How can I use the Slingbox away from my home?

Home Network Expansion

• What is the best (and relatively inexpensive) equipment I could use to expand my home network? I'm looking to expand my home network. I recently had a setup with two Linksys WRT54G routers, one acting as the gateway for my cable modem connection, and another acting only as router for the devices in my living room (XBox360, Slingbox, etc). The gateway/router died this morning, and I had to swap out the living room router to take it's place. I've been through many Linksys products in the past, and I am open to other brands at this point. Can you recommend me a gateway/router, plus a switch, that support Auto-MDI, so I don't need to make/acquire crossover cables to expand the wired portion of the network? (one switch I was looking at is the http://www.linksys.com/servlet/Satellite?c=L_Product_C2&childpagename=US%2FLayout&cid=1115416906263&pagename=Linksys%2FCommon%2FVisitorWrapper - however I don't really need Gigabit yet and it is a tad pricey). Can you recommend a USB print server (wired or wireless) that you have had zero problems with? This would be for an Epson Stylus Photo USB printer. Are there any advantages to separating my wireless AP from my main gateway/router? I live in a 1,230 sq. ft. condo, and currently the wireless range is fine throughout the house. The signal originates from my office which is in the upstairs loft (which is also where the cable modem lives).

• Answer:

  Larger antennas (higher gain) will work, and the cheapo CompUSA ones are fine, you don't need the $60 Linksys one. There's a netgear gig eth switch that we outfitted our house with for like $29 each ... We got them from TigerDirect AFAIK. Any small workgroup switch will work just fine. No reccomendations required. I've seen some for as low as $10 online. There's no real advantage to separating your wireless AP away unless you can position it in a place that'll do you better... but you can move or aim an antenna just as well probably, and with much less effort and cableage running all over. Good value you got out of your one question per two weeks. ;) I've had good success with dLink printer servers, but it was parallel. I had even better luck buying a different printer on sale that had networking enabled already, or connecting it to a computer and using Windows Printer Sharing. ;)