Cindy Papen-Beard asks:
I own a business. We have a PC hooked to DSL and we would like to offer wireless access to our clients and still keep us on a different network. What is the best way to do that and what equipment do we need? Our PC is Windows.
5 Answers -
Bruce Epper
July 12, 2012Your DSL modem may already have a built-in wireless router. If not, that is the only piece of equipment you should need. It just needs to be configured to allow guest access to the internet. It will allow access to the web without allowing access to any of your local equipment. The means of configuring it will depend on the make and model of the router/DSL modem. Check the documentation that came with the device.
Mike
July 13, 2012If your DSL modem/gateway allows you to isolate one Ethernet port from the others you just need to get a router or access point, hook it up to the isolated port and setup a Wireless network on it.
If it does not you will need a router that supports Guest WiFi (sometimes called AP isolation). Computers would be connected to the Ethernet ports and the WiFi clients will be isolated from them duo to this option.
Since you are running a business the right way would actually be to get a firewall appliance which is in between the DSL (modem) and your network.
In addition to protecting your business network it will allow you to isolate parts of the network as described at the beginning.
But depending on the size of your business this may be a bit of an overkill.
Oron
July 13, 2012Bruce and Mike’s advice more or less covers it, but if your router does not support guest internet access (and one could argue, even if it does!), you could set a secondary router to isolate and protect your network, as explained at
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-to-turn-an-old-router-into-a-wireless-bridge/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=2012-07-12
and http://www.grc.com/nat/nat.htm
Irshaad Abdool
July 15, 2012use the ‘Guest’ function of your router.
but have your network secured, as gaining access to your LAN makes the PCs on the LAN prone/vulnerable to attacks. if your budget allows a seperate connection, better opt for it
PacoSF
July 20, 2012RE: What is the best way to offer wireless to clients of my business?
Here’s your final answer.
You will flash your router to OpenWRT or DD-WRT
or buy one pre-flashed for you.
You will want a $100 router: or more to the point a wireless router w/ plent of memory and CPU — this will allow install of a FULL version of this powerful new firmware on your router.
I just finally got around to flashing my netgear, it only has 4MB of flash memory on board , so I have to install a smaller sized DD-WRT and you dont want that.
To the point: The main feature you will get is “HOTSPOT” options.
You willl be able to configure the customers and enter server which will handle the charges . Also, they’ll be on a different subnet and have no access to your network JUst the bandwidth.
One of the taglilnes from the opensource community is ; turn your $50 router into a $500 one. *trust me: get a $100 router and flash it to open source firmware
you will get features that are not available and more stability etc.
I’ve been up and running strong this whole week. And it’s safe to say that I will never use stock firmware again on my home network.
tl;dr *trust me: get a $100 router and flash it to open source firmware, set up the hotspot feature.