Nintendo Wireless USB
Monday, November 12th, 2007 - 2:59pm
Has anyone had any experience with the Nintendo Wi-Fi USB access point thing? The more I read about it, more confused I get. I don't have a wireless adapter at home, and I'm only interested in getting the DS online, so this seemed like a cheaper (and quicker) option than buying a wireless router.
Does it only allow you to play on the Nintendo network, or will it allow use of the DS browser as well? Some reviews gave me the impression it worked for games only.
For that matter -- is it for DS's only? Will my girlfriend's PSP work with it?
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just spend a few extra quid and get the router. Less hassles all around. There are several Buffalo models here for under 30 pounds.
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To be honest, the only thing stopping me from buying a router is the fact that I am a bit thick.
I have a broadband modem that my ISP provided that is USB on one end, and telephone jack on the other. This is connected to a mac mini, which connects to the 'net with my ISP username/password and shares the connection. Attatched to the Mini is a USB hub, from which ethernet cables run to my desktop machine and 360.
ie: ISP -> phone jack -> modem -> [mac USB ports] -> hub -> ethernet cable -> PC
I don't know how a router fits into this picture: I presume it doesn't replace the modem+mac completely, as I've seen routers with inbuilt modems which are much more expensive. So it must replace only the hub, right?
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Just a word of warning, Nintendo Wi-Fi via router only works with WEP encyption. WEP is extremely unsecure. There are downloadable hacking tools that can crack WEP in a matter of minutes. I won't run anything under WPA2 on my network so I ended up buying the USB dongle to plug in for my DS and Wii. It enables you to let the Nintendo devices on the network without forcing my entire network to use WEP.
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Yup...
That's the sort of thing that makes me feel a bit thick and that buying something Nintendo-branded that will (hopefully) 'just work' is a good idea!
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I got one of those last year for Christmas. I got it to work once. Don't remember what the issue was but the Nintendo tech. support basically just blew me off after they couldn't find out what was wrong. I guess it didn't really matter too much. There wasn't really anything on the Wii that needed the internet at the time. I still think it's kinda stupid Nintendo didn't just add a regular nic card in the Wii.
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Just a little clarification, the Wii will work under WPA. Probably not WPA2, now that I'm thinking about it.
I've had pretty decent experiences with the USB dongle from Nintendo, as it's the type of thing you'd only really plug in when you want to take the DS online. I'll echo everyone else's comments about WEP being pretty insecure, what's nice about the USB dongle is that it doesn't have the same signal strength of a normal router. Plus, in my experience, it's basically plug and play. If you're not really in the market for a Wi-Fi network and just want to log on with the DS easily, the Nintendo adapter is a good way to go.
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I wonder how easy it is to use the USB dongle to hack into someone's network... I highly doubt Nintendo suddenly implemented superior "security" into that thing.
This thread does not scale to my level.
I am currently running my Wii under WPA2, just to clarify. Don't have a DS so I'm not sure what the wireless situation is with that.
As for the USB adaptor - I had one and returned it before I got a wireless router. I had 2 main problem with it
1) It was an extra process running in the background of my computer, a huge no-no for me.
2) It hijacked my network, essentially disabling file sharing between me and my girlfriend's computers, which is a must.
For the average person, though, it should be fine.
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You guys are right, the Wii does support WPA and WPA2, but the DS is only WEP. I haven't used any Wi-Fi for either the Wii or DS in a long time though.
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If you're really all that paranoid about "hackers," can't you just lock the system down by MAC address?
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MAC address spoofing is not harder than WEP cracking.
This thread does not scale to my level.
... or you could just probably not worry so much about something that will most likely never happen (i.e. an "evil hacker" targeting your network).
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I should have dressed up as an evil hacker for Halloween.
Since I work from home sometimes and have sensitive data on my network, yes it is very important I keep my network secure.
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Something being unlikely to happen isn't close to the same as will never happen.
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I tried using one of those. It worked after a fashion. I already had a working wired router/firewall, so I didn't think I wanted to replace it with a wireless one when all I wanted to do was get our Wii talking to the internet, and possibly our DSes.
It had the benefit of presumably only connecting Nintendo things to your home network, and only when you had your Windows PC running, so it also seemed likely to be more secure than a full wireless router running 24/7.
But, in the end, it turned out to be a complete waste of my time and money. Thus I had to go and get a replacement wireless router so that our Wii could talk to the world.
The gizmo would only activate when the PC was on and someone (possibly only those with admin privilege) were logged into the PC. SInce we try to keep direct access to our PCs under password control (known only by parents) this wasn't a great fit. The killer, at least for me, turned out that it was impossible to have the gizmo (or even just its software) installed on the box and still use the IP encryption software our company requires to be able to access its network from the outside.
Now it very well could be that the latter is really the fault of the company-provided software (I cannot use it with the XP firewall running, either) but that's not something I have any control over, that is, beyond choosing to work for a different company, I suppose.
And, I imagine that someone who knows more about Windows could likely figure out was to do to get the gizmo to be actively doing its network stuff without anyone logged in. But it doesn't come with any such configuration setting in its software. I'm a UNIX guy, and the idea of requiring someone to be logged in just so that the system can do networking seems ridiculous to me.
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It doesn't take an evil hacker personally targeting a specific network. It only takes a car driving down the street running some hax0r kidd13 tool which scans every network it can find and autocracks the ones with weak encryption. Since I don't monitor the potential frequency or popularity of this practice, and NOT ALL vital information on my network is linked to an offsite backup, I prefer to stay on the safe side by not letting it happen at all. Sadly, the DS online connectivity is a casualty of that decision.
This thread does not scale to my level.