Another good reason 802.11 is great is that if you have a home or better yet an apartment, and you want a home LAN, but hate the idea (or have a spouse that hates the idea) of having ethernet cable strung throughout the house, or can't put the cable into the walls since it's not yours but your landlords, this is a great solution. You don't *need* the laptop to get the benefits of wireless....but it helps.

I live near a lake, and I keep meaning to put an external antenna on the house, aim it toward the lake and see if I can "surf" from one of the docks.

So no way to get Tivo to work with WEP, eh? I'm gonna be in the market for one this fall but I'm likely not going to have a (land) phone where I'm living the next three years. So it would have to be an internet thing. Is it possible to just plug a cat-5 into Mr. Tivo, or does it have to be wireless? What's the setup like? Cause I'm not sure I'd be comfortable leaving myself open like that. My house is gonna be in the ghetto so I'm not worried about my neighbors stealing my wireless, but still... Is it a daily download? I could turn off encryption every few days for five minutes to let it do its business....

Also, this is a little further off topic, is there anything I definitely need to know before I get Tivo? I've heard to get a model with dual tuners or I'll end up shooting myself... any other suggestions? I'm pretty sure there's a crap not crap topic on tivo, I'll go read it....

Sticky wrote:So no way to get Tivo to work with WEP, eh? I'm gonna be in the market for one this fall but I'm likely not going to have a (land) phone where I'm living the next three years. So it would have to be an internet thing. Is it possible to just plug a cat-5 into Mr. Tivo, or does it have to be wireless? What's the setup like? Cause I'm not sure I'd be comfortable leaving myself open like that. My house is gonna be in the ghetto so I'm not worried about my neighbors stealing my wireless, but still... Is it a daily download? I could turn off encryption every few days for five minutes to let it do its business....

Also, this is a little further off topic, is there anything I definitely need to know before I get Tivo? I've heard to get a model with dual tuners or I'll end up shooting myself... any other suggestions? I'm pretty sure there's a crap not crap topic on tivo, I'll go read it....

There is indeed a TiVo crap/not crap topic, but in answer to your other question - TiVo does work with WEP - just not over 802.11B. You've gotta have an 802.11G access point (or, of course, one that supports both B and G). I just found this out today with my own - I had thought it was WEP that was the problem, but it was because my router was set to use B only. As soon as I threw it back into mixed mode and entered my 128-bit WEP password, it worked a charm.

Also - the setup for these is brainlessly easy, seriously. If you use a compatible USB wireless device then the TiVo recognises it as soon as you pop it in the back, and that's about it. Just make sure you check the list of compatible adapters on www.tivo.com to be sure you don't waste $50 on a useless adapter (I did, three times over before I got one that worked).

Oh, and TiVo doesn't support cat-5 directly, so wireless is the only option.

Hope this helps some...

There's something about this thread that creeps me out -- namely, the piggybacking off of a neighbor's wireless network, even if only for the limited purpose of TiVo updates. Granted, the neighbor should be taking basic security measures to prevent this from happening, and all that's being used is a resource that would otherwise be wasted, but it still feels weird to me.

Set me straight.

Thanks Stewie, G it is. I'm glad this'll work out because it wouldn't be cost effective to have to pay for Tivo and another phone bill (I say this now, we'll probably end up with a phone anyway...grrr).

Brad:
I can't put you straight, I think it's shady as hell. I think most people here look at it like "Well, if they're not gonna protect it..." because most of us are computer-savy enough to know better. I tend to feel the same way, but I'd probably go ask them first: "Hey, can my Tivo use your wlan?" "Uhh, no." "Then fix your setup!" That way I can at least justify it to myself, saying "well, I told them so...and I was trying to help..."

I used to do something similar in the dorms; when I could find a nearby shared printer/computer (not a hard task), I'd print my paper to it and then knock on the door asking for my paper. They'd still be freaked out about their printer "magically" printing, and I could usually convince them to cough over the paper before they recovered from their state of shock.
"Oh, btw, you might wanna unshare your system unless you really want everyone to know how much you like the Spice Girls... And I've got another paper due Wednesday, it's your call" I'd say as I walked casually down the hall.

Anyway, there are lots of ways to justify stealing, and certain situations seem more ok than others, but it's still stealing--even if you both have the same connection type, same ISP.
And as for it being an unused resource... that's rough. You would never be able to tell for sure whether it was being otherwise unused. Just cause you think your neighbor's asleep, he might be downloading 3 GB of porn, and at a rate much slower than he'd like to be because you're mooching his connection.

I dunno, it's shady. But I could definitely see myself justifying it for some reason or another, so I dunno.

one of my best friends just called me and told me about how he got a laptop and he needs my help setting up his wireless router. i had to tell him i really don't know shit about it except that he needs to do a little web search and get the whole security thing straightened out...

saw a thing on tv tonight about these tech guys in cali that rented a couple planes and flew around above LA. according to their numbers, only about 30% of wi-fi systems were encrypted. the other 70% were wide open. they found thousands of unprotected houses.

toomanyhelicopters wrote:
saw a thing on tv tonight about these tech guys in cali that rented a couple planes and flew around above LA. according to their numbers, only about 30% of wi-fi systems were encrypted. the other 70% were wide open. they found thousands of unprotected houses.

This is going to make a great Bruce Willis film.

Completely off topic, but a bout of aphasia (or maybe just my contacts drying out, it's late) made me mangle the topic of this thread with that of another one very close to it as:

New Metallica - why?

I had to agree.