Windows XP Hacks

Extend the Range of Your Wireless Network

The efficiency and throughput of WiFi networks can vary dramatically. Make sure you get maximum throughput from your wireless network.

If you have more than one PC at home, the best way to hook them together and share a high-speed Internet connection is via a wireless network—in particular, one based on the WiFi standard, which is actually a family of standards known under the umbrella term of 802.11x.

The biggest problem in setting up a home network usually involves running the wires between PCs and a residential gateway. If your PCs are on different floors of the house, you may have to drill holes in your walls, ceiling, and floors and run wire through. Even when PCs are on the same floor, you have to deal with the problem of wires snaking along the floor.

That’s the problem I’ve had in my 150-year-old home in Cambridge. Drill through a wall, ceiling, or floor here, and you never know what you’ll find (horsehair insulation was only one of our many surprises). Even my electrician shudders when he has to take out the drill.

So, for me, a wireless network was a no-brainer. I now have got half-a-dozen PCs and laptops and three printers in remote parts of the house from each other, all connected via a combination wired/wireless network and sharing a single broadband Internet connection. And when the weather is nice here (twice a year, by my last calculation), I take my laptop out on my back porch and work from there while still connected to ...