Anyone know a thing or two about networking?

[Xer0]

Long story short my NIC appears to be on its way out and rather than spend $20 on another POS that's going to crap out on me I thought I'd give setting up a network access point of sorts up.

The problem I am having however, is that my intention is to pick up Router B's broadcast and allow my computer to connect to it with an ethernet cable connected to Router B.

I only assume that this is possible considering there are a dozen ways to do it wirelessly, but I frankly cannot find a guide for this procedure in particular-- all I can find are wireless access point instructions and even after following those I cannot get an internet connection.

The instructions I followed so far were basically

putting Router B within the same subnet mask, but changing the IP so that is was not within range of the primary router (basically change the last digit of the second router from .1 to .2)

DIsabling DHCP on Router B

edit- seem to have fixed it. router b didn't seem to take too kindly to having it's IP reassigned so I just switched the two and all seems to be well.

Ensuring wireless security options were identicla, and that the SSID was also identical.

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Basically every guide I've found so far seems to be dependent on having the two routers hardwired to one another.. anyone know if this is possible without such accommodation?

[moklianne]

I've read this 3 times already and don't have a clear picture on what you are trying to do. Maybe I need more coffee.

Are you simply trying to use the wireless on another router and disable the one on the AP with the gateway?

If so, you simply change the IP of the new wireless router to an available IP in your subnet. Routers are usually defaulted to either .1 or .254. Make sure your DHCP options (on whichever router you are using for DHCP) for clients are set to not assign an IP to whatever you pick. If one router wouldn't take the IP, you may want to check this. Some verify if there is a conflict before the setting is applied while others do not. This second router's WAN port would plug into one of the LAN ports on the router that is connected to your internet modem.

Issues with this setup are that you are complicating the network beyond what it needs to be. This is fine, just realize that if you need to adjust a firewall rule, you need to do it twice now. Port routing from outside in needs to be routed from router A to router B to whatever host you want to receive that traffic, etc.

[Xer0]

Sorry guys, hard to get a concise point about when you're as frustrated and as stoned as I was.

@Mendawen a cheap nic card at like 2 in the morning? When a cheap NIC from walmart (the only place I'd be able to find said peripheral at the time of posting) was what got me into this mess in the first place (original nic is only like 6 months old)

And Moklianne, allow me to clarify. My intention was to use a second wireless router to catch the signal from my primary router (that I didn't have physical access to at the time) and hardwire my PC to the second router-- no physical connection to the original internet router.

All I could find online were instructions on setting up bridges and access points. It took a lot of digging, as well as asking (this is like one of 3 forums I went to) but someone at Tom's Hardware was able to clue me in: What I was attempting to do was called a Client bridge.

Most residential routers don't have this function by default (though I saw mention of flashing the firmware with a hacked copy-- seems like a lot of risk though.) I however got lucky.

Just in case anyone in future forum searches is looking for information of the sort, ill post the steps I took

The first step necessary for me was to change the IP of the secondary Router. In order to do this. I had to disconnect from my wireless network and hardwire the second router to my PC.

Simply by accessing your routers control panel and changing the last part of the Router's IP from .1 to .2 is sufficient and in fact ideal, as it will help avoid conflicts, being that .2xx is out of the range of the .1xx IP established by the primary router.
(Sidenote: typically typing 192.168.1.1 into your browsers web address should direct you to the router control panel, which will bring up a login screen-- your routers manual should list a default user/pass or you may also consult manufacturer websites.)

After establishing separate identities in the network, access the routers wireless settings, or any sort of setup page and look for the option to use the wireless service listed as Client Bridge. If your router does not appear to support client bridge then as far as I know you are out of luck if your intentions are identical to mine.

That being said the same steps can be used to simply boost your wireless signal if that is your intention. Simply by finding the option to enable "AP" or Acess Point instead of Client Bridge.

After selecting the service type, ensure that the Secondary router's Subnet mask matches the primaries. Typically this should be 255.255.255.0

After ensuring subnet masks are identical, find the secondary routers DHCP settings. Disable this entirely.

The last step as I recall was making sure the SSID and the Encyrption type/passphrases are identical.

To be honest I'm beginning to question why I ever went wireless. I was able to get good speeds for downloading via steam, but there were always such constant hiccups.. the smallest fractions of a seconds delay, or moments where the signal would be lost completely. This kind of behavior completely ruined my ability to play any sort of competitive game.. and even though this second router is only wireless g, im still getting better, more consistent download speeds than I ever have.

also: big kudos to Sprinkles of Red 99 for helping me through the initial hiccups

[moklianne]

IIRC, you can use DD-WRT to setup a router to be a repeater or wireless bridge. It has many other features as well. I haven't used in on my new Asus router since it has everything already on the stock firmware (oddly enough), but I used it for years on my previous one.

http://dd-wrt.com/site/index

[Frug]

IIRC, you can use DD-WRT to setup a router to be a repeater or wireless bridge. It has many other features as well. I haven't used in on my new Asus router since it has everything already on the stock firmware (oddly enough), but I used it for years on my previous one.

http://dd-wrt.com/site/index

You can - many cheapo routers do it out of the box too. I have a $15 Belkin at home doing this.