Today I got a new router, a Belkin G Wireless Router, the F5D7234-4 to be precised.

I have been looking for the IP address of the device for 30 min. I is actually specified on page 26 (i.e. the Alternate Setup Method area). The IP address is 192.168.2.1.

Very annoying since my server is also 192.168.2.1. In other words, I cannot talk with my server to that darn thing!

Well... I'll do it from another computer, but quite annoying, if you ask me!

I have a Cayman for my Internet connection and it uses 198.168.1.254. At least I find that much more practical.

Next I wanted to setup the security. I use WPA2. As defined on WikiPedia it is the safest. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wi-Fi_Protected_Access

Note it is not all clear to me since there are something like 4 different protections in the software... And when they asked for the key protection, I had choses that did not match. AES was the correct one, I guess, since it worked.

Okay... so, I now am connected with the wireless, cool, but I don't get access to the Internet. Makes sense! The IP is wrong. Argh! It was automatically assigned, 192.168.2.202. Nice address and so far it has not changed. But I just cannot see anything in the router that could be used to force the address... Hmmm... trying to setup the dhcpd server on my machine, no chance. Does not work either. Thinking about it...

The solution was simple. You actually change the IP directly on your laptop. That's it. I did that for that specific wireless connection and it sticked. Now the computer has access to the Internet since it has an IP that my Linux box accepts and an internal IP. (Did I say somewhere I like static IP addresses so I can protect my computers with very strong firewalls?!)

Alright... nearly done I guess.

So just one more thing: I made the wireless security high by entering the Mac address of my laptop as the only one acceptable Mac address. I find that quite practical! It is quite secure since if you do not know that Mac address, it will take you a little time to connect in the first place (as long as the router is properly programmed obviously.)