Topic: Wireless Ap

[Bill]

I know this has been discussed.  I was just wondering what the best/cheapest card to get to make e-smith a wireless AP.  I just want to create a home 802.11b wireless network for my laptop.  Please list any cards that you have tried with e-smith and know will work.  

Also, has anyone tried using any type of secure tunnel to e-smith (since WEP isn't sufficient)?  I would like some kind of encrypted connection (in addition to wep) so that my email password and email isn't transmitted in cleartext to e-smith.  (I know e-smith has ssl webmail, but I don't have a dedicated connection, so I have to use my ISP for now)

Is there anyway to make a secure connection to the squid proxy server?  I want to create a secure proxy server on e-smith, so that you can use a SSL connection between the client and the esmith-proxy.

Thanks

[tkerns]

Bill,
Have you considered a wireless gateway like the Orinoco/Proxim BG200... or the Orinoco ethernet converter... these can be plugged into your nic or a switch and there is no configuration needed to e-smith. I think street price for the BG200 around $140 and the EC-Converter $190 plus wireless card for $70. Both of these can do 128 bit encryption with 4 different keys. I have found most 802.11b cards will connect with no hassel.

[Bill]

I appreciate the reply, but I was hoping that I could build my own AP cheaper then buying one of those.  I thought maybe I could find the desktop card for $60 or so and a laptop card for around the same and only be out about just over $100 all together.

Also, I'm still looking for some kind of secure proxy, or secure tunnel, because the 128 bit encryption seems of little use as the encryption key can be easily found.

Thanks

[saul]

You could build an IPSec tunnel across the wireless. This would encrypt all your traffic and let you avoid WEP. I believe it is built using FreeS/WAN

The latest issue of linux journal with the latest star trek movie on the cover has an entire article dedicated to how to do this (unfortunately, they don't say what kind of wireless card they used). If you don't know which issue, it's this one : http://www.linuxjournal.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=NS-lj-issues/issue105&file=index