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Introduction Home networking is all the rage now, as it is not uncommon for a family to have more than one computer, having perhaps upgraded to a newer computer, leaving behind a perfectly good computer. But at the same time, most home users will be reluctant to professionally lay cable needed for wired network. This leaves them with potentially two options: Having unsightly CAT-5 cables running near baseboards, or at least migrating part of their network over to a wireless medium. Years ago, wireless networking products were not only slower than they are now, but also they were unusually expensive, and the average person typically could not afford such gear. The situation has changed however, and wireless products have now fallen into the price range where they can truly be accepted by the average consumer. This has allowed them to propagate to the point where in major cities, wireless networks abound, and thus, security becomes an aspect that cannot be an afterthought. In recent years, one wireless standard has emerged to be the defacto leader: 802.11b. While somewhat slow compared to Fast Ethernet, with the proper equipment its range can be quite far, and the data rate can overlooked when one takes into account the mobility that is gained. In the past few years 802.11b can be said to have made up the bulk of wireless networking products sold. With PCMCIA, PCI and USB 802.11b network adapters available as well as a host of other 802.11b standalone devices, the standard is seen by many to be a success, at least sales-wise. However, new standards are on the horizon, and the most recent to gain headlines was 802.11a. Offering up to 54Mbps in the 5GHz range, this spec. promised to leave the 2.4GHz range often populated by cordless phones and other devices to move wireless networking into a less populated and unregulated frequency range. However, as I found out in my review of D-Link's 802.11a offerings, the speed often dropped off very fast as distance and the number of walls between the two communicating hosts increased. This, along with its incompatibility with current 802.11b and its high price, made it less than ideal for those who are looking to upgrade their wireless network. Something else was needed - while faster speeds are always desirable, backwards compatibility, the ability to work with existing devices, is feature that has much merit. Indeed, many companies have seen the need for faster speeds and have added their own feature set on top of 802.11b to increase wireless speeds. This has allowed their products to communicate at data rates faster than 11Mbps, while still maintaining the ability to communicate with other 802.11b devices, albeit at the standard speed. D-Link, being no flop of a company, has released their AirPlus line of Enhanced 802.11b devices, offering up to a 22Mbps data rate between support devices. They've also added up to a 256-bit WEP encryption, an increase from the 128-bit offered by most devices, although, as you may already know, this won't solve the basic problem inherent in WEP. However, some of their devices, after a firmware upgrade, will support 802.1x - a step in the right direction for wireless security. Expect other vendors to improve their products with 802.1x as well, so you can expect support for this initiative. So, today, I'll be looking at four of D-Link's products from their AirPlus line of wireless products: The DI-614+ Wireless Router w/ 4-port switch, the DWL-900AP+ Repeating Access Point, the DWL-520+ PCI adapter and the DWL-650+ CardBus adapter. These products will support up to a 22Mbps data rate between one another, while still allowing backwards compatibility with older 802.11b devices, making them an excellent option for users looking to upgrade their wireless network. They also promise to have the same ease-of-use as other D-Link products, and all of these features make these products a seemingly viable option. Specifications
 Group shot. I don't really want to copy out all of the specs for each individual part, so instead I'll just list the common features and point you towards the specification pages for each of the products, which are available at D-Link's site. All of the products have at least one detachable reverse SMA type antenna, except for the Cardbus Adapter, which relies on an internal antenna. The operating ranges quoted are more of a technical specification or limit, as it's unlikely you'll get adequate speeds at these ranges, depending on interference from other devices and other variables. While the PCI and CardBus adapters can work in Ad-Hoc (peer-to-peer) mode, with Access Points being so readily available and Infrastructure mode being much more featured and useful, it's unlikely you'll have to use Ad-Hoc in most situations. Additionally, all of these products use a Texas Instruments chip that allows them to transfer at the data rate of 22Mbps. If you're interested in this, here is an excellent article from 802.11 Planet about the technology used in this TI chip.
DWL-900AP+
Access Point In Infrastructure mode, the Access Point is the most important device as it allows your wireless clients to not only communicate with one another, but to access the wired network as well. If you're unfamiliar with the terms Ad-Hoc and Infrastructure when it comes to wireless networking, a quick explanation will go something like this: In Ad-Hoc mode all wireless clients communicate directly with one another and for this reason it may also be known as a peer-to-peer network. This mode can be somewhat insecure and cumbersome when the number of wireless clients increases. Additionally, allowing your wireless clients access to the wired network in this mode requires extra work, usually in the form of installing another (wired) network adapter in one of the wireless clients. Infrastructure, on the other hand, allows all wireless clients to communicate with one another through the access point, and the access point also has an ethernet interface to the wired network. This simplifies setup quite a bit and is the preferable way to run a wireless network. In addition to being a regular AP, the DWL-900AP+ also supports four other modes: Point to Point Bridge, Point to Multi-Point Bridge, Repeater (extending a wireless network) and Wireless client. In the Point-to-Point mode, this AP can communicate with another DWL-900AP+ on a different wired network so that two separate wired networks can now communicate as if they were one! In Point to Multi-Point mode, the concept is the same, except instead of two DWL-900AP+'s and two wired networks, multiple, separate wired networks may be connected this way. This feature is definitely something to look at, because while some of us may not have a need to have wireless clients, connected two different networks via CAT-5 may be cumbersome. In this case, the DWL-900AP+ offers a nice solution. It should be noted, however, that the two proprietary bridge modes of the DWL-900AP+ will *only* work with other DWL-900AP+; they won't be able to communicate with other wireless bridges that are available. The repeater mode is fairly self-explanatory for those of you who've dealt with the physical aspect of networks before; In this mode the DWL-900AP+ can amplify and thus extend the range of your 802.11b wireless network, but only when used with some other D-Link products, but however it is yet another useful feature. Lastly, client mode will allow you to connect the DWL-900AP+ to an ethernet device such as the NIC in your computer, and give that device wireless access; again, this will only work when the DWL-900AP+ is communicated with another supporting D-Link wireless device. Overall, I was very impressed by the feature set offered by the DWL-900AP+, especially the bridging features, which, until now, I've only seen on higher-priced wireless products. However these features are proprietary and limited to only some other supporting D-Link devices.
The first thing I noticed about this AP was how small it was. Seen in the rightmost picture above, you can tell that it's not much bigger than two sets of playing cards. The appearance of the AP is similar to all of D-Link's other current wireless gear, and that is of a two-tone grey plastic shell with blue highlights. Being made out of plastic and being so small means this AP is really light, but with its small footprint it won't take up a lot of space wherever you put it. Also included were the AC adapter, a straight-through CAT-5 cable and a bag of mounting hardware. It was nice to see the CAT-5 cable included as the straight-through cable is what you'll use to connect this AP to a port on a switch, hub or other similar networking device. The 802.11a 5GHz AP I reviewed a while ago didn't come with a CAT-5 cable, so it's nice to see this change. The mounting hardware consists of screws and plastic plugs that can be used to secure this AP to a desk, while the rubber-like feet appear to be for mounting this on top of another D-link device, as they feet fit perfectly into the grooves of both devices. The included setup guide was very brief, but punctuated with detailed screenshots, and showed you how to get the DWL-900AP+ up and running in its default mode as an Access Point. On the included CD was a more detailed manual in PDF form. Also on the CD were two pieces of software (beside Acrobat Reader, which seems to be on every software CD nowadays): AP Manager and a D-Link customized version of Zero Knowledge's Freedom Security & Privacy Suite. (The D-Link customized version only includes the Ad-blocker, Keyword Alert, Password Manager and Cookie Manager and so is reduced from the retail version.) Since this is a review of the DWL-900AP+, I won't go into too much detail about this Suite, but one thing I found useful was the Ad-Blocker, which is able to automatically update its "blacklist" of URLs or expressions. Other than that, it should be noted that it is a free version, so many useful features aren't included but instead must be "subscribed" to for extra money. The AP Manager software allows you configure the DWL-900AP+, and is ideal if you need to configure more than one access point. The only advantage of using the AP Manager over the web-based interface to configure the AP, in my opinion, is the AP Manager software's ability to accept a passphrase or password, which can then be used to generate the WEP keys. In using the web-based interface, WEP keys must be entered manually, which can be time consuming.
The front of the AP has three LEDs: Power, LAN and WLAN. The LAN LED will light up when data is being transferred over the ethernet interface, while similarly the WLAN LED will illuminate when data is transferred over the wireless interface. The back sports the antenna connector, reset switch, RJ-45 port and the DC input. There's no console connector here, probably because the unit was too small to include one, but that's no great loss as the web-based interface offers all the options you'll need. With the included CAT-5 straight-through, this AP is ready to be plugged into your existing network, and the ethernet interface is 10/100 Mbps capable. The bottom has a number of interesting indentations, used for mounting or securing the AP to another D-link device or a surface, with the included hardware. It should be noted that the external antenna can be removed and replaced with another compatible antenna that could provide better reception. Installation Physical installation of the DWL-900AP+ is a no-brainer. Simply supply the AP with power through the AC adapter, and then with the CAT-5 cable you can plug the AP directly into a port on a hub or switch. If you want to connect the AP straight to an ethernet card in a computer, you'll need to a use a crossover cable. After that's done, you simply point your web browser to 192.168.0.50, the default IP address of the AP. You'll have to use the default login and password provided. Following the setup wizard allows you to configure the DWL-900AP+ as an access point with your choice of WEP (enabled or disabled), SSID and channel. The wizard will also prompt you to change the password on the DWL-900AP+ itself, something that should never be forgotten.
For a more advanced configuration, the interface doesn't disappoint. You can adjust the transfer rates and authentication types, among other things, and you can also specify a list of MAC addresses that are allowed to connect, or not allowed to connect. While MAC addresses can be spoofed, this can provide some level of security, to at least keep out casual war drivers. But the main thing you'll want to do in the advanced section is disable SSID broadcasting, to create the first line of defence. Again, while not offering a perfect solution, disabling SSID broadcasting is the first step. However, when I did this I encountered some problems with the PCI and CardBus adapters that were solved with a driver update, as you'll see later on. Lastly, the ability to not only update firmware from the interface but also to save and restore the AP's settings was a feature I was pleasantly surprised by. If you ever forget your password and have to reset the AP, you'll at least know that you can keep a copy of the settings so you won't have to manually re-configure everything.
Additional options include the basic settings such as IP address/subnet mask along with gateway and DNS servers. The DWL-900AP+ can be configured either with a static IP or a dynamic one, so it can suit different types of networks. Additionally, this AP has a built-in DHCP server so if you are building a network around this device it is very useful. A handy activity log is also present to show what's been going on with your AP. The last part of the interface was a nice HTML-based help that provided definitions for each of the settings and also had some recommendations as to what they should be set to. Some of the definitions weren't helpful at all, but some did provide insight.
The things I liked most about the web-based interface were how easy it was to use, and the fact that is fairly platform or OS independant. When I checked out if any new firmware was available for this AP, I was surprised that the newest firmware not only support 802.1x, but also something called "4X mode". This seemed to hint at a theoretical transfer rate of up to 44Mbps, but I was sceptical, as after all this was a beta firmware. But I updated with it, and also updated to the latest drivers (also beta) for the wireless network adapters, so they would support this 4X mode, to see what, if any, performance advantage would be obtained. Updating to the latest firmware also gave some new options. Firstly, there is a page for 802.1x security options. A RADIUS server is required for this, and if you have one deployed on your network it would aid in securing your wireless network. You'll also need to obtain the client software for each wireless client on your network. Additional new settings included an option to set the antenna transmission power (from 12.5% up to 100%), selecting which antenna to use, and the enabling/disabling of 4X mode. << Back to Reviews Page | The DI-614+ Wireless Router >>
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