Wireless network devices

[Delphium]

Hi, im planning on building a storage server that I wish to store away and connect to it via wireless.

I have already a SMC wireless router SMC WBR14T-G EU which supports 108mb wireless, and so I wish to connect to this router.
My question is... what type of device would be better for this?

I have looked at USB devices and other AP's that just connect to pc via LAN, I need to have full control over firewall like I do with LAN, is that possible with usb? and needs to have a fairly strong signal as im going from 1 corner of the house to the total oposite corner upstairs, any recommendations for this kind of setup?


TIA for any advice
Delph.

[OleJ]

I would recommend you to wire it. 108mb wireless is very theoretical and considering you need to go from one corner of your house to the other you probably won't get much throughput.
But: if the server is very close to where you have your clients (laptop, stationery pc, media center, etc.) then speed should be decent as (iirc) only the initial connection will be established through the router while the rest of the data will flow directly between host/client.
Also you'd need your other computers to have compatible 802.11n abilities. Otherwise you'll of course be running whatever speed you have on the clients.

Still, with my experience with wireless and storage I wouldn't recommend it as a combo as I find wireless to be way too slow for any larger amounts of data (1GB+). Sorry I just don't have the patience for it

[Andy Mc]

Originally Posted by OleJ

I would recommend you to wire it. 108mb wireless is very theoretical and considering you need to go from one corner of your house to the other you probably won't get much throughput.

Still, with my experience with wireless and storage I wouldn't recommend it as a combo as I find wireless to be way too slow for any larger amounts of data (1GB+). Sorry I just don't have the patience for it

I have to agree with OleJ on both points above, you will always get a better speed out of the wired connection as until you try the connection wirelessly across your house there is no guarantees that you will get a good enough signal, even then the signal strength will vary from day to day by a little bit.


Also you need to think about security, especially if your running your fileserver over wireless, you dont want anyone getting into your box and a cable connection is more secure than a wireless one.

[Delphium]

Cheers guys for the advice

Originally Posted by Andy Mc

Also you need to think about security, especially if your running your fileserver over wireless, you dont want anyone getting into your box and a cable connection is more secure than a wireless one.

I had taken this into account, was planning on using WPA not WEP, also mac address filtering and hidden SSID, that should be secure enough for my wireless network, specially as there are very few houses (8 others) out in the sticks where I live, also the box will be running Debian.

If there is anything more that can be used to secure the wireless please feel free to comment.

Thanks all.

[Andy Mc]

Originally Posted by Delphium

I had taken this into account, was planning on using WPA not WEP, also mac address filtering and hidden SSID, that should be secure enough for my wireless network, specially as there are very few houses (8 others) out in the sticks where I live, also the box will be running Debian.

If there is anything more that can be used to secure the wireless please feel free to comment.

Thanks all.

No I think you have all the bases covered there. WEP can be broken in less than 20 minutes (I know as I've done it) but WPA and WPA2 PSK take brute forcing which If you don't have a suitably configured PS3 is going to take you a while and the bigger and more random the passphase the better .

Just make sure you use PSK and (WPA2 if possible but you will need to make sure whatever wifi adaptor you get will work under debian - my Edimax USB EW-7318USG works great under linux, only ever used it on BT2 HD install and updated it all (I just dont know if it will do WPA2 under linux as I havent tried that yet).


If you have to go wireless then at least you will have done all you can security wise, someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

[Delphium]

Thanks for the tip Andy Mc, I will look out for WPA2 and PSK, as you say about drivers/software compatibility with debian, think I shall look into a wired connection to an identical router to the SMC WBR14T-G EU I have already, and bridging the two wireless routers together.

[blu]

bridging wireless routers would give you really good coverage and signal strength. another thing you can do for security is set up a radius server for wpa/wpa2 heres a link on how. http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/30210/98/ part 1
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/30213/98/ part 2

[Buzzons]

just to say, hidding the SSID is pointless, as is mac filtering.

Netstumbler will find any AP even with a "hidden" ssid as it is still transmitting data. - ergo hiding the SSID just makes it harder for day to day use, not for hackers.

MAC filtering, again, packet sniffing the data passed in the air using wireshark or the like will reveal the mac addresses of other devices on your network. You don't even need to be authenticated with your AP to do this. Once a MAC is found it takes ~30s to change it in windows or in linux. Thus they will have a MAC that is allowed on the network (yes two things on a network can have the same MAC address). -ergo just makes it harder for day to day use (mates laptop brought over etc)

[Delphium]

Some valid points there Buzzons, after some reasearch looks like I may bridge 2 routers together to get the strength I require while still being able to talk between the two pc's and media streaming box (D-Link DSM520).

Thanks for the links blu, I shall have a good old read!

[OleJ]

Originally Posted by Delphium

Some valid points there Buzzons, after some reasearch looks like I may bridge 2 routers together to get the strength I require while still being able to talk between the two pc's and media streaming box (D-Link DSM520).

Thanks for the links blu, I shall have a good old read!

I completely agree with blu. I would also have suggested that solution if you kept on insisting on wireless ;-)

[Delphium]

I only insit as I wish to remove a bunch of heat and noise to outside my room by the means of removing the hard drives.

I have also have acquired a media streaming box (D-Link DSM-520) which I can stick in the living room to stream content from the server.

So for the large 1gb files or such that may be painfull over wireless, I shall be mostly avoiding by streaming the content

Thanks.