I initially began researching wireless applications when my office purchased space in a different building adjacent to the one we are in now. My employer had asked me to hook up a wireless network connecting both offices. No small task, and when he wanted this done 7 months ago, there were not many commercial products available to do this. But there was Cisco. This review is targeted at the Access Point, but we also purchased a Workgroup Bridge to "talk" to the access point in the other building, hence making one big network where all computers can see each other.

(In order to get the access point to talk to the bridge, I also needed to purchase two 5 db gain external antenna's) Inside the packaging, the unit came with a power adapter to power itself, a cd to install the drivers and software, and instructions to use it.

I have always had some experience with computers and network, but even to me the instructions seemed daunting. After some reading, and some fiddling with physically setting up the access point, it was now time to setup on the software for it. This part was relatively easy to access, since I used my web browser to change the setup settings.

Once I got here however, it took a good hour of trial and error to get the access point to talk to the bridge. Be prepared, if you go with the application we did, to be on the phone talking to the other person in the other building saying things like "Hows This? Do you get my signal??" or "How's my signal strength now?"

Since technology is always progressing, the 340 series has been replaced with the 350 series. But if you can find the 340 series, it has a lot of value. Most users out there would probably buy it to use it as a roaming base. Meaning, you have a laptop with a cisco wireless network card and you want to talk to the access point hooked up to their network. In this case, there are MANY products on the market that do this. I can't speak to their value however. With Cisco, you know you are buying quality work and great technical support (of which I used twice).

Also, be aware that if you are pursuing a wireless application, Intel has announced as of 11/19/01 that it has developed a new wireless architecture that reaches speeds FAR greater than what is achieved now with the wireless technology (currently 11mbs-mega bits per second). I find that using the DSL connection on the 340 series is more than adequate. But if I want to transfer large files (250 megabytes+) then I could use the increase in speed, otherwise its great.





Recommended: Yes