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2. ADSL Wireless Router Security - ZyXEL (Newtel).

1. Netgear D834G Router
2. ZyXEL 600 Series (Newtel)
3. Speedtouch 586 (Cable & Wireless)   
4. 3 Com Routers

Connecting to Wireless Network from a Laptop

Introduction

The very first thing you should do after installing a Router is change the default password. Without doing this everything else becomes a waste of time because all makes of router have a default username and password pre-installed and these are very widely known. For eg the username for most netgear routers out of the box is “admin” and the password is “password”, it's that simple. Buffalo, Linksys etc have similar setups see this site for a complete list of all default router user/passwords.

http://www.phenoelit.de/dpl/dpl.html

Anybody with access to your machine can log into the router and set it up to allow remote access in minutes, from there your network is an open book.

There are two types of Wireless Encryption, WEP (Wireless Equivalent Privacy) and WPA-PSK (Wi-Fi Protected Access Pre Shared Key). WEP is easy to break remotely and is not secure, it's just a straight password. WPA is a lot more sophisticated and should be used if at all possible.

How to Set up Secure Wireless using WPA Encryption

2. ZyXEL 600 Series (Newtel) Routers

Newtel ZyXEL Routers Information

With apologies to Newtel but as an independant advisor I have to tell it like it is.

I have struggled with this particular router, it is not very reliable and has lots of issues. In all honesty I have to advise buying a Netgear D834Gv3, or a 3Com, or a Lynksys Router and just keeping the ZyXEL as a spare.

Having said that the ZyXEL is perfectly good for a straightforward internet connection but anything beyond that causes all sorts of problems. I am sure Newtel will address these issues as sooon as they can. The following setup works, it is the maximum security I can get to work reliably most of the time, but if you have trouble the only thing to do is look on the back of the router for a small hole, stick a ballpoint pen in it to depress the reset switch and hold for about 4 seconds till it starts flashing lights. This resets it to factory settings and you have to start from scratch again.

1. First get to your Router's set up screen, via a web browser, enter your router address ie 192.168.1.1 then when it appears the first thing you will see is a prompt and advice to change the default password, change it to something about 10 characters numbers and letters all lower case. Hit the OK button after doing this and it will take you to the screen below. The default password is 1234 if you are interested, lots of hackers are so change it. If you cannot log into the router setup screens try turning off any firewall you have running first, just remember to re-enable it when you have finished the setup.

If its a new out of the box router go through the basic Setup Wizard to set up into your internet connection, just follow the wizard - click on (Wizard Setup - Connection Setup) and work throught the wizard supply your login and password (the one provided by Newtel for the account). This is all you need to add, the rest should be automatic. If its already on line and in use click on Wireless LAN >>>

2. Then click on Wireless as below >>>.

3. This will bring up the following screen, You can change the ESSID name to something other than ZyXEL if you wish this is a good idea both to identify the router yourself and to prevent giving its type away to outsiders. You can also change the channel setting to something else to avoid interference from nearby routers on a similar channel. Otherwise the screen should be exactly as it is shown.

4. Next click the "Back" button on your browser to get back to the previous screen as shown, this time click on 802.1xWPA.

5. This brings up the following screen, you set up the WPA passphrase here as follows. Click on the drop down box and select "Authentication Required".

6. Then scroll down a bit and in the Key Management Protocol Drop Down select "WPA-PSK" as shown.

NB - WPA-PSK2 is stronger and harder to break but it can cause trouble with this particular router so I would use ordinary WPA-PSK or buy a better router.

7. Next put a passphrase in the Pre-Shared Key box and click on "Apply"

The phrase is not the actual password, it is used to generate a key, the longer the phrase the stronger the key. Use lower case letters and numbers only, no spaces this will prevent some problems with connecting wireless devices later. This is not best practise but it is good enough for home security and it is best not to get too clever with the ZyXEL router it is a little flakey.

OK thats the router setup done, shut down the browser and reboot the router by turning the power off and counting 10 then switch on again and wait for it to log into the internet and the wireless indicator to light up. Then you need to set up your Laptop or other PC to connect via the secured wireless connection you have just configured. Click the link below to do this.

Connecting to Wireless Network