Routers

[ttrmotocross]

Ok. I have a Westell 327w four port wireless router and Verizon DSL. I recently also got hold of a linksys BEFW11S4 v.2 wireless access point with 4 port route and a linksys 5 port 10/100 switch. My question is, to get better wireless signal on my laptop in my basement where i get poor signal, how, if possible, do i connect the linksys to the westell so i can have the linksys in the basement?
Any help would be much appreciated.

[wrench97]

You could run a Cat5 cable from the Westell to the Linksys if you have a route to run it, return air ducts can work if you have them.

[Cripple]

As he said, run a cat5 cable to the linksys in the basement, and set up it IP address and everything else, then set up the default gateway on the PC it connects to and that should be it.

or if you wanted to get complicated, you could subnet and have two separate networks.

I presume you have a router before this switch already?

Cripple.

[ttrmotocross]

yes i have a way to run the cable and i have but i dont know what you mean by set up the ip adress for the linksys or set up the default gateway. Sorry to bother you i'm just new at this.
p.s should i place the cat5 cable in the WAN slot on the linksys, or one of the 4 router ports?
thanks again

[Cripple]

Originally Posted by ttrmotocross

yes i have a way to run the cable and i have but i dont know what you mean by set up the ip adress for the linksys or set up the default gateway. Sorry to bother you i'm just new at this.
p.s should i place the cat5 cable in the WAN slot on the linksys, or one of the 4 router ports?
thanks again

Is this your current connection?

Wall Socket -> Modem -> Router -> Switch?

Yes it goes in the WAN port.

You need to set up the wireless router as an access point for the laptop. To do this you need to get into the control panel of the access point by hooking it up as i said, (WAN port to switch, and another cable from one of the four ports to your laptop/desktop).

Go into the control panel and set up an IP address according to what you already have atm.

Once that is done, set up the default gateway on the PC to be the same as the IP address on the access point.

This way it will connect properly.

Ideally I need to see a diagram, and know all of the IP addresses etc to be able to help you. I don't like to use wizards, I like to set everything up manually.

Cripple.

[ttrmotocross]

i probably should have mentioned that my westell is also wireless eh?
attached is a diagram of my setup.

I typed ipconfig into command prompt on my desktop and here is what i got:

IP Adress:192.168.1.46
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway:192.168.1.1

Also, I'm still comfused about the order of the linksys/switch/laptop section

Hope this helps

[Cripple]

Why not just have a big ethernet cable going down into the basement from the original router?

Cripple.

[ttrmotocross]

sorry i should have mentioned that i've tried that and my laptop said it was connected but no pages would load. I tried it in every slot on the linksys which led me to this site. Could it be that both routers are giving off wifi and its interfering?

[wrench97]

You can only have 1 Router in DCHP mode did you turn off DCHP in the Linksys?

[lazareth1]

K to clear things up, run a cat5e CROSS-OVER cable from the westell to the linksys. connect them by using 1 of the 4 ports and NOT the WAN ports. If you do it this way, you won't need to configure any IP addresses between the westell and linksys.

Now connect the laptop to the linksys via a STANDARD cat5e cable and set the LAN connection on the laptop automatically obtain an Ip address. You should now be able to connect to the internet. If this works then we'll go through the wireless setup for the linksys. One step at a time!

Leave out the 5 port switch just now because I don't think u'll need it.

[ttrmotocross]

ok that worked. now what?

[lazareth1]

Great! Now to get wireless all you really need to do is setup the linksys with the same settings (SSID, wireless encryption key wtc) as the other wireless router and you will have an extended wirless network.