Sharing with some, not others

[cbs604]

I know this must be simple.

I have a guest house with wi-fi connection for the guests. File & Printer sharing is turned off, so they can connect to the Internet, but not see my office pc.

I have now added a laptop to the office and want to be able to share printers etc between the two. By doing that I will expose the office pc's to the guests.

I thought maybe set the router to assign auto IP's with a limited range, and give the 2 office pc's a static IP, and then configure their firewalls to reject anything in the auto IP range (the guests).

Does that sound plausible or is there a better method?

[johnwill]

Funny you should ask. How about a ready-made solution, a dual-SSID router with isolation for your guests?

http://www.buy.com/prod/zyxel-nbg334...209366667.html

[cbs604]

Thanks, johnwill, I didn't know they existed.

I assume they broadcast two wi-fi channels with different ID's. But once the guests are connected by one channel, how are they isolated from the office pc's?

I know it's simple, but it just hasn't clicked yet.

[Maz_-]

i think it will give you 2 wireless networks but they will be generated by this one router. So virtually the guest will not be able to see the office pc as it is on different network (2nd SSID).

[johnwill]

Yep, the guests will appear to be on a different wireless network with no visibility to any wired or wireless machines on your network. Tailor made for your scenario.

[cbs604]

Thanks for that. Sounds like the right solution. I will give it a try.