Puter Help please

[grumpy]

Finally got two working computers in my house ( Hell has officially frozen over ! )

Kids want to surf from their room and aside from them never leaving ( not all that bad of a thought ) their room I need some help.

We want to use a Wireless router to accomplish the INTERNET connection between the two. No way I'm wiring up all this stuff the hard way.

OK here is the question part. What the hell is the difference between a 2.4Ghz and a 802.11b router ?

Anyone got any cheap recommendations ? I have a gift card for Best buy ( I HATE THIS STORE ) so its gotta be available with them. Obviously the cheaper the better since all the puter crap becomes obsolete before I even get it home an open the box.

Next question. My kids and I play a few on line games. Nothing to graphic intensive but I'm pretty sure we need a better graphics card. I have these damn lines that go through my monitor and its there with every monitor Ive tried. Another reason is I am hoping it will make the gaming a little less jaggady ( word ? ) Same applies as about. The cheaper the better. Honestly I am not even sure if I can change the graphics card on the puter since everything is integrated into the mother board. Example when I play tunes ( not very often ) on it it slows down the rest of the system. How can I tell if the Graphics card can be changed or over ridden. Any and all help greatly appreciated.

Grumpy

 

[Andyman]

Grumpy:
Small can of worms there. This may help on the router designations:

"Definition: 802.11g was ratified in 2003 as the latest in the series of IEEE 802.11 standards for wireless LAN (WLAN) communications. 802.11g extends and improves on the earlier 802.11b standard.

802.11g supports a maximum bandwidth of 54 Mbps compared to the 11 Mbps of 802.11b. "

I think the 2.4 gHz may be the RF frequency that the signal is transmitted on, just like w/ cordless phones. I have all 6 computers (say old and garage sale) wired here and can appreciate you not wanting to string that wire all over creation.

As to video, what kind of computers do you have? Processors, video cards, and what OS(s) are you running? A new card is usually just a plug n' play deal; just pop one in. Unfortunately, those games really hammer the computers power and always have been a PITA here. Gaming is MUCH more demanding (and $$$) that simple surfing.

Let me (us) know!

PS. I thought the Patriots won the SuperBowl, not the Lions?
You did say Hell has frozen over??

 

[ProAc_Fan]

Grump a 802.11B router operates at 2.4ghz frequency. The 802 refers to the IEEE standard 802 and the 11 refers to the transfer speed of 11 MBS. IF you can upgrade your video card look for at least a 64meg one. Nvidia makes some nice cards.

Mike

 

[JoZmo]

Grump

802.11B is a wireless protocol and 2.4GHz pertains to the speed of the router. It's not either or, they are two different things.

Probably more than you want to know but check this link:
http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=39

As far as adding a graphics card, if you have an open slot, put it there, and disabe the on board card through Device Manager.

Hope this helps.

 

[Don C]

(1) I have had good experience with Netgear brand equipment.

(2) If you have an open AGP card slot in the computer, then a new card will be no problem. Normally the onboard graphics are automaticly disabled if you add a card. You may have to disable the onboard graphics in the bios if it doesn't do that for you.
If you don't have the agp slot, I would not bother with a new card. The AGP slot looks just like the PCI slots, but it is offset an inch or so inward from the PCIs. It is normally the closest slot to the CPU, and the connector is usually a different color.

 

[grumpy]

K a couple more questions. Will I notice a difference between 54 and 11 mbps ? Even 11mbps is pretty damn fast.

Member I want to do this on the cheap ( sounding like a bird )

1st puter is a HP ( in know 1st mistake ! ) 850mhz athalon. 512K ram. Have no idea what the video card is but I bet its un up gradeable like everything else on it ! Puter runs ME which we all know to be the worlds suckiest OS but for know its all I have.

Other puter is a 700 celeron with 256 of Ram. Not sure about the graphics card but I know its got very little ram and runs even worse with games then my HP.

Ive been tempted to load XP on both and bump on the memory which has already helped the HP puter a ton. The celeron was a real dog even when i put all my memory in it ( over 750K of memory)

 

[Andyman]

I use W98 on all our 'puters here, so won't be much help with the newer OSs.

I do use SiSoft Sandra as a test and diagnostic tool, and it will identify your video card and memory. You can download it from :

Sisoft Sandra

It also will ID your mobo, so you can google it up and maybe find a manual for it online.

One thing I really love about having more than on computer online (all 6 are), besides not having to brawl for access, is that when one goes down, I can use another to access the support I need to restore it.

 

[Shain]

Grumpy,

The wireless network I just put in a couple of weeks ago is the "D-Link" brand (was on sale at BEST BUY) model 802.11g router. Can connect 4 other computers. The router came with all the necessary cables.

The router goes next to your computer, and hard wires to the modem, and your computer.

Will run up to 108 mbs. Note the "g" series. (latest and fastest, about 5 times faster than "B" series) Can download from D-Link, the firmware for 108 mbs)

Has firewall, parental control too. Can be used to share internet, both wireless and hard wired to other computers.

The kids computer is using a wirless card in his, because his computer is too far away from mine. (other side of house)

After I got my puter "well again", the network/internet works great.

The router was $70 (after rebate) and the wireless card was $49.
AND got a free cordless phone to boot!

You don't need the wirless card if the kids computer is close by and can be hard wired.

 

[grumpy]

Andy

Is there a shareware version of Sisoft

 

[Shain]

Also Grumpy, both of our computers are running XP (home edition), and I like it better than Windows 98.

(my kids old puter had ME... it sucked!)

Seems to be more stable, at least it has for me over the last 18 months. Never really had any problems, unitl some files got corrupted, which is from tons of use, both on and off internet.

The old 98 would lock up the computer, crash, etc. every so often.

I have 512 ram, and he has 678 as I recall. I have Celeron, he has Pent 4.

They both seem to run fine on internet. His may be slightly faster, but I'll settle for the preformance I'm getting for now. Everthing is working real well (knock on wood)

 

[merrylander]

This makes me think of Sam Goldwasser's fix-it site. Someone asked whay his TV only had a blue screen, I asked him if it was running Windows. I think Sam still has the exchange on his site somewhere.

Rob

 

[THOR]

I use a Dlink wireless router and a wireless PCMIA card for my laptop, was perhaps the easiest thing I installed on my PC ever, truly plug and play.

I recommend getting the stuff from ebay, I got both of mine NIB and cost me less than 1/2 what I would pay at BB.

 

[grumpy]

Well after shopping quite a bit and many questions to Tech geeks we settled on a D link 802.11B

Reason we went with the older model was they way the speed difference between the B and G models was like this. The G is much fast BUT only for transferring data between computers. Well we need it only for linking our cable modems and the best speeds it can achieve so far are way under the 11Mbps this router can handle. Our total out the door was 100.00 and 30.00 of that will come back as rebates.

Only real pain with wireless routers is setting up all the encryption and firewall crap which we still have to do.

Hope this helps any one else in the market for a wireless router.

Grumpy

 

[Shain]

The only reason I went with the "G" series was to get the latest and fastest model.

Who knows what may change (in the computer world) later on, or the reasons, or how to use a network, ......but this is going to be the only network I'll probably ever have.
So wanted to get the fastest available. If it's slow 5 years from now, it won't matter for home use.

Wasn't much more $$ anyway, because of all the rebates,
.....AND also got a FREE new cordless phone ($75) that's expandable to 4 more remote cordless phones.


Figuring in the free phone and rebates, I have less than $40
in the wireless router, all the cables, and remote wireless card for other computer.

Now that it's up and running, it's really a better deal than I though it would be, for the whole family.

 

[zobsky]

okay,

i guess i'm late on this one, .but i second the decision to go for a B-router.

11Mbps (mega bits per seconds) = 11/8 = 1.4megabytes per second (or 1400Kbytes per second)

consider that most high speed connections won't let you download at anything more than 100 - 150 kbytes per second (or 1200 kbits per second), .. you will not be bottlenecked as far as your internet link is concerned.

the other advantage you have is that if you ever buy a laptop and set it up for wireless networking, you can access the network from many places in the house.

just be sure that your network is secure.

the only hit you may see is if you stream videos or large files from one PC to another like i sometimes do in my network at home (wired 100Mbps LAN), ..but that is not a big issue, typically. You could always use the 100Mps ( i think) LAN port if you need that capability. my cost for this setup (router $7, 50 ft ethernet cable $10, 2 network cards ($1.00 (after rebate)) . worked out convenient in my case because
a. both my PCs are standard desktops, which don't need to move around
b.the wire runs conveniently along a wall and doesn't have to cross doorways, living areas etc ....




The G routers should come down in price in the next year or so, if you feel a need to upgrade then (although at that point, your wireless cards will still be only rated for B-operation, ..so you would have to upgrade them to take full advantage (even though G routers are supposed to be abckward compatable with B-cards))

Your 2nd question,

can you tell us the model number of the HP, ..that way, I can determine what graphics adapter it is running. Is it integrated or a seperate AGP card mounted on the motherboard. If the card is an AGP or PCI , there are several upgrades on the market. If the card is onoard video, you may still be able to buy a PCI card (if you have spare PCI slots left) and use this video card as opposed to your onboard video.

Likewise for your other PC, ...
Sometimes, on bootup, the type/ manufacturer may appear on the screen.



Depending on these answers, what your current card is, your budget, your requirements , ... I can help make specific suggestions.

Beware though, PC upgrades, like audio, can be a downward spiral

 

[grumpy]

Thank for the great info. Bother are puters are stand alone so networking them was never an issue. Cost was the other reason for the B router.

I still have not hooked up the router yet but its supposed to have 128 bit ( i think ) encryption.

The HP in question is a XL844. I am nearly positive that everything on that dang computer is integrated into the mother board since it slows WAY down once you play a video or music.

Thanks in advance for any more help.

grumpy

 

[zobsky]

the help link for your PC (in case you haven't looked at it yet)

http://h20015.www2.hp.com/en/taskPa...ppavilion28606&pagetype=solve&docparent=solve

do any of the issues seem familiar (if you haven't already checked them out)

the actual product specs

http://h20015.www2.hp.com/en/docume...hppavilion28606&docName=bph06397&cat=prodinfo


glancing through them, .. I would guess that your card is infact NOT integrated . By looking at the rear of your PC, if the card sticks out perpendicular to the PC, it is not integrated (and probably an AGP card), ..and so your upgrade choices are wider. The other reason I suspect that this is so, is that in the early days of the athlon, motherboard vendors had not yet developed integrated video solutions. anyway, .. the vanta is a so - so card.
can you verify what the card is, i could yet be wrong?

i definately can say that amount of RAM is not an issue since you have 512MB (unless the RAM is going bad).

if you are seeing banding or messed up colours using multiple monitors, your video maybe going bad, ..but we can address that later

a couple of years ago, a friend of mine had a duron 750 running windows ME using integrated sound (like you) and running an AGP TNT vanta (like you) ... essentially the same animal. around 6 months after he got the PC, we started seeing music locking up or getting screechy when other applications were open.

we fixed the issue by getting the cheapest PCI sound card money could buy at fry's (around $6) which offloaded the burden of sound processing from the motherboard to the hardware processor on the sound card board(of course, in such a situation, you must also disable the onboard sound from the BIOS).

another friend of mine also had similar lockup issues with an earlier HP athlon which we resolved by updating the via drivers (described below)

i also notice your motherboard is running the KT133 chipset.

this is what i would do, before going out and buying anything, if i were you:

1. backup any important data
2. install and run an anti virus, if you haven't already
3. install and run a spyware cleaner like adaware, , if you haven't already
4. (optional) at the windows start menu, go to run and type msconfig , ...
go to the startup window and look if any suspicious program is set to start at bootup
5. install the latest via motherboard chipset drivers for your OS from http://www.viaarena.com/?PageID=300

....
let us know what happens and we'll go from there