Chapter 7 Wireless LAN

7.1.2 What You Need to Know About Wireless

Wireless Basics

“Wireless” is essentially radio communication. In the same way that walkie-talkie radios send and receive information over the airwaves, wireless networking devices exchange information with one another. A wireless networking device is just like a radio that lets your computer exchange information with radios attached to other computers. Like walkie-talkies, most wireless networking devices operate at radio frequency bands that are open to the public and do not require a license to use. However, wireless networking is different from that of most traditional radio communications in that there a number of wireless networking standards available with different methods of data encryption.

SSID

Each network must have a name, referred to as the SSID - “Service Set IDentifier”. The “service set” is the network, so the “service set identifier” is the network’s name. This helps you identify your wireless network when wireless networks’ coverage areas overlap and you have a variety of networks to choose from.

MAC Address Filter

Every Ethernet device has a unique MAC (Media Access Control) address. The MAC address consists of twelve hexadecimal characters (0-9, and A to F), and it is usually written in the following format: “0A:A0:00:BB:CC:DD”.

The MAC address filter controls access to the wireless network. You can use the MAC address of each wireless client to allow or deny access to the wireless network.

Finding Out More

See Section 7.9 on page 121 for advanced technical information on wireless networks.

7.1.3 Before You Start

Before you start using these screens, ask yourself the following questions. See Section 7.1.2 on page 106 if some of the terms used here are not familiar to you.

•What wireless standards do the other wireless devices in your network support (IEEE 802.11g, for example)? What is the most appropriate standard to use?

•What security options do the other wireless devices in your network support (WPA-PSK, for example)? What is the strongest security option supported by all the devices in your network?

•Do the other wireless devices in your network support WPS (Wi-Fi Protected Setup)? If so, you can set up a well-secured network very easily.

Even if some of your devices support WPS and some do not, you can use WPS to set up your network and then add the non-WPS devices manually, although this is somewhat more complicated to do.

•What advanced options do you want to configure, if any? If you want to configure advanced options such as Quality of Service, ensure that you know precisely what you want to do. If you do not want to configure advanced options, leave them as they are.

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P-660HN-F1 User’s Guide