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Basic Internet Question

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Iawia

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Hi,

I am interested in hooking up my devices to the internet, however, they do not have wifi capabilities. How would I, say, hook up 2 non wifi printers in my house that are not in the same vicinity of each other?

I heard terms like bridge, router, switch, and terms like that, but really I can't figure out which is the correct way to do it.

I have high speed cable internet, the modem and a router already. What else do I need? Another router??

Thanks in adv,
-t
 
You need a router. They often come with wifi also. Typical low cost unit has one port for internet that connects to your cable modem, four RJ45 wired ports and a wifi connection.

You can get router and advice at Best Buy, Fry's, or other electronic stores.

A switch is not a router. Switch can expand ports but you need a router to assign and manage IP addresses to each device connected.

If you are asking how to get non-wifi devices that are far apart without running Cat 5 or 6 wire then my advice is just buy a printer with Wifi capability. They will likely be cheaper then getting a wifi adaptor for non-wifi equipped printers. Just about all new printers come with wifi capability and they are cheap. Printers and ink are like the old rasor and rasor blade relationship respectively. They practically give away the printers and charge you dearly for the the ink.
 
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Hi RC,

So if I am understanding you correctly, I hook the cable coming out of the wall to the modem, I connect a router to the modem. In another room, I connect the 'new' router to the old router via wifi, and then hook the printer up to the 'new' router? Is this correct?

Thx for your reply.
 
Only one router. You likely have multiple RJ45 ports on back of your present router. Just connect printer to one of them. If you are using all the available ports on back of your present router then buy a 4 way or 8 way Switch and plug one of the their ports to one of the ports on back of original router to give you more expansion ports from the switch.
 
Hate to say it, but your all wrong. RC is correct though, you you can use router ports. I am in the process of upgrading that side of things. Near my roter I have two switches, an access poit, a USB serial server, a slingbos, a skype handset base station. Plans include a home automation server and RAID array.

Further away, there is a wirelss all in one printer and a wired laser printer. I'm working on adding wired ethernet for IR repeating and gigabit ethernet for the RAID array.

I have this: https://www.dlink.com/us/en/search?q=dwl-2100ap, A wireless repeater. It will do what you want,

Here are the instructions for "Client mode" https://www.dlink.com/us/en/support...0ap/how-do-i-set-my-dwl-2100ap-to-client-mode

In "repeater" mode, you can use the Ethernet port as well.

Usually, these types of devices are called wireless repeaters or access points. They allow all sorts of configurations such as with two, you can make a Ethernet to wireless - wireless to Eternet link

They repeat a wirelsss signal and the Ethernet port can be used for a device,

They act as an access point for wireless. I have a router configured to be that, but it doesn't have the other modes.

or what you need, they connect a wireless signal to Ethernet.

You will have to determine if you have wireless b, g, n or ac, Mine covers b & g only; hence it's on the way out.

I actually, just used it the other day to access my wired network wirelessly, but I kept it in repeater mode.

You can use a cheaper device, called a wireless print server. These usually use USB. https://www.nextwarehouse.com/item/?1344767_g10e

There is a whole bunch of products here: **broken link removed**

I have used these types of devices many years ago for a USB DeskJet. I guess I was an early adopter.

Same thing with the repeater. I know of no one that has one. With it, I have living room, porch and outside access.
 
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i have one of the earliest network printers, an HP LaserJet 4+. it's configured with a static IP address on the network, so that it's easier to connect to by any computer running any OS (there's a mixture of Windows, Linux, Mac, and Android devices in use). some OSes like to look up the printer by hostname, and some by IP address, and some work by looking up the printer's hostname, but refuse to work with the printer if it's IP address changes )Windows has a tendency to do this)
 
Only one router.

Hi,

RJ i'm still not sure how you are hooking up the two printers to the same router if they are in different rooms. I suppose that I could use a print server like Keep is saying, but that would limit me only to printers in that room, correct? I believe what I need is an 'access point', one of the devices mentioned by Keep.
 
Print Servers are TYPICALLY Wireless or wired Ethernet to USB. You can use one per printer. They will probably be your cheapest option. One per printer.

USB serial servers can sometimes support multiple USB printers. One serail server I have will support 15 USB serial devices using a switch. One per printer IN YOUR CASE.

"Repeaters" typically have the functionality you need. One per printer IN YOUR CASE.

Routers rarely do, but one of my routers can function as a "Wireless Access Point". e.g. It creates a wireless network to ACCESS a wired network. You need the other way around. Routers may be too expensive as an option, but typically they won't do the job.

If your printers have Ethernet ports, then the "Client access point" or repeater configured properly would have the least amount of problems.

The correct term is a "Network Bridge"

**broken link removed**
 
Thie https://www.asus.com/Networking/EAN66/ looks like it got pretty nice reviews and te expected cost is about right. It even looks cool.

So, unless you need to support Wireless ac you would be good to go.

I'm looking seriously at buying two of the ASUS RT-68ac router when it goes into production. I think we can assume that it will have repeater and bridge mode since it's based off of the RT-66ac.

I'd look at sources such as ebay. e.g. **broken link removed**

It does mention Client Bridge, so it should work for you at about 1/2 the cost.

---

My Dlink acess point is a little strange to hook up. In my case, I needed the MAC address of the router I was repeating and you have to connect to it wired at it's default fixed address to configure it.
I had a DLINK wiresss b repeater that I had to replace because it was incompatable with a b/g computer that I bought.

The DWL-2100ap has generally been working flawessly until I had to replace the power supply. I suspect a surge because a neighbor's oven was hit too. I replaced the power supply with one from ebay. I lost two wall warts for network stuff. Both are not on surge supressed outlets.

I'd love to try to get my network to have backup internet from 3g or 4g services, ideally CLEAR. Long-term plans include backup of the repeater. All of the other network devices are UPS backed up.
 
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