Office Wifi to LAN router in living room?

[daedal]

I need to find a way to have my living room devices (TV, XBOX360, PS3, PC, HAVA) in a LAN so I can easily share media and allow internet access to ethernet-only devices.

The problem lies in internet access. There is no way to have internet access in the living room, other than wifi. Long story short, this cannot be resolved without running CAT5 all over the apartment, which I need to avoid.

I'm wondering if there are routers out there that would simply "grab" the wireless signal and distribute it through the LAN. I'm sure there's a solution but I'm having a hard time finding relevant information.

I've thought about the power-line adapters, but they seem expensive, slow and generally hard to find in Ottawa.

[PS, if you're wondering about the TV, it's a KDL-52XBR9 which has internet access through ethernet and plays YouTube videos, weather, etc, so it'd be nice to get it working fully.]

 

[InvisiBill]

You want a WiFi-Ethernet bridge. Whereas the access point in your router turns LAN into WiFi, a bridge sort of does the opposite and turns WiFi into LAN. Just plug any switch into it, and that will become part of the same network.

You may be able to do this with a router specifically configured, most likely with DD-WRT or Tomato firmware installed. It may be easier to buy a separate bridge and switch, depending on your tech level and the prices you find.

 

[daedal]

You want a WiFi-Ethernet bridge. Whereas the access point in your router turns LAN into WiFi, a bridge sort of does the opposite and turns WiFi into LAN. Just plug any switch into it, and that will become part of the same network.

You may be able to do this with a router specifically configured, most likely with DD-WRT or Tomato firmware installed. It may be easier to buy a separate bridge and switch, depending on your tech level and the prices you find.

Great, thanks! It looks like DD-WRT does support the feature and can be dropped on several router models, but most of them are a little hard to find or pretty expensive. I'll dig around and see if there's a compatible router I can use that'd be available at Future Shop or Best Buy in Ottawa. If you know of any, do let me know!

 

[InvisiBill]

I have the Asus WL-520gU, Buffalo WHR-G54S, and a few variations of the Linksys WRT54G. I bought all of them when they were cheap, because they were cheap (under $30 each).

Also, anything plugged into the switch on the bridge will be sharing that single WiFi link. You're probably not going to be playing XBox and PS3 while watching Netflix on the TV, but the link will be shared between all the devices. Also, G is borderline for streaming HD. You'll want N or a wired connection if you're planning to stream video over the link.

 

[keenan]

I have had success using ASUS WL-330gE as a client bridge. They're (fairly) cheap, pretty easy to get and have been reliable IME. You can't run dd-wrt or Tomato, so I wouldn't want one as a router, but as a plain bridge they do well. The WL-520gU as mentioned is also a fairly inexpensive and good choice, but requires a bit more technical knowhow to get going in this configuration as you need to install dd-wrt, but it does include the 4 port switch as well, which the WL-330gE doesn't have.

 

[daedal]

I have the Asus WL-520gU, Buffalo WHR-G54S, and a few variations of the Linksys WRT54G. I bought all of them when they were cheap, because they were cheap (under $30 each).

Also, anything plugged into the switch on the bridge will be sharing that single WiFi link. You're probably not going to be playing XBox and PS3 while watching Netflix on the TV, but the link will be shared between all the devices. Also, G is borderline for streaming HD. You'll want N or a wired connection if you're planning to stream video over the link.

I'm in Canada, so we don't get all o' yer' fancy Netflix streamin' up here. But I understand what you mean. Really, all I want is to have a LAN line between the XBOX and my laptop to use Windows Media Center.

The problem is that the XBOX (as far as I know) cannot be set to use Wifi for internet/gaming and LAN for MCE.

 

[InvisiBill]

I'm in Canada, so we don't get all o' yer' fancy Netflix streamin' up here. But I understand what you mean. Really, all I want is to have a LAN line between the XBOX and my laptop to use Windows Media Center.

The problem is that the XBOX (as far as I know) cannot be set to use Wifi for internet/gaming and LAN for MCE.

Not sure if it'll work for you, being in Canada, but Newegg has the WL-520gU for $30AR right now. http://slickdeals.net/permadeal/294...WiFi-Router-w-USB-Print-Server-30-after-10MIR

The bridge is transparent to the network. It will all be one big LAN, just with wired and wireless segments. When the XBox needs something on the LAN, it will connect to that IP. When it needs something not on the LAN, it'll go out the default gateway (router) to the internet.

It sounds like you'd be streaming only across the local switch, but just to be perfectly clear, the single WiFi link will limit any communication between the two halves of the LAN, not just internet traffic. If you have a media server plugged into your main router and your XBox after the WiFi bridge, it'll have to travel over that WiFi link. If your media server is on the same side of the WiFi link (i.e. plugged into the same switch or DD-WRTed router), then it'll only being going over the wired connection and the WiFi won't be an issue. For example, your HAVA in the living room there could stream to the XBox right next to it over the wired connection without touching the WiFi at all. If you have another device plugged into the main router, the HAVA stream would have to go over the WiFi link to get to that device. Even a single run of CAT5 from the router to the living room (where you could split it with a switch) will be several times faster than the WiFi link and have lower latency (in case you do online gaming with the XBox/PS3).