wireless buying advice

[custard]

right got a friend looking to make the jump from dial up to broadband

now she is on BT 56k at the mo.
she wants basic to medium use BB for 2 PC's
one is downstairs and one is is upstairs.also a laptop may be added soon(dont know if it will be centrino or what)

now does anyone have recommended bb providers?reliability is key as she uses her PC for work access to the university system where she lectures.

also either as part of a BB package or buying the wireless components what are the required recommnded parts?
none of the PC's have any wifi components as yet.

i one cable BB and live in a rabbit hutch sized flat so have never needed wifi

cheers guys n girls

 

[Alex]

Cable seems to be the way to go for a reliable service. NTL have been exellent for me over the past few years. I'm not sure if there is any speed advantage in going for cable anymore, ADSL will be capable of much higher speeds soon, but competition in this market is still causing some reliability and continuety difficulties.

As far as home infrastructure goes, I'd recommend Linksys (consumer version of Cysco products) for most things USRobotics for wireless routers. As far as w-lan cards go as far as I know they're all much of a muchness, I'd try and pick one with a chipset that is commonly used you'll find supporting it in years to come may be easier.

Hope that helps

 

[ian stilo 1.6]

Cable seems to be the way to go for a reliable service. NTL

Please do not advise her to get NTL :bang:
any problems you have..... you tried turning it on and off? you look ok this end (as if your going to phone and stay on the line dor a full ****ing hour to hear you must be lying coz their lil screen says your fine)

 

[stilosporting]

cable connections are fine imo but if she is going wireless DONT use the wireless router that uses the modem in the cable tv box. they are so unreliable, she is better off getting a separate line/modem from them and then buying a wireless router. im using netgear and it seems good enough to me www.netgear.com i think.

 

[Alex]

I haven't a bad word to say about NTL. The only service I get from them is broadband though, and they provided a good brand of modem, we've been upgraded every year for no extra money, and the service has never been down. I've experiance with ADSL, and the service, terms and conditions (£50 termination charge, and changes to the minimum term without warning, and the mere fact you have to have a BT line already installed adds £10 per month to the total bill since all my calls are made on a mobile phone), and availability of service have been highly questionable.

EDIT: And I wasn't endorsing NTL, just offering my opinion.

 

[custard]

were in a telewest area who i have been with for over 3 years. she isnt sure about cable as she's used to her BT phone line and sky(you know what there like)
ive told her to get blueyonder for ages.

now what exactly do i need if say i got broadband form A.N Other BB supplier over the BT line?
they will supply a modem which can be used to hard wire the ground floor PC. no need for it to be wireless.
then i need a wireless router?and a wireless network card for the other PC? yeah?
really never had anything to do with wifi

like this?
http://www.misco.co.uk/productinfor...s 54Mbps ADSL Modem Router + FREE PC card.htm

 

[Alex]

If you're going wireless and going with ADSL, then the cheapest way is to get a Wireless ADSL router from your prefered brand, and equip all PCs with wireless cards. Simply because if you hard wire the ADSL to a computer you still need a wireless access point which looks very similar to a wireless router but with out the routing functions, and it costs about the same. The router will come with ethernet ports as well so you can still use a wire to connect the pc to the internet.

Make sure you set up the SSID (WiFi name) of the network with the correct wireless encription settings, so nobody can steel your broadband.

Also not that Infrastructure mode 11/12 (or which ever is the fastest mode) is illegal in the UK because it transmits on a subscription channel. Although everybody I know of ignores this... if you read the manual it should say that though.

EDIT: that link seems to be the kind of thing you need, except you'll also need an PCI card for any desktop machines (i.e. not laptops) because PCMCIA cards usually aren't supported. Or you could buy a USB wifi card, which are usually about the same price, but you don't have to take the computer apart to install them.

 

[custard]

cool,thanks for the help. just dont want to give poor buying advice now she has finally decided to come out of the dark ages of dial up

 

[Alex]

cool,thanks for the help. just dont want to give poor buying advice now she has finally decided to come out of the dark ages of dial up

Your welcome that will be £1,000,000 pease

 

[custard]

there ya go

 

[Hellcat]

I haven't a bad word to say about NTL.

Consider this your bad word about NTL. My father in law had an intermittent fault causing his internet connection to disconnect. This happened almost daily.

About 8 calls of about 1 hour or more to NTL, speaking to Indian call centres who really struggled to understand my accent - and I have quite a bland accent.

One call I got through to the Welsh call centre. Really helpful. 2nd level tech and he put in place some tests. Most notably he noticed that the modem had restarted over 400 times. A typical number was around 8. Called back a week later and back to India. Could I be put through to the guy in Wales? NO! I had the woman lie to me about line speeds (I studied data coms theory at uni) so that was the last straw. Binned NTL and went to BT for phone and Pipex. What a change. Helpful tech support.

As for hardware - Netgear DG834G2, easy to setup modem/router/wireless.

 

[Alex]

Lol... You mention pipex... I have to say that truely was the worst customer experiance I've ever experianced and they owe me money 3 years later. Constant ammendments to subscription minimum term, and pricing structure, erroneous charges, and fees, and 3 people in their call centre all of whome were on holiday 24/7. I did used to have a 56k account with them (years ago) and they were top notch, then I did the stupidest thing ever and went to ADSL, and it all started. I hate ADSL simply because you must have a BT phone line which costs £10 extra... something I don't need, such is the price of mobile calls these days. But thats all by-the-by, and when ADSL was first introduced as a comodotised (if thats a word) product.

Please don't prosume to inform me that the service I get from NTL is shoddy, thats simply not my experiance. I'm not going to argue with you about if your friends uncle's mother inlaw (or whoever) once had a complaint. People complain when they experiance bad service, and they don't when they get good service. I'm not in the habit of advising which providers are good and which aren't. However according to what I've read the ADSL network is superior in its ability to provide faster services than cable at the moment (as far as I am aware), however its all dependent on your distance from the exchange. Cable is more robust, but will require companies to re-invest in the infrastructure in order for it to remain competative, and because Cable TV has never been in National (Gvt) ownership the infrastructure is owned by individual providers, and is not as widely available as the telephone network is.

END OF.

Custard, your friend should buy a computing magazine (or which? magazin) to research the ADSL providers and choose whats right for her.