Microsoft Vista Home Networking Setup and Options
The most daunting part of upgrading to Windows Vista may be trying to figure out where in the layers of menus the networking and file-sharing options are hidden.
Tips for Securing Your Home Router
Seemingly minor and easily overlooked settings can still have profound security implications. Here are some steps you can take to make sure your wired or wireless home router — and by extension, your network — is as secure as possible.
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Tuesday, 27 February 2001 - MaxGate has entered the competition for the
best 802.11b wireless router. See how their UGate 3300
measures up in our review.
- Outpost.com's $30 rebate on theLinksys
BEFSR41 4 port Etherfast router has been extended to
March 19. [Thnx again Brent Heiss!]
Monday, 26 February 2001 - Having trouble getting your D-Link DWL-1000AP
Wireless Access Point configured? Try this
procedure, contributed by reader Tom Haas.
- Outpost.com is offering a $30 rebate on theLinksys
BEFSR41 4 port Etherfast router. With free overnight
shipping, the cost after rebate is about $100.
Rebate ends March 2. [Thnx to Brent Heiss!]
Sunday, 25 February 2001 - Got the urge to try out making calls over the Internet
via your broadband connection, but don't want to futz with special
hardware or software? Well, Linksys' new EtherFast
Cable/DSL & Voice router may be just what you need.
See how it performed for us!
- WARNING! Been getting
some reports from Asante FriendlyNet router owners who
loaded AMIT or SMC firmware and are trying to upgrade
to the latest Asante 2.02 firmware. One reader says
that he ended up locked at version 1.90, another says he can
change to other (post 1.88) AMIT/SMC versions, but can't go
to 2.02. See the Support
page for more info.
Friday, 23 February 2001 - Reader Mark Naber reports that Fry's now has
the Linksys BEFSR41 on sale for $119 from now
until next Tuesday, 27 February.
- Outpost.com is offering a $20 rebate on SMC's
4 port Barricade router. With free shipping,
the cost after rebate is about $95. Get 'em before Feb
28 when the rebate ends! [Thnx to Jerry Falatko!]
Thursday, 22 February 2001 - The Fry's NETGEAR RT314 $99 offer is available
in all Fry's stores, not just California as we said yesterday.
(Sorry for our confusion!)
- It may not be the most hi-tech item we'll test this year,
but Buffalo Technology's External Flat antenna might
just be what you need to squeeze that last bit of range from
your wireless network. Read
all about it!
Wednesday, 21 February 2001 - Looks like NETGEAR is clearin' the shelves
to get ready for their new stateful inspection version of their
popular RT314 router, the FR314. Reader
Brent Heiss reports that the RT314 can be had at Fry's Electronics
today and tomorrow for $99! Too bad only our California
friends can take advantage of this offer!
-3Com's HomeConnect product line has arrived and we've
taken the Home Wireless Gateway into the lab to see what
it's got. Read
the review to see what we found.
Tuesday, 20 February 2001 - Reader Andrew Deo says that Amazon.com has
a deal on the NETGEAR
RT314 router for $100 plus shipping ($130 price
with $30 rebate).
Thursday, 15 February 2001 - SMC just announced their Broadband Storage
Server. The product is positioned as an all-in-one networking
solution for home and small-to-medium sized businesses. Looks
like it combines an 7 port Barricade router with 20
Gig of networked storage for a street price of about $750.
More info in SMC's press
release.
- Reader Todd Miller tipped us that Buy.com has this
info on the soon-to-be-out NETGEAR FR314 Cable/DSL
Firewall router.
- Dan Tseng's WallWatcher
is a nice, new, FREE, logviewer app for the Linksys
router. Hop over to the Tools
page and give it a look.
Wednesday, 14 February 2001 - We've updated our Wireless
Networking Backgrounder with new information on what
Access Points will and won't do, Wireless Routers, and what
to expect for range with these products. Take a look!
Tuesday, 13 February 2001 - MaxGate has new firmware for their UG3200P
that fixes problems with VPN connections. Go
here for download info.
- ORiNOCO (now part of Agere Systems - the spinoff from
Lucent Technologies Microelectronics Group) just announced a
$30 price cut for both their Silver (64bit WEP)
and Gold (128bit WEP) cards. The new
prices are already posted!
-We welcome Steve Winograd as a contributor to PracticallyNetworked.
Steve's first piece for us is a HowTo
for WinMe's ICS feature, including how to set it up
to handle multiple networks. Check out our revamped ICS
HowTo Central!
Sunday, 11 February 2001
A little traveling music, please...
- Yes, the site looks a little different, but we're still here!
As part of the internet.com and EarthWeb merger, we've
moved over to the EarthWeb part of the network. The new "file
folder tab" nav bar at the top of the page will take you
to the EarthWeb "channels" (topic areas), so please
explore our new neighborhood...
- The PracticallyNetworked navigation bar has changed,
too! The Serving link has been replaced by the
HowTo link. This will take you to our new...you
guessed it...HowTo section, which should help you find
our expanding collection of networking tutorials and backgrounders,
including the Serving information. Explore a little!
- Travis Watford's IPMailer V1.2.2 fixes a bug for SMC
Barricade users and includes some other fixes. Check the
ReadMe and grab the download from the Tools
page.
Friday, 9 February 2001 - A helpful reader (where would we be without them?!)
pointed out an SMC press release from last December (so
we're a little slow...) that describes some of the features
of their upcoming Barricade Pro product line, slated
for release this quarter (Q1 2001). They'll be using a
new processor from Conexant,
which can run Watchguard's
LiveSecurity software. Go
here for the full press release.
Thursday, 8 February 2001 - ZyXEL has released V3.21 firmware for
their Prestige 314 router. More info here.
- Ever wonder whether those software wireless Access Points
work? So did we. That's why we checked out Zoom's ZoomAir
Access Point software. See
if it's the solution for you.
- 2Wire has added Dell to their list of distributors,
along with CompUSA. Go
to the Dell site if you're looking to buy!
Wednesday, 7 February 2001 - Nexland
has been tapped to supply the embedded routing technology for
Bell Canada Enterprises' (BCE) new technology project.
Code-named 'ComboBox', it will combine BCE's Bell
ExpressVu satellite TV and high speed Sympatico Internet
services into a suite of advanced interactive services.
See this
press release for the details.
- If you were looking to get in on NETGEAR's IPO, better
make other plans. Reuters reported today that in
a filing on Wednesday with the SEC, Netgear said it ``has elected
not to proceed with the offering due to general market conditions.''
Full
story here from Yahoo Finance.
Tuesday, 6 February 2001 - Travis Watford's IPMailer has been updated
again. Version 1.2.1 fixes a Windows 2000 shutdown problem.
Go to the Tools
page for the download.
- We welcome Paul Muehr as a contributor to PracticallyNetworked!
His first article: "Sharing
Files via the Internet" will show you there's more
than one way to get a file to where you want it to go!
- BuffaloTechnology has released PPPoE upgrade firmware
for their WLAR-L11-L "Local Router Model" only.
Go
here for the upgrade info.
-ORiNOCO has also released new firmware for their
notoriously-difficult-to-setup RG1000. New client card
drivers, too! Get
the details here.
Monday, 5 February 2001 - Linksys has new BETA firmware that
they say will cure your Quake disconnection problems,
among other things. You can download it from here.
- We finally unpacked our Sonicwall Tele2 eval unit
and dug into it. Is it really 10x faster than the old
design? Check
the review and see.
- Thanks to the many readers who sent various links to articles
about the 802.11b WEP security issues uncovered by the
ISAAC group at the UC Berkeley Computer Science division.
No need to bolt the doors and draw the blinds, at least not
yet. Just some info that WEP isn't foolproof and can
be compromised by people with enough incentive and time on their
hands. Go read the actual
report if you're interested and judge for yourself!
Saturday, 3 February 2001 - SOHOware has introduced their BroadGuard
Secure Cable/DSL router, which provides a Stateful Packet
Inspection firewall for under $200. Have they
made a breakthrough? Read
the review and judge for yourself!
Friday, 2 February 2001 - Heard that Linksys had a little problem with
AT&T Broadband in New England recently. A bug in
old versions of the firmware for Linksys' routers caused the
router to request a new IP address every 7 seconds. This problem
finally got troublesome enough that AT&T shut out all affected
Linksys routers.
AT&T did call affected users to tell them what they did,
but after the disconnection. Users had to upgrade to 1.37
firmware and contact AT&T with proof of the upgrade
to get reconnected!
- In other Linksys news, looks like they snuck out the
first firmware upgrade for their 8port BEFSR81
router. No details on what's different are available,
however. Go
here for the download link.
- Are you a MaxGate UG3000 or 3200 user who has
been experiencing problems running game servers?
Help has arrived! MaxGate just released new firmware,
which should fix you right up. Go
here for the download info.
Thursday, 1 February 2001
JUST IN!
- SMC just released new firmware (1.90h) for their
Wireless Barricade that fixes the problem that ORiNOCO PC Card
users have with getting 40/64 bit WEP to work. The firmware
is posted on the SMC
downloads page, and you can get
it here! (Our link has a .zip file has a README, .bin
file and Windows updater file.)
- Buy.com
has the Linksys BEFSR41 for $105 plus shipping.