A friend of mine just purchased a DLINK 8500AP and I'm trying to help him set up wireless internet in his house. His computers are connected to one of two switches, which are both hooked up to his DSL modem. I connected the 8500AP to one of the switches. According to the instruction manual, I need to configure the switch through a web browser. It says that DHCP is disabled by default, so I need to connect from a host on the same subnet. The default IP address of the 8500AP is 10.90.90.90/8.
Because I'm not very well versed in networking, I apologize if the steps I took do not make sense. Here's what I tried: I couldn't access the IP address in a web browser (I assume because the IP address doesn't follow that of the rest of the network). So, I tried taking one switch and only hooking up the 8500AP and my laptop. I changed my laptop's IP to 10.0.0.1 to put it on the same network. I still wasn't able to access the web sever on the wireless AP.
I would appreciate if you could point me in the right direction. Thanks a lot!
---------- Post updated at 04:21 AM ---------- Previous update was at 01:11 AM ----------
Nevermind, I was able to get into the configuration page. It turns out that DHCP was enabled. I used Angry IP Scanner to find the local IP address and was able to access it through my browser.
Wireless connections are more complicated to set up than wired connections. You�re basically setting up a radio transmitter that broadcasts to little radios attached to your PCs. You need to worry about signal strength, finding the right signal, and even entering passwords to keep outsiders from listening in.
---------- Post updated at 04:46 AM ---------- Previous update was at 04:45 AM ----------
Wireless transmitters, known as Wireless Access Points (WAPs), come either built into your router or plugged into one of your router�s ports. The setup software is different on every model, but it requires you to set up these three things:
Network name (SSID): Enter a short, easy-to-remember name here to identify your particular wireless network
---------- Post updated at 04:46 AM ---------- Previous update was at 04:46 AM ----------
Later, when connecting to the wireless network with your computer, you�ll select this same name to avoid accidentally connecting with your neighbor�s wireless network.
Infrastructure: Choose Infrastructure instead of the alternative, Ad Hoc.
Security: This option encrypts your data as it flies through the air. Turn it on using the recommended settings.
I don't recall how many network ID's a /8 is for, but for giggles I'd try 10.90.90.91/8 and then see if you can connect to the web interface on the AP.