VisorCentral.com - Wireless LAN (WiFi/802.11b) Question - How many concurrent connections possible?

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Posted by MitzEclipse on 09-19-2001 09:15 AM:

Wireless LAN (WiFi/802.11b) Question - How many concurrent connections possible?

Wireless LAN (WiFi/802.11b) Question - How many concurrent connections possible?

Hi All,

I have a SMC Barricade Wireless Router. I understand the limit of Wired connections (the number of physical ports availiable). However, with wireless, couldn't you theoretically have a hundred wireless devices (laptops/pdas/etc) connected onto the LAN and still receive connectivity?

Or is there some sort of limit? Is each devices assigned some sort of unique identifier (other then IP address)? Can this SMC Router or any other wireless router for that matter be overloaded with too many users?

Finally, I live in an apartment complex. How do I make sure that my neighboors do not leech off of my Wireless LAN connection? And if they are, is there a way to change the frequency (or some sort)?

Thank you in advance!

Posted by alexmathew on 09-19-2001 04:55 PM:

Interesting post in a Visor Forum but...

quote:
with wireless, couldn't you theoretically have a hundred wireless devices (laptops/pdas/etc) connected onto the LAN and still receive connectivity? Or is there some sort of limit? Is each devices assigned some sort of unique identifier (other then IP address) Can this SMC Router or any other wireless router for that matter be overloaded with too many users?

Yes, there is a limit - usually set by the router. It ranges from 10 to 256 - 256 being the more unreasonable figure :-) Each wireless base station and remote device has its own unique ID - similar to an IP address but usually not changeable. The base station keeps track of each connection and tries to dole out the connections - if there are too many remote devices, the base station has problems verifying and authenticating each one and so can get overloaded - even though traffic on the IP side may not be high. 802.11b is limited to 11mbps (thats bits not bytes!) but that is theoretical and true thruput is usually in the 2-4mbps and 11 is achieved in bursts only when there are more than one devices on the wireless network.

quote:
Finally, I live in an apartment complex. How do I make sure that my neighboors do not leech off of my Wireless LAN connection? And if they are, is there a way to change the frequency (or some sort)?

No frequency change - 802.11b is fixed at 2.4gHz. You can setup password authentication on most base stations (mine is an Apple Airport and it is enabled by default). The password is asked of the remote device every time it connects but your remote dvice supplies it automatically. This will prevent casual users accessing your network. If you want to prevent more serious hackers - you need to start with WEP (Wireless Encryption Protection) being enabled - which is usually 40bit only and if you are really paranoid you need to get one of the new 128bit (gold!) WEP cards or base stations. However, with WEP enabled, your access speed will see a hit.

Thats about it.
Bye
AM

Posted by MitzEclipse on 09-19-2001 08:25 PM:

Anyone have any ideas on how to implement the password authentication on a SMC Barricade WiFi Router?

Thanks for the replies

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