Recommendations for wireless routers?

[oshunluvr]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

I'm looking at the Asus Black Diamond to upgrade to N class. It's dual band.

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

There are typically 2-5 wireless networks in my neighborhood, i.e., that I can 'see' from my computers. So it's not really crowded--at least not right now. Plus, if I have problems with the new router I can send it back (although I'm really bad about doing that). Keep in mind that I have not had any problems with my old WRT54G...well, unless you consider it DYING being a problem...so, hopefully, the new one will be fine.

[wizard10000]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

...Moving away from locally-installed software and transitioning to an online (dare I say, in the cloud?) system is a really smart idea for situations like these. By keeping data off the local compuers, you're definitely reducing overall risk. One of your earlier messages indicated that all data in transit is encrypted, so interception risks are mitigated, too.

This makes me feel a little better as my biggest concern was local data. Full disk encryption works great if your laptop is stolen but is completely ineffective against access across the network. I'd be happier still if all IP traffic was tunnelled back to the IRS but SSL works, I guess.

I'm a federal geek - I head up tier 1 and 2 desktop support for a fair-sized agency under DoD.

And yeah - deleting the keys won't work. If IRS works anything like DoD does he has to certify the drives have been wiped. Big government agencies change slowly

[wizard10000]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

...I had to install the tax program on every computer, and we used Truecrypt to set up an encrypted drive for this.

Interesting. DoD isn't allowed to use Truecrypt as it doesn't have a FIPS 140-2 certificate.

My parent agency made an enterprise purchase of Pointsec - which frankly, sucks mightily. When Nokia bought Pointsec there were only about three people on the planet who knew how Pointsec worked and all of them are working ridiculous hours providing support. I'm lucky if I can get onsite support once a year, and then only by having my higher threaten to cancel their contract.

[SteveRiley]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

This makes me feel a little better as my biggest concern was local data. Full disk encryption works great if your laptop is stolen but is completely ineffective against access across the network. I'd be happier still if all IP traffic was tunnelled back to the IRS but SSL works, I guess.

Yup, that's why I always look for encryption at rest and encryption in transit. Both are necessary to fully protect data. Also, for transit protection, SSL is equivalent to a VPN. Most VPNs use IPsec, which have similar key exchange mechanisms and use the same symmetric encryption algorithm.

I'm a federal geek - I head up tier 1 and 2 desktop support for a fair-sized agency under DoD... Big government agencies change slowly

We should talk sometime! I've done some security advisory work for the DoD. Nothing major, and nothing requiring clearances... more along the lines of policy stuff.

Interesting. DoD isn't allowed to use Truecrypt as it doesn't have a FIPS 140-2 certificate.

If you have to use Windows, get your agencies upgraded to Win 7! BitLocker is fully FIPS compliant

[wizard10000]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Yup, that's why I always look for encryption at rest and encryption in transit. Both are necessary to fully protect data. Also, for transit protection, SSL is equivalent to a VPN. Most VPNs use IPsec, which have similar key exchange mechanisms and use the same symmetric encryption algorithm.

I'd still feel better if they were tunnelling all IP traffic

If you have to use Windows, get your agencies upgraded to Win 7! BitLocker is fully FIPS compliant

We still need a third party solution, though - as BitLocker doesn't do optical media >

We can kick this stuff around sometime

[oshunluvr]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Uh, yeah - isn't it like bad juju for moderators and board ops to thread hijack? 8)

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Call me weird (go ahead, it's okay!), but I not only don't mind thread drift, I actually kind of like it. It's fascinating how things evolve.

[SteveRiley]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Ooookay... don't buy routers that suck!

The topic is thus restored.

[oshunluvr]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

It was an interesting discussion, but I had nothing to contribute so I went and tattled like any well-spoiled petulant child would...

[SteveRiley]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Watch it, bud

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

To get this thread sort of back on track... I received my ASUS RT-N16 router, and am completely stumped.

I first connected my laptop to it via cable, as its 'Quick Start' guide suggests. I connected to its setup page at 192.168.1.1...and from there it went downhill. It's not auto-detecting anything (IP address, etc.). It's not generating keys (I've tried WPA-2 and WEP). It's not receiving a response from Earthlink (although I'm definitely entering the correct username and password). In other words, I'm screwed. On the router's setup page, it correctly identifies the two computers currently connected to it via cable.

Meanwhile, my laptop sees the new wireless network, called ASUS by default. It shows that I'm connected to it. It also shows that I'm connected via Ethernet. But I can't *DO* anything. There is no Internet connectivity at all.

(I'm typing this after plugging the Ethernet cable back into my DSL modem.)

I don't know what else to try. I tried manually entering my IP address and subnet mask, but got stuck when it asked for other info that I don't know, so I couldn't continue. My previous router picked up all that stuff automatically.

Its Quick Start guide makes several references to the CD included with the unit, but since its instructions (in the guide) are windoze specific, I'm assuming the CD is, too.

[oshunluvr]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Did you connect to modem to a WAN or LAN port?

[DoYouKubuntu]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

Did you connect to modem to a WAN or LAN port?

WAN, the only port available.

[oshunluvr]

Re: Recommendations for wireless routers?

So you went through the QiS setup and all that?