RE: DHCP and wireless access point
- From: Owen Williams [SBS MVP] <Owen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 9 Jul 2007 21:22:38 -0400
In article <04EDD3C2-EB7C-47BE-81A4-551454FAF8AF@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
AndrewMcNab@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx says...
I'm not sure about new wireless routers but as short as a year ago, any
wireless router I've had could not be used as a WAP functionality wise.
Turning off the DHCP in the wireless router was just a means of connected
devices to use static IPs in different IP pools without any sort of
complications. WAP architecture is quite different, specifically in terms of
that it "expects" to be a relay(or bridging) system for a DHCP from a wired
interface to a wireless.
Your wireless router might be different and support this kind of
polymorphism but if it's causing your greif or taking up too much time, it's
a lot simpler to buy a WAP and clone the SSID and network security of the
wireless router. Plug the WAP into a switch that goes to the server DHCP and
the integration is seamless and simple. The WAP, by default, will just send
dynamic IP requests to the DHCP and is essentially "invisible" in the network
schema.
Definitely not my experience. I've reconfigured newer, older, business-grade,
and consumer-grade wireless routers as APs with no problem. In fact, I
normally acquire wireless routers for my very small and/or non-profit clients
because they tend to be easier to find than APs, are less costly than APs, and
include a switch which can be useful.
To convert a wireless router to a basic WAP, I've always just:
* Disable the DHCP server on the router.
* Ensure nothing is connected to the WAN/Internet jack (put a piece of
electrical tape over it if necessary).
* Assign the device a static IP suitable to the LAN addressing plan (for
example, if the LAN uses SBS-default 192.168.16.x addresses, you might
assign the router 192.168.16.4, assuming that address is available).
* Connect the router to the LAN (usually to another switch) via one of its
Ethernet switch jacks; the remaining jacks can be used as a switch on
the LAN.
That's it. Some wireless routers - for example, the (consumer-grade) Belkin
F5D7230-4 v1444, which dates to ~2004 or thereabouts - even include an option
on the admin pages to reconfigure the router as an AP. If you flash it with
the open source DD-WRT firmware, you can even reconfigure the WAN jack to be
part of the (now 5-port) switch.
-- Owen Williams [SBS MVP]
.
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- DHCP and wireless access point
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