Configuring Your Linksys Wireless Access Point

[Bob Batson]

The Mailing list Linux Journal Weekly News gives the following tip.
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   Tech Tip: Configuring Your Linksys Wireless Access Point

    The Linksys WAP-11 Wireless Access Point:
    http://www.linksys.com/products/product.asp?prid=157&grid=22, version
    2.2, is quickly becoming a must-have item. Their familiar little blue
    faces and black rabbit ears are appearing atop bookshelves and drink
    coolers in homes, coffeehouses and other places where 802.11 WiFi
    (wireless Ethernet) gets around. It's no coincidence that our own Don
    Marti and Doc Searls both got their new units in the last week. Cost:
    under $100 a piece. Look around for bargains.

    One problem, though, if you're not a Windows user: don't expect help
    from the documentation. Linksys tells you nothing about the settings
    you need to make. So here's how to set it up, passed on from Cory
    Doctorow of the EFF:
    http://www.eff.org.

    The WAP-11 starts up at 192.168.1.251. Set up the wireless network
    card on your laptop like this:

         IP address: 192.168.1.2

         Gateway: 192.168.1.1

         Subnet mask: 255.255.255.0

         ESSID: linksys

         WEP: none

    With any browser, go to http://192.168.1.251/. Log in with no user
    name and the password "admin".

    Now you're in the admin interface for your access point. There's not
    much to set here: a new password, a different network name and a
    specific channel. Click Save, and you're in business.

    The WAP-11 doesn't do anything fancy. It won't distribute DHCP
    addresses of its own; it won't dial a phone--basically it's a virtual
    extension cord. If it gets a wired Ethernet signal from a router
    that's distributing the Net by DHCP, it'll pass those addresses and
    signals through. If you need to administer your upstream router at the
    common http:192.168.1.1 address, you'll see your router and not the
    Linksys access point. In fact, if you try going to
    http://192.168.1.251/, nothing at all may come up, unless you
    disconnect the unit from the network, power it down and start over.

    Once it's up, the WAP-11 seems to do an excellent job.

-- 
Bob Batson
rcb at kc.rr.com

Chocolate is the true opiate of the masses!