Setup of Wireless LAN

[dread26]

Hi,

I am new to wireless and have been given the task of networking 2 buildings together.

My scenario:

2 Buildings about 30 meters apart.
Direct Line of site (no obsticles - 2 buildings seperated by open car park)
Encryption is nessisary
At present there are 2 sepearate LANS, one in each building. We want to combine them and all run off same ip subnet with DNS, DHCP etc.
Windows 2000 server with WinXP clients
Minimum speed of 54mbps across link but prefer 100mbps.

What do I need at both ends to connect the two buildings together? Each location has their own hub so the equipment needs to plug into that as well.

Do I need an outdoor antenna? or can I use two indoor access point thingies (on at each end) and they should talk given distance not that far?

Any advise would be appreciated

Dave.

[Mr.Tweak]

Re: Setup of Wireless LAN

I've just done this recently actually...

You'll need to buy two wireless access points, one for each building which plugs into the switch in each buliding

Now I'll assume only one building has an internet connection so in that builiding you'll need to plug the access point into the router if it isn't already a wireless router - if it is already a wireless router you'll save yourself some money

I highly recommend adding an outdoor atenna to each buliding even though it's only 30m apart, it will help in maintaining the connection and will result in better data throughput

Brands I recommend - X-Micro, Dlink or Linksys (ones I use and work well)

[dread26]

Re: Setup of Wireless LAN

Thanks for your reply!

Am I correct in assuming the access points need to run in bridge mode?

[Mr.Tweak]

Re: Setup of Wireless LAN

Thanks for your reply!

Am I correct in assuming the access points need to run in bridge mode?

Actually you'll need to find access points which support "repeating", as discussed here:

http://www.practicallynetworked.com/networking/wireless_bridge.htm

I use this one, it has many modes to work with and site survey which is handy

http://tweaktown.dealtime.com/xPF-D_Link_WIRELESS_ACCESS_POINT_W_SNMP_AES_802_11G_108MBPS