Presently the majority of the wireless hardware you will buy (routers, wireless network cards, printers etc) will use a networking specification called 802.11g which has a maximum speed of 54Mbps. This maximum [...]]]> It’s been years in development but this September it looks like 802.11n Wi-Fi will finally become a standard… well, an official standard anyway.

Presently the majority of the wireless hardware you will buy (routers, wireless network cards, printers etc) will use a networking specification called 802.11g which has a maximum speed of 54Mbps. This maximum speed is being increasingly seen as inadequate as applications become more complex and require more bandwidth.

The successor, 802.11n is being ratified to increase both the speed and range of wireless devices however it should be noted that due to the time the IEEE Task Group n have been arguing about the intricacies, equipment manufacturers got bored and decided to run with the draft specification. As a result, the fact that 802.11n is becoming ‘official’ is unlikely to change a great deal as hardware utilising the new standard has been available for some time now. Although these devices have been produced working on the draft specification, the reality is that there are very few differences between this and the anticipated final ‘official’ release.

Essentially based on the current 802.11g standard, 802.11n uses some new technology and tweaks to give Wi-Fi more speed and range. The most notable part of this technology is called ‘multiple input, multiple output’ or MIMO for short. MIMO uses several antennas to transmit multiple data streams simultaneously rather than a single antenna transmitting just one stream of data. This allows more data to be transmitted in the same period of time while also increasing the potential range of the network.

Other technologies include payload optimisation which results in more data being transmitted in each packet and channel bonding which can use two separate non-overlapping channels at the same time to transmit data. The result is all this is achievable data transmission rates of around 100Mbps and double the potential range of 802.11g.

There are no security enhancements as they simply aren’t needed; the WPA2 encryption standard provided by existing network hardware is considered by most to be ‘extremely secure’.

It’s worth checking the box of any network equipment you have purchased in the last couple of years as you may find it is already compatible with 802.11n and simply needs setting up correctly. It goes without saying that in order to benefit from the faster speed both the transmitting and receiving devices both have to support 802.11n; A 802.11n router working with a 802.11g laptop will result in slower 802.11g speeds.

At present ‘n’ rated hardware is more expensive than the older ‘g’ standard however not prohibitively so; our ‘n’ rated wireless router typically retails for around a tenner more than the £25 ‘g’ rated equivalent. Of course, if you are already happy with your wireless network and the upgrade will mean replacing perfectly functional hardware it is certainly worth considering whether your needs warrant the faster hardware.

At present 802.11n will only be required by those with blisteringly fast broadband connections or those that regularly copy large volumes of data across a wireless network however it will soon become the norm. If upgrading your hardware, therefore, it may well be worth paying a couple of extra pounds now to ensure that you remain future proof.

Some lucky people in this world have two computers in their household; one in the kids’ room and one in their room maybe. This week I’m going to shed some light on the advantages that can be gained by networking both machines together.

Some lucky people in this world have two computers in their household; one in the kids’ room and one in their room maybe. This week I’m going to shed some light on the advantages that can be gained by networking both machines together.

First things first, to make setting up a home network easy and worthwhile I would suggest that both machines are of fairly good specification and ideally should be running a Network friendly OS such as Windows ME or XP. This isn’t essential as you can have two old machines running Windows 95 if you like but the immediate benefits will be less obvious and your network will be a lot harder to set up.

With those criteria met, you will require a number of items to make your home network successful – these should not exceed £60 or so.

- 2 Network cards; if you have a newish PC, ask the person in the shop for two PCI network cards of 10/100mbps specification. Don’t worry so much about what that actually means; these are the cards that will allow your two PC’s to communicate to one another.

- A length of RJ-45 crossover cable. This is the cable that will connect your machines together so ensure that it is long enough.

- A moderate amount of knowledge of using a Windows PC.

The instructions I will give will be based on a Windows ME or XP machine. As I stated above, it is possible to set up the network on a 98 or 95 machine but I would require a longer article to discuss this procedure as it is quite a bit trickier. Before I explain how to go about setting up your home network, what exactly could you gain?

1) You will be able to play games across the network – Being defeated hands down by your 12 year old son on Half Life must be quite an experience.

2) You would be able to share pieces of hardware. For example, if you had one printer but two computers you could both utilise it instead of buying a second one. The same goes if you only have one connection to the Internet which you would like to have shared between two machines.

3) If you had a number of files on one machine that you would like both systems to have access to, let’s say for example a database of contact numbers then this would also be possible using a home network.

If this has convinced you of the need of a network in your home then perform the following steps carefully:

First take the lid off both the computers and slot the Network cards into a free PCI slot (white coloured slot) in the computer, screw them down in to the case and put the lid back on. This is easier than it sounds, but if in doubt then please get a knowledgeable friend to help you with this step.

Once you restart your computer, Windows should re-appear saying that it has found new hardware and should request a driver disk that would have been provided with your network cards. Insert the CD into the drive and get Windows to automatically search for the new driver and wait for it to install. Repeat this for the second machine so they both know how to utilise the piece of hardware which will allow them to communicate.

Once this stage is complete, it should be fairly plain sailing from here onwards, all you have to do is go into ‘Start’, ‘Settings’, ‘Control Panel’ then click on ‘Network Connections’ and the on to ‘Set up a home network’. Windows will next ask you a number of questions about how you want to set up your home network such as what it should be called, whether you would like to share your printers or not, etc. After this step is complete, it will ask you to insert a floppy disk into the computer which you can then use to transfer exactly the same settings onto the second machine so that it knows how to communicate with the first.

If all goes well then you should have the base of your home network installed and you can start sharing files and playing multiplayer games. As always however, there are a number of things that could go wrong along the way so if you are in serious doubt as to your abilities to perform the above then please get someone with a greater knowledge to do it for you. If you do have any minor difficulties along the way then you are always able to click on ‘Help’ and Windows will give you assistance.