Build your own home wireless network

If you have a broadband Internet connection at home, and you have other family members who want to access the Internet as well, you should seriously consider building your own wireless LAN.

It will free you from having to lay those dust-gathering cables all over the house and drill holes in the walls.

You can then take your notebook or PDA -- or even a Wi-Fi- capable cell phone when it becomes available -- anywhere in the house and get connected.

You can work on the dining table while watching your children do their homework, or sit in the veranda when it gets so stuffy inside the house. You can also share your printer with other users.

You can even add an Internet camera such as D-Link's DS-5300W for remote surveillance. Wireless connection will give you the level of flexibility that the Ethernet-based network cannot offer.

Like everything else in your life, your job will be much easier if you first spend some time on planning. There are a couple of decisions that you should make before you embark on this project.

First, decide on which standard you will use. The most common one today is the 802.11b. This standard will give you a speed of up to 11 Mbps. This is a shared bandwidth, which means the more people are using it the slower the connection will be. Still, it will meet the need of most home users today.

The other standards will give higher throughput levels. For example, the 802.11a will give you 54 Mbps while the 802.11g will go up to 54 Mbps -- sometimes doubled to 108 Mbps. The 802.11a operates in the 5 MHz frequency band, however, and it is incompatible with the others.

If you have the budget, you can choose the best throughput such as the 802.11g. You don't have to worry if your notebook -- like my ThinkPad T40 -- only supports 802.11b, as the 802.11g is backward compatible with 802.11b. Of course, I can only get up to 11 Mbps on my notebook although accessing an 802.11g network.

Another feature to check out is the range of the access point. An access point is actually the radio transmitter and receiver that connects to the broadband modem. If you live in a big house, you may want to make sure that your access point is powerful enough to cover every room.

If you live in an apartment, choose one that is not so powerful. Remember, your neighbor may steal your bandwidth -- especially if your network is not secured, and this will reduce your actual data rate.

So, what else do you have to buy? If you want to combine your wireless network with a wired one, you may have to add a separate router or switch. A switch has more intelligence and can configure the connection dynamically so that you'll get the highest throughput from any port.

Finally, you will need to buy a Wi-Fi card for each of the desktop PCs and notebooks that does not yet have one. The Wi-Fi adaptor for the notebook usually comes as a PC-Card, so all you have to do is plug it into the PC-Card slot. For desktop PCs, you may have to open the casing to install the PCI card.

Who are the best vendors for wireless home network equipment? In general, you can rely on names such as D-Link, LinkSys and Netgear.

What additional features should you look for? A built-in firewall is a must, as it will prevent outsiders from sneaking into your home network and stealing your data. If you have under- aged children and you want to make sure they do not venture into forbidden websites, choose a switch with the parental guide function.

Finally, as you don't want other people to piggyback and rob you of your bandwidth, you have to secure your network. Find a switch that has 802.1X or WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) -- or any other security features -- so that only authorized users can access your home network.

Now, if you are not using a PC as the Internet gateway into your house, you may also add a standalone gateway. This may also be a function that is already incorporated in the switch.

Once you have all the components, all you have to do is put them together. With the help of Wizards, setting up should be fairly straightforward -- especially if you buy everything from the same vendor. -- Zatni Arbi