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Great Buys Network help and tricks, setup your own network.
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Well if your looking at this page it can only mean that you are wanting to setup a network or have an existing network and are looking to add to it or are having problems. You have come to the right place. Whether it is a wired network or wireless, file and printer sharing or simply wanting to share the Internet, You should be able to do what you want from the info one this page. DISCLAIMER: I am a computer tech, not a writer nor English teacher. Please forgive grammar and misspellings. Also read the entire page to find exactly what your looking for. You can also visit our forums which I read and respond to daily. I have been a full time tech since 1992, I started networking prior to ethernet or TCP/IP protocol. I was one of the 1st Internet providers in my area and later the 1st DSL provider and the 1st Wireless provider. The below is not from research or copy and paste, it is all in my head from setting up, supporting etc. 1,000's of networks thru the years. For simplicity sakes I will assume we are running some version of MS Windows. However you can also use Mac's or different flavors of Unix, Linux etc. The thing to keep in mind is each computer has to have a network adapter, either a Nic / Ethernet port or a wireless adapter. You have probably heard of protocols such as TCP/IP, NetBeui, IPX, etc. Protocols are nothing more than the language the computer uses to communicate over the network. All machines must use the same protocols. Nowadays the only one we want is TCP/IP. If the others are enabled disable them. Next is workgroup name. All computers must belong to the same work group. Computer names must all be unique. If we are sharing files / folders / printers we must have file and print sharing enabled. Ok lets, get started. Most likely you are going to share the Internet on your network besides possibly file and print sharing. Let's start with the Modem / router your ISP provided you. Cable Internet or DSL doesn't matter. If your lucky your ISP provided you with a Router / modem. Look at the plugs on it. Besides the power cord and cable or phone line port, how many ports do you have? 1 for sure. Ports are for network cables and look like phone jacks only wider. If you have 4 you have a router / modem, look and see if you have an antenna on it. If you do you also have a wireless access point. If you have no more than 4 network devices your hooking up and don't use wireless or do have wireless and have an antenna on router, skip to next paragraph. If you only have one port or need wireless and no antenna keep reading. You will need a broadband router. Broadband routers come with a Wan port and four Ethernet ports. If you need wireless also get one that is also a wireless AP. Now hook up your new router next to ISP's modem. You will connect a network cable from the port on the modem to the WAN port on the router. Make sure it is the port labeled WAN. The other 4 ports are for connecting network devices such as computers.
If your running a wired network, you need to run a Cat 5 network cable from each PC or network device to the router. All 4 plugs are equal, so doesn't matter which one you plug it into. Exception is WAN wan means wide area network which is the Internet. LAN (which is the 4 ports) means local area network. Our computers or network devices are part of our local area network so they plug into the Lan ports. If running cable is impractical or you just want wireless, we need to make sure the computer has a wireless card. Almost all newer laptops have this built in. If your laptop doesn't go buy a PCMCIA wireless adapter. If you have a desktop you can either buy an external wireless adapter that connects via USB, or buy and Internal PCI wireless adapter. More info on all of this is on page 2 of network help and setup. Link at bottom of article. Ok we now have all computers either wired to the router or wireless cards installed in computers. Lets start testing and bringing the network up. Please keep in mind that we need to keep it simple. Basic testing and troubleshooting, then add features. If your wired keep reading, if wireless, skip to next paragraph. Go to a command prompt. Start-run cmd (enter) or start-programs-accessories command prompt, or earlier versions start-programs-command prompt. You should get a new window that is a black screen. Type ipconfig (hit enter) Look at the 1st line which is your IP address. If it starts with 169 we have a problem. Easiest way to troubleshoot is to reboot, repeat above and is IP address is still 169. Skip to 2nd paragraph below this. If it starts with 192. or 10. Great. 192. is the most common. Now look at the 3rd line. That is the gateway. something like 192.168.1.1 now still at the command prompt (black screen) type ping gateway IP (hit enter) something like ping 192.168.1.1 (hit enter) there is a space between ping and numbers. You should get 4 replies. If you get a time out skip to 2nd paragraph below this. So we got 4 replies, great. That means we successfully communicated with our router. Next step, still at the command prompt, type ping yahoo.com (hit enter) We should get 4 replies. If we do great, close command prompt, try surfing the Internet and you should be able to. Try above on all computers on the network and if successful and all you wanted to do was share Internet your done. Congratulations. If when we did the ping yahoo.com and we got a unable to resolve hostname or similar error message then go to page 2 and 1st paragraph. Link to page 2 end of article. If we want to add file or print sharing go to page 2 for help on that. So your going with wireless. Assuming you have installed your wireless adapter or you already had one pre-installed, you should see an Icon down by your clock for the wireless connection. open it up. If your connected look at signal strength. Naturally the higher the better. It may tell you 1 or more wireless connections are available. Look at them, don't be surprised to see more than 1. Those others are your neighbors unsecured wireless connections. Connect to yours, the brand of your router should give you a clue as to name. It may say unsecured connect anyways answer yes. How to secure your wireless connection is on page 2. Look at signal strength. Wireless, 2.4 can be funny. Placement of your wireless router, orientation of antenna, etc. can have a tremendous effect on signal strength or connecting at all. The enemies of 2.4 Ghz wireless are metal, water, microwaves and 2.4 Ghz cordless phones. Once your connected look at above paragraph and do what it instructs. Ok we have a IP address that starts with 169. That means we are not getting a IP address from a DHCP server. The DHCP server for you is your router. You rebooted and tried again right? If not, do it now. Still 169. ? look at router. You have a cable plugged into your computer and then the router. The router should have a light on corresponding to the port you are plugged into. Is the light on? If not try plugging into another port on router and see if light comes on. If it does, reboot and repeat above to see if you get a IP other than 169.xx.xxx.xxx If still no light try another cable. If still no go, please go to page 2 under troubleshooting.
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