if i buy a wireless router do i need a notebook card ?

Answer 1

Maybe.

Some notebooks come with built in wireless capability. Others do not. If it does not you will need a pcmcia wireless card for your notebook.

To determine whether you have wireless, open command prompt (start, run type in cmd and hit enter). At the prompt, type in "ipconfig /all" without the quotes. You should see your LAN ports. One will be wired; if you have a wireless it will be shown there (even if it has no IP address).

Answer 2

You need some kind of wireless capability in your notebook to receive the signal from the router. Could be internal, a card you insert in a slot, or a usb adapter.

Answer 3

Yes you still need to get a signal from the router to the laptop

a router will send the signal to the notebook card

Answer 4

If you don't have a wireless adapter of some sort in your laptop, YES you will need one.


Long Version follows.

Let's cover what you need to get Internet access to more than one computer at home, via wireless LAN.

1. You order or use your existing Cable or DSL Internet access.

2. Your Cable or DSL company sets up your Internet access and typically either rents or sells you a Cable or DSL "modem".

Prices for Cable or DSL Internet access vary from approximately $19 per month to $80 per month in the United States. This varies based on bandwidth, location, and provider.

At this point you have what is commonly called Broad Band Internet access.

Now you want to share that high speed connection with more than one system or you want to be able to cart your laptop all over the house and stay connected to the internet.

1. Confirm that your system has a wireless adapter or get one and install it. You need one of these for each computer.

2. Get a wireless router. I recommend the D-Link Dir-655. Get D-Link n series Adapters if you get the D-Link wireless router.

3. Plug the wireless router directly into the Cable or DSL "modem" via an Ethernet cable.

4. Unplug the electrical cord from your Cable or DSL "modem" for 30-45 seconds.

5. Plug the power cable back in.

6. Check the Cable or DSL "modem" for green lights.

7. Make sure that the properties of TCP/IP are set to Obtain IP address automatically, and obtain DNS automatically on ALL of your computers.

8. Turn on or reboot your system(s).

Now you should be able to stay connected to the Internet with all of your computers.

If you can not access the Internet from every computer:

Attempt to log in to your wireless router via your web browser (internet exploder or Firefox) by typing in http://192.168.1.1/
Then log in using admin and admin typically. Be sure to change the password to something of your own choosing.
Enable DHCP by following the instructions in the manual for your wireless router.

You only need one wireless router for you wireless LAN. One wireless router can potentially accomodate up to 253 wireless computers. My wireless router only has MAC tables for up to 32 devices.

For extra security:

1. Don't announce the SSID of your wireless router.
2. Use WPA2 if you can. WPA-PSK if not, or WEP at the least.
3. Put the MAC addresses of all of your computers into the MAC routing table of your wireless router and ONLY ALLOW from the addresses in the table of the wireless router.
4. Turn the SPI firewall of the wireless router ON.
5. Filter anonymous or incomplete packets.

Answer 5

Only if you plan on using wireless internet on a laptop that doesn't have an internal WiFi card and antenna.

Answer 6

go to the start menu, then to settings, then to network connections. If you see a network interface labeled "wireless network connection" then you have one in your laptop.

Answer 7

you can get USB wireless adapters now

Answer 8

no