A quick Youtube movie demonstrating the ease of using Netgear’s Parental Control system.
To check out the range of Netgear Routers and compare features and prices, select “Netgear” in the first section of my “Find products according to features” facility on the find-a-router page, go through and select any other features you’d like and then click the “Go” button.
I was recently sent this link to Gizmodo showing a robot that can be controlled via the internet based on the open source Linksys WRT54GL router. Amazing stuff!
More at jbprojects.net.
For more information about the WRT54GL see my quick review at http://www.ozcableguy.com/review.asp?router=WRT54GL.
It could happen to anyone and it happened to me.
A couple of weeks ago my little internal server PC refused to boot up. I had all of our office PCs backing up to its hard drive as well as some other important data so I took the hard drive out and put it in my workstation to retrieve the data off it and then my workstation wouldn’t boot up either. Hmmm…
It turns out both PCs (both connected to the same surge board incidentally) had blown motherboards. Not quite a total disaster and after just a day of mucking about later we were up and running again. Thankfully nothing was lost apart from a day’s work.
But it could have been much, much worse…
I started thinking about house fires and burglaries where the PCs might be lost forever. Insurance would cover the hardware but some of that data would be irreplaceable and could even mean the end of my business, so I needed a better backup solution for starters.
What I was doing was a good starting point where I have all the important data from all the office workstations backing up to a spare hard drive in a PC, but I needed to go one step further and have that copied to a 3rd source and that’s the beauty of the NAS (network attached storage) devices that many manufacturers now have on the market. These are basically enclosures with hard drives inside (hard drives are usually not included. Check manufacturer specifications for details and supported hard drives) that you can connect to a PC network. They show up on the network in “My Network Places” the same as a PC does so you can drag & drop files across or use a scheduled backup application like ezbackitup or windows backup. (I like ezbackitup because it only backs up files that have changed since last time, doesn’t compress and retains the same directory structure so it’s easy to find and retrieve single files).
A small NAS enclosure can be hidden or placed anywhere you like to make it an unlikely target for thieves and at the same time be easy to grab and chuck under your arm if you need to vacate the premises in a hurry. They start small & cheap to suit home and small business owners right up to rack mountable units with RAID and other options.
Click here to check out available NAS devices from my online shop.
The next problem was to deal with why those motherboards blew in the first place. We get quite a few surges in my house that we’ve never been able to get to the bottom of. (They tend to happen early in the mornings when everything’s turned off and no one’s even out of bed. Electricians are mystified). Since the surge protection board didn’t save them in this case the obvious solution was an uninterruptible power supply (UPS).
A UPS is basically a battery pack plugged into a power point to keep the battery charged, while any PCs or other devices plugged into it run off the battery power. If the power fails the PC keeps running for however long the battery can last and then will automatically shut the PC down safely before the battery is depleted. (There’s a serial or USB cable between the UPS & PC and software to facilitate this process). How long the battery lasts is dependant on the size of the battery and what you’ve got plugged into it. The cheaper ones tend to give a “clean” power supply to your PC and just enough battery power to automatically shut the PC down safely in the event of power failure.
I chose a Powerware 5110-1000A (currently selling for $237.60 at my online shop) which should give me 10 – 20 mins of power for my PC and 2 monitors in the event of a blackout but I’ve configured the software to shut me down after 5 minutes just to be on the safe side (which is generally heaps of time to make it outside to flick the circuit breaker back on anyway). It passed the first test with flying colours so was money well spent.
Choosing the right UPS for your situation can be confusing but Powerware have a great UPS Selector on their website to take out the guesswork. Click here to check it out.
Click here to check out the range and prices of UPSs from my online shop. I like Belkin and Powerware brands because they back their products up with connected equipment warranties and I get favourable feedback from my customers about them.
A couple of quirks worth mentioning with the installation of my shiny new Powerware 5110-1000A: The manual mentions removing the front cover to connect the battery lead prior to plugging it in. My cover was connected by a couple of screws which weren’t mentioned in the manual and my battery lead was already connected when I did get the cover off. A bit of unnecessary confusion there…
The other issue not explained was before installing the shutdown & monitoring software you need to install the UPS drivers. Without doing that first it won’t be able to detect the UPS so it can do its thing. I assumed the driver installation would be part of the same application but that wasn’t the case. It has to be done manually first.
All in all a valuable lesson learned from something that could happen to anyone any time. I strongly advise not to delay putting off doing something about this stuff.
Sort it out today!
Going through some notes while working on updates for the OzCableguy site I came across a page I started a while back comparing the two VoIP systems available from Linksys. At the time I was getting geared up to sell and install them but it turned out to be extremely difficult to get off the ground so I’ve put it on the backburner for the time being. However, while the table is incomplete it’d be a shame to lose what I’d got done so I’ll stick it up as a blog page and hope I do get around to doing more with it one day.
Linksys have produced two separate VoIP systems for small businesses. Basically they consist of products like a PBX system, IP telephones and optional routers, ATAs for PSTN failover and PoE switches and integration with certain service providers for services like VoiceMail. Neither system is available for general retail and must be purchased as a supported package from a Linksys Certified Partner.
It can be a little confusing trying to choose which system is the most suitable but this table should help answer some of the more common questions.
|
Product/Feature |
Benefit |
||
| Number of Users |
1-16 |
5-100 |
|
| Router | Provides internet sharing and firewall security. | RV042/RV082: Dual WAN 4 or 8 port router, or any QoS capable product. | SVR3000: Dual WAN, 16 Port, PoE Router with PBX |
| PBX System | SPA9000: Std with 4 license. Upgradable to 16 with SPA9000-UPG | Built into SVR3000 | |
| Phones | SPA901: Single line wall mount or table top plain phone with no display. | PHB1100: Monochrome display with two port 10/100 QoS Ethernet switch, IEEE 802.3af PoE powered by upstream switch (SVR3000) | |
| SPA921: Single Line monochromatic display | PHM1200: High-res colour display with two port 10/100 QoS Ethernet switch, IEEE 802.3af PoE powered by upstream switch (SVR3000) | ||
| SPA922: Single Line monchromatioc display with PoE (power supply sold separately) | |||
| SPA941: 2 Line (upgradable to 4 with SPA941-UPG) monochromatic display | |||
| SPA942: 2 Line (upgradable to 4 with SPA941-UPG) monochromatic display & PoE. (power supply sold separately) | |||
| ATA | Allows failover to PSTN | SPA3102: 1 x FXO & 1 x FXS | VGA2000: 1 x FXO & 1 x FXS with PoE |
| VGA2100: 3 x FXO with PoE | |||
| VoiceMail | Provided externally by VoIP Service Provider | Stored on USB Memory stick inserted into SVR3000 Router | |
| Auto Attendant | Answers calls automatically and provides instructions to connect to various departments or message service. |
Yes |
Yes (Latest firmware has Aussie accent while earlier versions were American) |
| Automated config backup |
Provides fast recovery after equipment loss or failure |
No |
Yes |
| Call hunt | Incoming calls can be directedto ring certain phones in either sequential, round robin or random |
Yes |
Yes |
| DID | Direct Inward Dial (bypass auto-attendant) |
Provided by VSP |
Yes |
| Music on Hold | Built into SPA9000. (Standard file can be over-written.) |
Built into SVR3000 |
|
| Call Park | Place call on hold and pick up from the same or a different handset |
Yes |
Yes |
| DND | Do not disturb. Users can set phones to forward all calls depending on their forwarding configuration. |
Yes |
Yes |
I’ve been everywhere man, I’ve been everywhere… Or so the jingle goes. 3G wireless Internet is starting to really take off in Australia and I get a lot of requests from people about how to share it with multiple PCs on a network, preferably wirelessly.
The easiest way to go is with a router and there’s a few emerging on the market now to suit both the PC Card and USB types of modems.
The Billion 7300GX has been on the market for a few weeks now but for some reason is yet to take off. Strange, as over the last few months I’ve been virtually inundated with requests for this one and there seemed to be a queue forming for it. Where’d everyone go?
Besides being a wireless modem + router similar to the 7300G, the 7300GX adds the ability to accept PC Card style wireless modems and at under $200.00 it’s an absolute bargain.
Compatibility has been tested and proven with the Vodaphone 3G card and Telstra’s Turbo Express card but there’s an issue with the Hutchison card that should be resolved mid-November. No word on the Optus card at this stage.
Linksys led this market with the introduction of the WRT54G3G a couple of months ago but it’s a little more expensive and lacks the built-in ADSL modem. Mind you this means if you ever do switch to another type of broadband service you can plug whatever modem you like into it, chances are it’ll be ADSL anyway due to the minimal Cable coverage in Australia. But if you have Cable already and want to use a 3G connection for backup or failover then this one is the way to go.
Draytek focused on USB 3G modems and upgraded the existing USB Print Server port on the 2800 and 2910 series to accept them. USB 3G modems must be the more popular choice because these have been extremely popular.
Gabriel from Draytek Australia told me how he travelled across Taiwan by bus during the recent Draytek Distributor reunion and had a 2910G plugged into a power inverter in the bus’s cigarette lighter sharing a 3G USB modem wirelessly so everyone on the bus had wireless Internet on their laptops as they traveled. Neat stuff! More on this and other 3G sharing applications from Draytek here.
Update: In response to some of the questions I’ve been getting I have created a basic FAQ about 3G networking including a quick summary of the current 3G capable routers here.
I just got one of the new D-Link Media Players which can play music, pictures and video directly from your PCs onto your home entertainment system connecting either by wireless or cable. Pretty cool stuff, and the mind boggles at where we’ll be in a couple of years with digital media and gadgets like this.
Click here for more.
Pictures of 1.5 km Wireless bridge recently installed.
One building has ADSL with Router and 2 PCs. ADSL is shared over the wireless link from first building to 4 other PCs at the 2nd building.
All work happily together as one LAN, with throughput figures in excess of 5-8mbs. (ADSL top speed is 1.5mbs)
Wireless Bridging offers many security advantages over plain Access Points and is not susceptable to WarDriver interference.
Rooftop Parabolic Grid antenna (one needed at each end). Part No 16PARAGRID20 from MMT. Cost approx $230.00each.
2 x WAP54G in bridging mode. Cost approx $230.00 each.
+ Approx $250 – 300.00 in assorted bits and pieces like low loss cables, pigtails, brackets etc.
Thanks to -
Fred & the boys from Philcomm for the cabling and antenna installation.
Mark & Danny from MMT for product assistance and recommendations.
Leroy from WirelessNederland (see SeattleWireless for an excellent firmware hack that makes the WAP54G probably the most powerful WAP in its class for the money.
