Making a wireless router secure

iwilldoitthistime

Hi there

I have a wireless router Ive been using for a while, but I havent yet made it secure with a password etc ( but not through want of trying!)

Ive read the information that comes with the router, but its not in very plain english, and I cant find any mention of security.

Can anyone give me a pointer as to what the part of the router is called that I need to access and set?

Sorry to appear so thick - but it has me stumped (so is probably really simple )

thanks!

emmaroids

what do you mean by secure?
it will have a built in firewall if thats what you mean.

Browntoa

what make/model is the router

iwilldoitthistime

theres no make on it - the disc just says 'wireless lan broadband router IEEE 802.11b' if that means anything?

I basically want to make it secure so that other people cant connect to my network?

thanks!

albertross_2

start, search, cmd

ipconfig

note the gateway address, and put it into IE

e.g. http://192.168.0.1 or http://192.168.1.1 http://192.168.2.1

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=2471408&postcount=37

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=2471410&postcount=38

iwilldoitthistime

aargh - youve lost me already!

Im using vista - does this make any difference/ What is IE?

Sorry to appear so thick!

ianian99

basically you can make it MORE secure but not totally secure

albertross_2

internet explorer.

To make it secure, you have to give it an encryption key, and then tell your vista PC what it is to connect.

You normally have to do this with a wired ethernet connection.

Is it a cheapy/old router?

iwilldoitthistime

The router is about a year old - and was bought by my nephew who is a computer wiz, so i dont think it would be a crappy one??

albertross_2

If it is only a 802.1b, it's quite crappy/old. That's the old 11mb/s standard, not 54G (54Mb/s) which is the norm.

iwilldoitthistime

I believe you - but it seems to work okay, so is it worth changing it?

I put the gateway into explorer which takes me to the setup - I assume I need the advanced part? When I select this, I get options
System
WAN
LAN
WLAN
NAT
Firewall

I guess I need to pick System?