GOING ON DSL STANDALONE ON MY LAPTOP T61 Can I Do It..

[Ladywiz]

Up to now, I've been on an old desktop or a T61 Lenovo ThinkPad. I'm moving to my own apt. and will be losing my piggyback WiFi connection. I thought I'd like to go it alone on DSL Stand Alone.

Will I be able to do it. Don't know much about these things as you can tell. Does my T61 have the software or hardware already installed or whatever so I can have a DSL Stand alone running?

Is it better to set up a WIFI connection. No one else is going to be using the laptop and will be living alone.

Any thoughts will be appreciated.

[rkawakami]

Stand alone DSL is a broadband connection to the internet using a telephone line but without the capability of making or receiving regular phone calls. DSL connection speed ranges from around a few hundred Kbps (kilobits per second) to a couple of Mbps. Speed depends upon your distance to the nearest phone company office and how much you are willing to pay per month. When the line is provisioned, what you should get from the phone company, or you might be able to obtain yourself, is what is normally called a DSL modem. The phone line connects to this equipment and then your network connection to your laptop is either via ethernet or wireless (WiFi). If you continue to use a WiFi connection with your T61, then all you will need to do is configure the DSL modem's wireless settings with an SSID of your selection and an encryption key and enter the same information in your laptop's wireless card utility. I would suggest using some sort of encryption as this will prevent your neighbors from "piggybacking" on your system like you were doing before. You can also use an ethernet cable between your laptop and the modem and your operating system, in almost all cases, should automatically configure your connection. Since you've used WiFi in the past there's nothing extra you need hardware or software-wise for the T61; maybe just a little digging into the wireless settings.

[ajkula66]

In addition to Ray's well-presented post...

Most of FL is serviced by Frontier Communications, and the DSL modem that they provide will be inclusive of wireless router, a 2-in-1 device.

The technician who installs your service can configure it any way you want, they'll likely ask you how you want it set up.

[axur-delmeria]

These days many DSL modems issued by telephone companies/ISPs have a built-in wifi router.

In any case, having a LAN connection to DSL modem should work without issues: before we got wifi, we had a Pentium 3 desktop connected to the DSL modem that way.