wireless network on LinkSys

In this tutorial, I will explain how to build your wireless network using a LinkSys router in very easy steps.

Wireless networks became more popular these days since mobility is a key aspect in any environment, even for home users. This tutorial will show you how simple it is to setup a small wireless network to share your Internet connection for fixed and mobile users.

Typically, a wireless router has two types of interfaces: classical, RJ45 for fixed stations (at least 4 usually) and a radio antenna that supports multiple clients.
For this tutorial, I used a LinkSys wireless router, model no WRT54GC. It's a small office/home user type of router, and I've spent for the device about 50$.

As it comes out of the box, the router has some default settings that help you set it up really quick.
First of all, it has a DHCP server turned on so your PC will recieve an IP address automatically.
So this is the first step you should make: connect a PC to one of the router's LAN ports using a straight-through UTP cable (of course, after powering on the router..).

The PC must be set up to get it's network setting automatically (see http://www.tutorial5.com/content/view/32/79/ if you don't know how).
After doing this, click Start - Run and type cmd. In the command prompt, type ipconfig /all and hit enter. You will see some informations on all your network interfaces; like shown bellow, on Local Area Connection, you'll see and IP, a subnet mask, etc that your computer got from the DHCP server on the router.

Get the IP address from the "default gateway" since that is the router's LAN address. Of course, you can get this address from the user's manual supplied with the router too.

Open a browser and type in that address in the Address field (in my example, it's 192.168.1.1) to connect to the router's graphical user interface.
As shown bellow, you will be asked for an authentication to access the router for security reasons. The factory default username and password depend on the vendor and model; for Linksys it's generally

Username: (leave blank)
Password: admin

This information too can be found in the user's manual, on the vendor's website or even on a label posted on the equipment itself.

After logging, you will see the router's menu. This indeed depends on the vendor and/or model, but the topics are quite the same for all.

The first screen brings up the basic router configuration, like WAN and LAN IP addresses. The "Internet Setup" part should be configured using your Internet Service Provider addresses (DHCP/Static IP or PPPoE if you use some kind of authentication for your Internet access). The Domain Name and Hostname are optional.

The Network Setup reffers to your Local Area Network. I recommend you to leave the DHCP Server as enabled to allocate IP addresses automatically in your network; this is appliable to both wired and wireless interfaces. If you don't have any special needs, you can leave all fields here to the default ones, since it works perfectly for a network up to 50 clients.

The MAC Address Clone tab activates a function that will duplicate one of your PC's MAC addresses on the Internet interface. This is useful only when the Internet Service Provider restricts the usage of the connection to the physical address of only one PC for security reasons.

If enabled, by clikcing "Clone My PC's MAC", the MAC address of the interface that connects to the Internet will be identical to the one of your PC; the Internet Service Provider won't know that you are sharing your internet connection and their equipments will think that they are still connected to your PC without any router. If this is the case, be sure that you are not violating any agreements between you and the company the provides you Internet services since that could lead to extra fees or worse.

Next it's time to configure your Wireless settings. Go to the Wireless tab, and select the Mode your want your antenna to work: 802.11b, 802.11g or both.
802.11b is not commonly used anymore, since it has a maximum transmit rate of 11mbps, best case scenario, in comparision with the G standard which works at 54mbps. You can use mixed if you know you will access the wireless networks with older laptops or so which only have 802.11b wireless interfaces.

Next fill in the SSID of the network; this is the name of the wireless network itself and should be set to something that describe your network (like Private-home for example). The wireless channel is not important, since any radio interface will scan all channels to find a wireless device to connect to; just be sure not to interfere with any other wireless router or access point, having the same settings and the same channel.

The SSID Broadcast should remain enabled even though it's a fair security risk. SSID Broadcast is a service that sends some signals called beacons periodically so new devices can see there is a wireless network avaiable; this is a security risk since an attacker can discover the network - but by disabling it, a new device will not see the wireless network at all automatically.

Save your settings and go to the Wireless Security tab:

The default is disabled, but that's an invite to anyone who wants to connect to your network. Leave it that way only if you are building a so called "hotspot" offering free internet services for the costumers in your range. Otherwise, i recommend you to set the security mode to WPA2 Personal which uses a fair AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) cryptography mechanism to protect your wireless data. The Passphras you enter here must be from 8 to 63 charachters (as longer, the better - and I recommend you to use something like your birthday twice: 1710198017101980 for example). The key must have a logic since you have to remember it easly for entering it when connecting a new client.

Save your setting and your ready to go.

After connecting your clients, you can also use the "Wireless MAC Filter" tool for better security. This feature will learn the MAC addresses of the clients you select and allow traffic from those wireless interfaces only after enabling it.

After you do all this, it's time to backup your configuration. FOr this, go to the Administration tab and click Backup Settings. A config file will be generated and you can download it to your PC and restore it if something goes wrong in the future.

For better security, change the router's administrator password too, from admin to something more complex to prevent unauthorized access.

Enjoy your brand new wireless network!

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