[Discuss] Home Wireless Routers OT

[Tom Metro]

Chris O'Connell wrote:
> This is a bit off topic...

Consumer routers pretty much all run Linux, so in my opinion it is on topic.


> I'm looking for a home wi-fi router that can broadcast a guest SSID and a
> protected SSID.

One of the newer routers with stock firmware that supports this should
be your least effort solution.

Using a third party firmware might let you use a cheaper router or
repurpose an existing router. There are experimental versions of Tomato
that support multiple SSIDs, such as:

http://code.google.com/p/tomato-sdhc-vlan/

(The main developer of Tomato USB hasn't updated the code in over a
year, but several other developers have branched the public git
repository and created updated and feature enhanced versions.
Unfortunately they aren't able to update http://tomatousb.org/, so they
can be hard to learn about.)


markw at mohawksoft.com wrote:
> I have a similar issue and my solution was to buy two cheap NetGear
> refurbs at MicroCenter. I put the "guest" WiFi on its own subnet 
> and route through the cable modem. My internal wifi is part of
> the cable modem network. 

Good solution, but this usually requires 3 routers to pull off, or one
of the 2 routers supporting routing rules that usually is beyond the
abilities of the stock firmware in a consumer router. (A version of
Tomato found at the above link can handle VLANs, which can easily handle
segregating a network in this fashion.)

What sits between your cable modem and your guest router?


> One advantage is that two wifi systems effectively double your wifi
> as well.

True. I hear some routers have multiple radios/antennas and you can
dedicate an SSID to a specific band. (The Tomato firmware supports this.
So, for example, you can limit your guests to 802.11g speeds.)

 -Tom

-- 
Tom Metro
Venture Logic, Newton, MA, USA
"Enterprise solutions through open source."
Professional Profile: http://tmetro.venturelogic.com/