Building a 802.11 WiFi Bridge From an old Laptop
This How To will outline how to build a wireless network bridge to connect a WIRELESS network signal (most likely from a Wireless Access Point or ISP) to a regular WIRED network.
It could be used to connect the network from 1 building to another building without having to run cable between the buildings.
To test this installation a working Access Point with internet access would help alot. Also in this example a Linksys wireless Access Point was used with NO security features enabled to eliminate any problems. You should enable them upon successful completion of the build.MATERIALS NEEDED (old stuff was used as much as possible as it is a shame to toss good working outdated hardware)
1) An old Laptop computer will be converted to be our WiFi bridge , (**A Cyrix DX2/66 Sharp Laptop was used in this build.)
2) A Second (client) computer running Windows 98 or better.
3) Windows 98 Second Edition CDROM
4) One Wireless network card. (*Orinoco Silver PCMCIA card )
5) Two Wired 10/100 network cards (*No name 10BT PCMCIA card)
6) Wireless Access Point (Linksys BEFW11S4 to send a signal to your bridge for testing)
7) Working Broadband connection to the BEFW11S4
8) Network Crossover cable* PCMCIA card because I used a laptop.
**I wanted the bridge to be quiet and the laptop does not have the noise associated with the fans in a desktop system.
1) The computer that will be converted into the bridge will have the following installeda) A regular Wired network interface card,
b) A wireless network interface card.
c) This computer shall be running Windows 98 Second Edition.
d) Install the network cards and software provided by the manufacturer.2) Your Wireless AP should be up and running as well as your broadband connection. I have a Linksys BEFW11S4 and have configured it with the defaults. These are some of the required settings. This is for you to test your bridge.
a) SSID = linksys
b) transmitt SSID = yes
c) do not use encryption (yet)
d) Gateway = 192.168.1.1
e) DHCP = enable
3) Setup the Internet Connection Sharing on the (Wireless Bridge) Windows 98 second edition computer. Which is our laptop in this example.Here is the guide I used:
Bridge Settings (Laptop computer)
a) Configure your wireless bridge (laptop) incoming wireless card (Orinoco Silver) to get an IP address via DHCP.
b) Share your wired outgoing (laptop) connection to the wired network via your (no name PCMCIA ethernet card)
4) Client computers can now access the internet via the laptop bridge
Client PC ------> Laptop Wireless Bridge----->Linksys BEFW Wireless AP -------> DSL modem ------>Internet
The client will get a IP address 192.168.0.x from the Bridge (Laptop).
To Do
Install a second wireless card and make this a true wireless bridge. That is receiving a wireless signal from a source and then retransmitting it to client computers wirelessly.
Install on a desktop PC using regular PCI adapter cards.
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