Hi.
Me and about 7 friends of mine want to set up a wireless netowork in our dorms to frag each other during the summer break. This is our first ever wireless networking endeavour, so please help us.

We have almost decided to buy the D-Link DI-624 wireless router and I have a few questions to ask, which are:

1) We already have our university wireless network setup in the dorms. Will our own router interfere with this network?

2) Will this router support at least 8 - 10 hosts over a distance of about 50 metres (We live in different rooms but on the same floor)?

3) Linux compatibility is desired, but not mandatory. Is this router linux compatible? What about un-official drivers/wrappers?

Please help me decide on this. Thanks.

Linux compatibility shouldn't be an issue because routers don't require any kind of drivers.

A home network (or frag network in this case) should be able to co-excist with other network in the same area.

Walls greatly reduce the usable distance of wireless networks and all I can say is that you should try whether it works. I.e. order from a company which allows you to return it if it doesn't work.

Agreed, make sure of the return policy. Too many routers cause problems out of the box.

For the interferences, use a different channel from the other station and all will be well.

Tom's Hardware and other sites rate the Netgear products highly.
Linksys is also quite good.
My impression of D-Link and my experiences have been overwhelmingly negative. Their products seem quite cheap. A person here at work rendered her laptop unbootable by loading the D-Link wireless driver.

Use a different channel and SSID, and no, it won't. Try to pick a channel at least 5 channels away from any other channel visible to you. The common channels to use are 1, 6, and 11. Try to stick to those for maximum compatibility.


Probably, yes. If not, then an omni antenna with some additional gain will help.


Routers simply are. It's not a matter of compatibility. The network cards you put in the linux boxes will either be linux compatible or not, but the routers are platform-agnostic. They don't care what OS you use on the computer. They work with anything that is talking over the network.

However, at this point, I would recommend a Linksys WRT54G router, simply because of the hackability of it. You can download third party firmware and get all sorts of useful features for it. Including the ability to turn up the power on the access point, for increased range. However, only turn up that power as far as you need to and no more, to avoid adding more interference issues.

Woah!! Thanks a bunch, folks. Obviously, I am a newbie to networking in general. Anyway, I have already ordered the DLink router from NewEgg (and it looks like they have a 30 day return policy). If it doesn't work, it will go back and I'll probably buy a NetGear router. Thanks a lot once again.