Router
Yay, the new router works nicely. Only took a couple of minutes to plug it in, untangle ethernet cables and plug them in, then run around setting clients to DHCP (I'd used static IPs under Linux.) A couple more minutes setting up WEP, and I was all set.
I've only found two things to dislike so far: one, the power supply wall-wart is just a fraction too wide to plug into my power bar alongside the cable modem and switch PSUs. It works if only two of three are plugged in, but if I try all three, one refuses to fit. So I'm currently running without the switch - which is fine, since there's a four-port switch on the router, and I only use more than four ethernet cables if I need to transfer files rapidly to/from the laptops. With 802.11G rather than B, this shouldn't be as much of a problem as it used to be.
The second thing is the fact that you can't set the DHCP server to give out static IPs to certain MAC addresses. I usually use direct IPs to connect to other computers' Windows shares, since I've never gotten Windows computer name browsing to work reliably. I suppose I'll have to give it another shot, though.
I'm not sure whether I'll continue running a server at home - all it's doing now is running irssi/screen sessions, and acting as central storage for my photos. The latter could be replaced by a cheap network storage disc, and the former by running irssi on geeksoc. I guess I'll wait and see. If I do continue running a server, I'd like to resurrect my old laptop server - perhaps with the CF card system disk I've been thinking about for ages.
I've only found two things to dislike so far: one, the power supply wall-wart is just a fraction too wide to plug into my power bar alongside the cable modem and switch PSUs. It works if only two of three are plugged in, but if I try all three, one refuses to fit. So I'm currently running without the switch - which is fine, since there's a four-port switch on the router, and I only use more than four ethernet cables if I need to transfer files rapidly to/from the laptops. With 802.11G rather than B, this shouldn't be as much of a problem as it used to be.
The second thing is the fact that you can't set the DHCP server to give out static IPs to certain MAC addresses. I usually use direct IPs to connect to other computers' Windows shares, since I've never gotten Windows computer name browsing to work reliably. I suppose I'll have to give it another shot, though.
I'm not sure whether I'll continue running a server at home - all it's doing now is running irssi/screen sessions, and acting as central storage for my photos. The latter could be replaced by a cheap network storage disc, and the former by running irssi on geeksoc. I guess I'll wait and see. If I do continue running a server, I'd like to resurrect my old laptop server - perhaps with the CF card system disk I've been thinking about for ages.