You’re probably mastered the art of setting up a Wi-Fi wireless network in your home. But what if you want your network to extend for 5, 10, 20 miles or more? That may sound fanciful, but it’s not so tough to achieve long-distance wireless connectivity. You just need to add a few tools to the mix and get to work on your mash-up.

To help you, we tracked down a chapter from Mike Outmesguine’s ExtremeTech book, Wi-Fi Toys: 15 Cool Wireless Projects for Home, Office, and Entertainment, from Wiley Publishing You can find it online at PCMag. It details how to select your access point sites, choose your antennas, and more. Creating a long-distance link simply means marrying many of the essentials of wireless with a dose of physics to overcome the obstacles of a far-reaching connection.

Or perhaps you’re interested in the subtle art of wardriving using a car equipped with a computer, a wireless card, and software to identify the presence of a Wi-Fi signal, even if you’re out on a deserted highway. What an excellent idea! It’s surprising how ubiquitous Wi-Fi signals have become. You’ll find everything you need to get started as a budding wardriver at PC Mag.

Finally, several blogs contain complete instructions for upgrading the capabilities of Linksys routers. Take a look at www.lifehacker.com for some interesting examples. You don’t have to settle for bush league Wi-Fi.

The D-Link DCS 2120 lets you remotely monitor a home or office in real-time using a mobile phone’s 3G video capabilities. Of course, if it can be monitored through a mobile phone, it can be using a computer as well.

In fact, the camera’s visuals are available from any Internet Streaming Media Alliance (ISMA) compatible device and offers support for RealPlayer and Quick Time applications. The camera supports resolutions of up to 640X480 at 30 frames per second.

You can manage and monitor up to 16 camere using D-Link’s IP surveillance camera management software and archive the video to a hard drive or network attached storage (NAS) devices. You can even control the DCS 2120 remotely from Web using the browser.

The camera is able to capture video in rooms with minimal lighting because its low sensitivity gives quality video feeds even when lighting condition aren’t optimum. The 4X digital zoom with motion alert function ensures that you won’t miss any details if anything unfortunate happens.

The Linksys Wireless-N broadband router lets you start a wireless network with up to four times the range and 12 times the speed if conventional wireless routers. Now isn’t that an appealing prospect?

If functions as wireless access point, letting all your wireless devices connect to the Internet through a single broadband connection. It used a draft implementation of 802.11n, using MIMO (multiple in, multiple out) technology to increase the router’s range and reduce dead spots. It’s compatible with 802.11b and 802.11g too.

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Question

I want to use a different wireless network, but it’s secure. How can I get onto the new wireless network?

If a wireless network is secured with encryption, you will need to provide a valid encryption key to access the secured network. First, right-click the wireless network icon in your System Tray and then click View Available Wireless Networks. Highlight the name of the secured wireless network that you want to use and click Advanced. A Properties dialog box should open. In the Available networks area, highlight the desired secure network again and click Configure. A new dialog box appears. Make sure that the secure network SSID is correct, enable encryption, and then enter the necessary key(s) in the spaces provided, this dialog will appear a bit different for WPA-type security. Click OK to accept the key(s).

You should connect to the secure network once you click OK. If you still do not connect, double check the encryption key(s) and make sure they are correct. Remember that unless you’ve set up the wireless network yourself, you’ll need to obtain any encryption keys from the secure wireless network operator.

With high speeds and fuss-free setup and usage, the 3Com OfficeConnect Wireless 108Mbps Cable/DSL router might just be the wireless you’re looking to equip your small office.

It allows wired and wireless personal computers to share a single broadband connection securely. Using eXtended Range (XR) technology, it is designed to enable wide coverage in small offices and home office, so that you’ll get a reliable and strong wireless signal whenever you are.

In SuperG mode, it can handle wireless speeds of up to 108Mbps. Not only is it fast, it’s secure too. It has the latest in firewall capabilities and wireless local area network security WiFi Protected Access (WPA) as well as WPA2 with temporal key integrity protocol (TKIP) and advanced encryption standard (AES).

The router includes a 4-port 1/100 switch, stateful packet inspection firewall, an IP router and a dynamic host configuration protocol (DHCP) server.

Despite having so many user interface and setup wizard to help you manage the router as simply as posible. In fact, a conventional setup of the router has been independently-certified to be under 15 minutes.

Question:

There are several wireless networks operating at work, but how can I choose the one that is best for my Windows XP laptop?

The best connection is usually the fastest, so select the wireless network that offers the best signal strength.

First, right-click the wireless network icon in your System Tray and select Status from the menu. A dialog box will illustrate the connection and report on signal strength as a series of green bars. The strongest connections will have five green bars. Close the dialog box.

If your signal strength is low, right-click the wireless network icon again and select View Available Wireless Networks from the menu. A dialog box appears and lists all of the wireless networks that your laptop detects.

Select one of the available wireless networks and click Connect. After a moment, you’ll receive a new IP (Internet Protocol) address and notification of your connection strength. Check the connection status again. If you have better strength, you can stay with that new connection (or try another available wireless network if you like).

A backlog of almost 12,000 comments on the first draft of the proposed 802.11n standard is pushing back the second draft, originally planned for late fall of this year. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) said late last week that it is likely that the second draft would not appear until January 2007.

The delay means that the final standard may not be approved until 2008, industry insiders say. While approximately half of the comments had to do with editorial changes needed in the document, the remaining 6,000 or so comments may lead to changes that put some of the pre-802.11n hardware in danger of being incompatible with the final standard.

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