Hey guys, I've come to pick your brains a little. I'm planning to host a couple of LANs over Christmas at my place. A few of my mates are gamers, so a couple of rigs are going to be set up, but my girlfriend in particular is an avid fan of her laptop. Since a few of the games we're running don't require massive hardware (UT2k3, Trackmania, Civ4), this is fine. However, this means we've got a mix of wireless and wired connections, and to top it all off, there's no internet at our place, so we'll be going through some router (I'd imagine). Is it possible to take on LAN play through a wireless connection? Since it's all going to be within 3 metres of the router, connection strength shouldn't be an issue. Any thoughts on going about it? Would life be more difficult if a wired connection was involved? Cheers in advance, guys! Will
Does the laptop not have an ethernet port? If the laptop uses any form of Intel integrated graphics I'd doubt it's be able to run any games TBH.
It can run Civ. Kinda. We've already checked. To be honest, the processor's throttling a touch, and the graphics are OK. Unreal Tourney runs just fine. And the lappy does, but, well, she's a girl. Asking her to put cables in a laptop is like asking her if she'd like a kick in the face. Extreme hostility. This is a girl who plays on Quake Live with a trackpad...
Yes, and she's not that terrible with it, either, I must confess... Yes, but I prefer her p Spoiler ersonalit y. Spoiler You dirty git. ;-) Having said that, I'm a guitar teacher, so I imagine it wouldn't be too hard for me to replicate. So, back on-topic, I suppose the big question is, what are the obstacles to getting wireless and wired LAN play through the same router? Any? None?
I can't see any reason you'd experience problems with a mixture of wired and wireless. As you say, signal strength isn't going to be a problem if you're close to the router.
Well that's good to know. Think I may have to rig up sometime today and "test" Civ 4. Cheers, guys! Will
If you want a more definite reply then the answer is; it won't be a problem. I currently run 2 pc's gaming plus my mrs surfing on wireless on her laptop without issue and I have had 4 pc's and 2 laptops on wireless with all surfing as well as gaming. The only possible issue is your equipment. I had a cheap router and it didn't like to have more than 3 different connections at a time so it would randomly drop one or another of them. That could be a rare thing or a dud router but just food for thought.
I've run LAN games via wireless before, and for one person linked to others on wired its fine. For more than two on wireless, its a problem. Four just results in a horrid experience for all four. Wireless is a shared bus, and gaming traffic is a constant stream of low-latency traffic. The more users constantly streaming data, the more trouble you get. So in summary, if its everyone else wired up to a hub, and her on wireless, it should be ok.
