Wireless router Issues.

[Shoupie080]

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Thanks in advance for anyone who can help me here.

Ok I use a linksys wireless router which I share with my girlfriend. The first problem i'm encoutering is I think the people in the apartment below us are jumping on our network even though I have it secured with an impossible password. I don't know much about security but i'm sure they could get into it if they knew enough about router security. So my first question is how do I know if there's someone other than myself and my gf using the wireless? And also, how do I stop them if they are using it. Someone said something about only allowing the MAC address for my computer and hers but I don't know how to do that.

My second problem is that I play a lot of counter strike and those of you who play know how important your ping is. Well my gf downloads and uploads a lof of music and pictures which always gets me booted from servers. I was wondering if theres a way I can limit her bandwidth to about half of what it is now so that this wont be a problem.

Please try to make any response to either problem as non-complicated as possible. I know how to log into my router via the IP but thats about it.

Any help would be awesome.

Cheers!

 

[Ididmyc600]

Hi
nope you cant limit the bandwidth, just agree to a time for you and a time for her...

If you go into your router, look for DHCP client list it should show your PC name and the girlfriends, if it shows any others then your right, if not your dammed paranoid.

To set up MAC filtering do START > RUN > CMD >ENTER in the box type
ipconfig /all (there is a space after ipconfig)

now look for something called the physical address, there may be 2 of them dependant on if you have more than 1 network card, such as a hardwired socket and a wireless card, this is the MAC address, now use that in the part of the router setup which applies to MAC filtering, make sure you do yours first otherwise you will get locked out of the router...

Make also sure that you use a decent level of security on the router, dont use WEP It can be cracked in 4 minutes or less using 2 laptops and some software, go for WPA its harder to crack and use a password that you would set on a PC, at least 14 characters long and a mixture of upper\lower case letters and numbers.

Regards

 

[Shoupie080]

Ok that sounds easy enough. One last question. If I buy a more expensive router can I assign bandwidth or is that just impossible period? I'll have to check what security setting I have it on. Thanks a lot for all your help

 

[Ididmyc600]

Hi

I dont think any router can deal with BW assignment, except maybe a Cisco or similar, these aren't built for home users and are very expensive, I think however there are some software options, but here I falter, and pass the hat to someone else to answer.

 

[N1Hawk]

There are software programs out there that will work with the router and limit BW but there's expensive to buy as far as i've heard like 200.00 to 300.00 full version!

 

[Shoupie080]

Alrighty I guess i'll just forget that whole idea...I could always block her MAC address =)

Thanks a lot everyone