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Firewall Routers

Brother Michael

Brother Michael

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Apr 14, 2004
717
0
Hey all,
Quick one here about Routers.

I have for some reason allowed myself to become well...stupid with routers. I bought one about 2 years ago and it worked. It was a basic NAT Router, but we never had any problems with it. Never let anyone through (my dad even had the network guys at his work bang on it trying to find holes.)

Well that router died in a lightening attack. sigh. Currently, I have a Linksys. And it works fine as well.

Ok here's where things get interesting. I went to Best Buy to play with cameras, and decided to look at the routers too. I wanted to get one with a 4port switch and a Wi-Fi.

In short, I was amazed at how many there were. I was overwhelmed. Ok, here's the one that hit hard for me though. There was one Router that stated specifically that it had a Firewall in it.

I thought they all did? Am I wrong? This really puts me a in state of worry right now, as my plan was to get a router for at school set it up in my dorm and have my PC and Mac behind it, with their respective firewalls off so that I could freely fileshare between them. This throws a small wrenge in my plans (not a large one, I can live with having software firewalls on as well). But now I am very confused about this router stuff.

Thanks
Mike
 
If you want a good flexible router, get a D-Link DI-624. I have one, and it is very easy to set up, has a good customisable firewall, and a whole bunch of other features.
 
Ok I will look into that one! I knew someone here would be able to help me!

Thank you!
Mike
 
All routers have NAT, but NAT is not the same as a Firewall.

With NAT (Network Address Translation), your router is the only device on your network with a public IP address. Your computers only have local IP addresses. Since your computers don't have public IP addresses, no one on the Internet can connect to them (how can you send a packet if no address?) They can connect to your router, but you can configure it to ignore connection requests or not.

Firewall is more than that. Firewall monitors traffic coming in for certain types of typical Internet attacks such - denial of service etc. and logs them or notifies you if you are under attack. Reverse firewalls can also stop progs on your computer connecting to the outside (such as viruses or spyware)

Just plain NAT is safe enough for everyday use.
 
So, can anyone here tell me if the Airport Extreme base station works as a router and has NAT? I’m confused with the things I read here and there, but I just want to know.
 
edesignuk said:
Yeah, AirPort has NAT, I think it assigns 10.*.*.* LAN addresses by default (I don't have an AirPort so I'm not sure exactly).
Click to expand...

What is with not using the old 192.168.*.* format?
 
I didn't say you were wrong edesignuk, I just asked why the AirPort units don't follow the normal numbering system for private networks.
 
Jalexster said:
I didn't say you were wrong edesignuk, I just asked why the AirPort units don't follow the normal numbering system for private networks.
Click to expand...
I know mate, I was just amazed that I was actually right about it :).
 
edesignuk said:
I know mate, I was just amazed that I was actually right about it :).
Click to expand...

Wow, thats a rare occasion. You got something correct.
Okay, that wasn't very funny.
 
If you want a good router, with a firewall that won't cost you any filesharing grief, check out the Linksys WRT54G. It goes for under $60 regularly in the Sunday ads at places like Compusa/Circuit City/BestBuy. It gets frequently updated firmware and mine has been rock solid.

I highly recommend it.
 
Celeron said:
If you want a good router, with a firewall that won't cost you any filesharing grief, check out the Linksys WRT54G. It goes for under $60 regularly in the Sunday ads at places like Compusa/Circuit City/BestBuy. It gets frequently updated firmware and mine has been rock solid.

I highly recommend it.
Click to expand...

I'd get a second one if you can afford it. It runs Linux, so it can be hacked to do some cool stuff.
 
Jalexster said:
I'd get a second one if you can afford it. It runs Linux, so it can be hacked to do some cool stuff.
Click to expand...

I saw that on Tech TV.

Actually, I was thinking about dropping some money on an Airport Express.

Reasoning, when I come home during breaks I have to drag a cord up the side of the stairs to my room where my toys are. Mom HATES this. So spending some money on Airport Express isnt a bad thing.

Now, besides cost/do I really need it? (I am not home THAT often) there is one other reason why I do not want an Airport. IF I go AE I have to get a Wireless card for my Dell. I don't mind this EXCEPT it will require me to fill up my last expansion slot. Problem (maybe), I have a PNY GeForce FX 5200 Video card, it has a little fan on it. Is that thing blowing warm air on another card (like a Soundblaster 5.1 card) a problem? Will that damage the Video card (too hot) or the whatever car is right after it?

Mike
 
If the card is a problem, why not go with a USB wireless adapter? They seem to work better than the PCI card versions on desktops, because you can move them around if you're getting interference from something. You can also quickly unplug it and attach it to someone else's computer if they need to get wireless access at your room quickly.
 
These are router/firewalls

http://www.netgear.com/products/routers/firewallvpn.php

http://www.netgear.com/products/routers/firewallvpn_comparisonchart.php?view=

which provide another layer beyond NAT, and also have some keyword/content filtering (may require a yearly subscription to keep the db updated).

At one time NAT was not marketed big time as a firewall, NAT was a NAT router and firewalls were much more than just NAT, until people realized the need for firewalls. Then anything with NAT all of a sudden became a firewall.
 
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