Increased network reliability

Question

I have to give a speech to a company on Tuesday. I'm putting a powerpoint together now about WLANs and how they should go from wired to wireless... cause their not sure if they want to. How do I get the point across that WLANs have increased network reliability?

Answer 1

They don't, you'd be wrong to say wireless is more reliable than wired. Wireless is also slower. The advantage of wireless is less wires and portability (no good if they all use desktops).

Answer 2

lol well they actually don't

but i can still help you

the wireless movement is eventually going to take over in the near future and it will be AS GOOD as the reliability of the standard lan (connected w/ cable) and in addition it is more expandable because it's WIRELESS so if your making a presentation make sure you emphasize FUTURE DEVELOPMENT IN THE NEAR FUTURE because right now it's a standard in the industry that wlan's are NOT as reliable but SOON that is LIKELY to CHANGE

hope i've helped ya

Answer 3

Well hard-wire will *always* be more reliable than wireless because it isn't subject to outside interference.

You can increase the reliability by having mulitple APs on different channels so if one channel has interference there's another available.  I do this at home to get around cordless phone interference from my neighbors.

Also, try to keep the APs on non-overlaping channels (1, 6, 11) for best performance.

Don't forget to enable WPA security (a company should go with WPA-Enterprise because it's even more secure than WPA-PSK) to keep the traffic safe from prying eyes.

My college puts the AP's in the cieling and has antennas hanging from the drop cieling tiles (they look like index cards here and there hanging from the tiles).

My college also "hides" the ssid of the staff/admin networks but there's so much wireless roaming I often see the "hidden" names popping up in my available networks...it may discourage the average person from knowing they exist though.

The great appeal of wifi (especially if your employees have laptops) is people's desks can be moved or rearranged or they can take their work with them somewhere else in the building and be connected.  If you need group colaboration, everyone can take their laptops into a conference room and work jointly on the project, without re-wireing everything.  Then the only wires you need to have running away from the desk are for power (keyboard/mouse and private printers would be running within the same cubicle) and telephones.

Also, if they go wireles and already use IP phones they could get cordless IP phones instead of hardwire ones so there would be no need for a network cable in the cubicle at all (if you need a network cable for the IP phone that somewhat defeats the point of wifi since most IP phones have a second port for the computer)

Here are my usual suggestions to home users when setting up wireless, some of this may apply to your situation:

CHOOSING A ROUTER:

If you only care about internet, 802.11b (11Mbps) is plenty fast. They don't really sell these anymore but what they do sell is 802.11g (54Mbps) which replaces and is backwards compatible with 802.11b.  This is also what most built-in WiFi laptops and handhelds sold today use. I wouldn't get anything else because it's just a waste of money. Residential broadband internet is usually only 1-5Mbps so even WiFi-b is plenty fast.

If you plan to do file-sharing, you care about the wireless speed more so go with 802.11g (54Mbps) or the new 802.11n (108Mbps).  I should say I've never actually seen 802.11n in action but from what I understand it's compatible with all 4 standards (a/b/g/n) and claims to be wider-range.

POSITIONING A ROUTER:

Put your wireless router as high up as you can and as far from electrical and metal things as you can, that'll give you the best coverage.  Try to put it in the middle of where you expect to be (usually the middle of the house).  If you have 2.4GHz cordless phones you may want to replace them with 5.8GHz, 900MHz, or the new DECT6.0 phones that won't cause interference.  Also, wireless video senders, or wireless cameras that run on 2.4GHz should be set to the farthest channel from your router (e.g. set video sender to 1 or A and put the router on channel 11).

SECURING THE WIRELESS ROUTER:

Make sure you secure the wireless to keep others from piggybacking and/or monitoring your private information:

1. Change the web-admin password of your router (even if it's wired this is good) so not anyone can get into the config page.

2. Change the default SSID (name) and don't use something that identifies you, your location, or your brand of router to outsiders (e.g. "Home", "Cox.net", "My Network", "Wireless", etc).

2. Enable WPA-PSK, WPA-PSK2, or if those aren't supported MINIMUM of WEP128. Refer to the manual or call the manufacturer for directions.

3. Don't hide the SSID. It just makes your life harder and it's easily found out anyways.

4. Don't bother with MAC filtering, if someone can crack your security they probably know how to spoof your MAC address which will circomvent the filtering.

5. Don't use static-IP, it just makes your life harder. Anyone with the slightest knowledge about networking knows how to use a static IP.

The reason you don't want to identify your router's brand/location/owner:

1. Default passwords and settings are available online. Knowing the brand makes it easier to bypass these.

2. Knowing where it is makes it easier to get a stronger signal while staying away. This gives the attacker an advantage of getting a strong signal and being hidden.

3. Knowing who owns it makes guessing your password easier. Most people use names, dates, and other personal info for passwords (bad practice) and if they know you they probably know the things you would use for a password.

Answer 4

Is it going to be better for *their* business or better for *you* as the salesman?  

At this present time, wireless is *never* a better solution.  It is only a *more organized* solution.

Everyone who has commented above me is absolutely correct.

Edit: With your most recent addendum to the question, the only real solution would be to sell to a company that is pressed for space because wireless is a lot less cluttered  than wireless.  I'd still recommend having a firewall, though, and to use WPA security at the minimum.

Further, as an aside, you should add that there should be no microwave near the wireless router.  I used to experience nightmares as a sysadmin in an office that had one in the main room!