by Silverhaze on Wed May 31, 2006 12:27 pm
Err...I think its all pretty much the same thing with XP regardless of flavour.
Look [url=http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Online_Catalogue_Routers___Firewalls_417.html[here[/url]
Theres a BT router right at the top of the list but any ADSL router should work. Ive been told to avoid Linksys and know to avoid Belkin too.
So you can spend about £40 on a router and then a couple of quid on CAT5. Luckily I work for an IT company so I can get reels of CAT5 for nothing which made that part of things cheaper.
If you go wireless then I think the router should come with 4 (or however many inputs the thing has) wireless receivers to go in the PCs you are connecting. That would save on wires but then do you want a network that doesnt operate at 100mbps or are you willing to go the extra mile and get a 108mbps wireless router?
Theres also the drops in signal I've read about. Network speed seems to depend on signal strength. Theres security issues too if you dont know what you're going but theres easy ways around that with simple security settings to stop your neighbours hijacking your signal.
If you were to buy an Xbox360 you'd have to spend a further £30 - £40 on a wireless adaptor for it if you wanted to connect it to your wireless router as opposed to just another bit of CAT5.
Now that I have the netgear hard wired router I havent had a single drop in connectivity (the belkin would crash 2 or 3 times a day) and everything seems stable.
I have the Xbox360, 2 PCs running the exact same version of XP Pro and one PC running XP Media Centre Edition LAN'd up. The Media Centre PC has the Media Connect software installed to allow me to stream TV, pictures, movies and music from the PC, over the network to my Xbox so I can look at them on the TV in my bedroom. It works pretty much flawlessly and is pure simplicity itself to setup!
The 360 does slideshows of your photos but not just that....it actually does a lovely fade from pic to pic and also does thing nice slow zoom or panning effect on each picture it displays. You can also stream music at the same time so you can watch your holiday snaps in a slideshow all set to your favourite album on a TV in a completely different room and control it all from there too. Brilliant!!! I love it.
For the people who are still alive.