From: Digest To: "OS/2GenAu Digest" Date: Sat, 3 Jul 2010 00:00:20 EST-10EDT,10,1,0,7200,4,1,0,7200,3600 Subject: [os2genau_digest] No. 1982 Reply-To: X-List-Unsubscribe: www.os2site.com/list/ ************************************************** Friday 02 July 2010 Number 1982 ************************************************** Subjects for today 1 Re: eCS & wireless : Paul Smedley 2 Re: eCS & wireless : Peter Moylan **= Email 1 ==========================** Date: Fri, 02 Jul 2010 06:14:26 +0930 From: Paul Smedley Subject: Re: eCS & wireless Hi Ed, Ed Durrant wrote: > Alan Duval wrote: >> Peter mentions wanting to get a printer that works via wireless. >> I didn't know that eCS supported wireless connections. >> Is there any info that I can read about this? >> >> Regards, >> >> Alan Duval >> > From a printer set up point of view, whether the network is wired or > wireless makes no difference - once the wireless link is in place, when > the printer queue looks for a specific network printer name and hence IP > address, it talks to it. Correct - and in the case of my Epson TX810FW - the IP configuration can even be done using the touch screen panel on the printer. Very nice indeed :) Cheers, Paul -------------------------------------------------- http://www./melbpc/ - The Melbourne OS/2 SIG === **= Email 2 ==========================** Date: Fri, 02 Jul 2010 22:49:09 +1000 From: Peter Moylan Subject: Re: eCS & wireless Alan Duval wrote: > Peter mentions wanting to get a printer that works via wireless. That was my original intention, but I ended up getting a Xerox 3125N, which is not a wireless printer. This printer does, however, have an ethernet interface, so I could probably turn it into a wireless printer by adding a wireless-to-ethernet adapter - see below. I haven't yet tested this option because I don't yet have network printing working. Someone on this list suggested another possibility, a wireless device which, as I understand it, acts as a one-printer print server. Again, it's not worth testing this until I have network printing working. > > I didn't know that eCS supported wireless connections. Is there any > info that I can read about this? The computer I'm typing this message on is my main computer, connected wirelessly and running eCS 2.0. I learnt the trick for doing this from Daniela Engert; it involves buying a small gadget called a wireless access point, which is a sort of special-purpose wireless router. There's an ethernet connection between my computer and the access point, and then a wireless connection between the access point and my main router (which is of course a wireless router). As far as eCS knows, I'm connected to the network via the ethernet port, i.e. eCS doesn't have to know it's a wireless connection. (Therefore no wireless driver is needed. Or, to be more precise, the driver is inside the access point's firmware, therefore is indepedent of operating system.) The one I'm using now is an ASUS WL-330gE wireless access point. It has four modes of operation (gateway, access point, adapter, repeater) but of these I've only used "adapter". (I would probably use the "access point" mode to turn my network printer into a wireless network printer.) The product page is at .... oops, ASUS web site appears to be buggy. However, you can find reviews on the web, for example .... hmm, those "review" sites don't seem to have reviews. Anyway, my personal review is that it works well. My only real gripe about it is that it requires a separate mains power plug, which in practice means that it stays powered up even when I turn my computer one. The next device I'll describe, below, can be powered from USB, which I found more convenient. Current prices appear to be $40 US or $165 Australian. Hey, that's a big gap. Maybe we need a free trade agreement with the US. Of course, this is massive overkill compared with the inexpensive wireless adapters that work with Windows. The catch, as you know, is that none of those adapters have OS/2 drivers. The beauty of a wireless access point is that it doesn't care what operating system you have. Beware of model numbers, by the way. The WL-330gE is a totally different device from the WL-330, which in turn is totally different from things like the WL-320. You just have to take care that the thing you order is called a _wireless_access_point_, no matter which manufacturer you go for. (It's marketed as a travel accessory, by the way, to carry around with your laptop to connect to strange networks. Its big selling point is its very small physical size.) Before I used the ASUS device, I had a DWL-G730AP from D-Link. That's the one Daniela recommended several years ago. I actually liked that one better, and I see that it's slightly cheaper now. The reason I'm no longer using it is that it suddenly stopped working, for no reason that I can guess. Well, there's one possible reason. I can't remember now whether the failure was when the house across the road was hit by lightning. On that occasion I lost my VoIP adapter and my fax, so maybe that's when a sensitive wireless device also blew up. It's still sitting on my kitchen table waiting for further tests, but I'm pretty sure it's dead. It was pure luck that I had already bought the ASUS one, for use with a computer that I had planned to install in my then girlfriend's house. That never happened, so I was left with a spare OS/2 computer that I never use. Over time I guess I'll use it for spare parts. I have a vague memory that the D-Link one has the option of using a static IP address, while the ASUS one is DHCP only. That doesn't bother me because my router always allocates me the same address anyway. So there you have it. At least two solutions, and probably more. True, they cost more than a cheap printer, but they work beautifully, at least until the next lightning strike. -- Peter Moylan peter at pmoylan dot org http://www.pmoylan dot org -------------------------------------------------- http://www./melbpc/ - The Melbourne OS/2 SIG ===