I have a wired Linksys router with an 8 port hub attached to it.
Besides this new situation, did you have any need to replace
the Linksys for any needed features (besides wireless, we're
ignoring the laptop for a moment) or instabilities, or is it
doing fine per your needs? Do you need to use it in some
other place, is having it spare useful to you?
These issues would pertain to whether you have a benefit in
pulling the linksys from it's routing role, not using it in
your lan at all, or taking the easier approach and just
adding the new wifi router for the purposes of adding
wireless access. Also, adding the wireless router
elsewhere, closer to the anticipated location of laptop use
may improve the signal to it, but this "elsewhere" might be
far away from the modem and thus easier to keep using the
linksys than string more cables around.
My dad
wanted wireless for his laptop so he went out and bought a wireless router.
Can I hook this thing into the hub?
Yes. Not knowing what features and user-configuration
options this new wifi router supports, it's hard to be sure
but in general the desirable option as you suggested would
be to just hook the router up to the hub, disable it's DHCP
feature, and/or set it (via it's menu) to be an access
point. See it's user manual for specific steps to configure
it if that is not obvious looking in the menus (accessed by
brower/HTML generally on modern routers).
Can all three be connected? Right now
I have the router uplink port connected to the hub uplink port. The new
wireless router only has ports 1, 2, 3, 4, and "internet."
Are either or both, auto or manually set to uplink mode?
You only need one of those two connected via a port set as
an uplink, but not the other. If it autoconfigs itself,
connecting the two both by uplink ports may also work.
The key issues in using both routers are to be sure the wifi
routers' DHCP feature is disabled, and then having the
notebook confirmed operational and checking connectivity of
it to the (internet and lan, both).
Of course, the other lan config briefly mentioned above is
that you can pull the linksys out of the network altogether
and just use the wifi router for everything... If your ISP
ties your account to the host MAC address, you would then
(only if using the wifi router as the new primary router
without the linksys in that role) either contact then and
give them the mac address of this wifi router, or in the
wifi router's menu system there should be a way to clone the
mac address of the linksys so it is still presenting itself
as the same device to the ISP for identification purposes.
The MAC address in question is the one for the WAN, not LAN
or WLAN if mulitple macs are listed (often are on a
sticker).
