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Setting Up an Ad Hoc Wireless Network

Ad Hoc means for a special purpose, or applying to a specific thing or situation. In Latin, the phrase simply means ‘for this’. From the definition, you could probably deduce that an ‘ad hoc’ network is one that is slapped together for a one-time use, and you would be right. Ad hoc networks are used for conferences, trade shows, military maneuvers, sales presentations, multi-player games, and in other temporary situations to enable sharing of files, printers and Internet access.

The simplest way to create an ad hoc network is with laptops equipped for 802.11 wireless transmission. You can very quickly put together a wireless peer-to-peer network with minimal configuration. No hubs, no routers, no cables, no worries. The Hakuna Matata of networking!

Although it complicates the setup just a little, in many cases it’s convenient to have one computer, called the host that is wired into a LAN to give the ad hoc network access to the LAN’s resources. This host computer must be equipped with an 802.11A, B or G wireless PCI card (see our earlier tech tip on the different types of 802.11). Many cards come with some type of proprietary software for configuring ad hoc networks, but for this tech tip we will discuss XP’s built-in configuration settings, which will work just fine in most if not all situations. However, the proper driver must still be used for that specific card.

Once the driver for the 802.11 card is installed, make sure ICS (Internet Connection Sharing) is enabled. To do this, find the icon in the system tray for Local Area Networks and right-click it. Choose Network Connections and click the local area network connection you want to share. On the left side of the screen under Network Tasks, click ‘Change settings of this connection.’ On the Advanced tab under Internet Connection Sharing, check the box to ‘Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s Internet connection.’ There is also a check box to allow other users to enable or disable the Internet connection, if you are so inclined. If your network doesn’t need Internet access, you can ignore this paragraph altogether.

The Host system also needs to be configured with an Ad Hoc Network Connection and a Service Set identifier (SSID). Right-click on the Wireless Networks icon in the system tray and choose ‘View Wireless Networks.’ Do NOT connect yet to any wireless network that might show up in the box. Click the Advanced button. This will bring up the Wireless Connection Properties window, with the Wireless Networks tab in front. Click the Advanced button at the lower right of this tab. Select the radio button ‘Computer-to-computer (ad hoc) networks only’. Make sure the box labeled ‘Automatic connect to non-preferred networks’ is NOT checked. Click the Close button (once) to return to the Wireless Network tab. Under Preferred Network, click on Add

You will now need to put in an SSID for this machine, which is basically the name it will use to announce itself to other members of the wireless ad hoc network. In a burst of imagination, we called ours ‘Host’. Feel free to use it in your own ad hoc network. Network Authentication should now be Open, and Data Encryption can be either Disabled or WEP. In order to keep this tech tip reasonably short we will choose Disabled, but we have discussed WEP configuration in previous tech tips and we strongly recommend WEP encryption in any wireless networks you set up, ad hoc or otherwise. Click OK when done.

In the Preferred Network box there will appear a red X, labeled Host. Close this window for now. In a few seconds a dialog box will pop up notifying you that a new wireless network connection has been detected. Windows XP is simply detecting itself with its new wireless configuration. Right-click on the wireless network connection icon and select ‘View available networks’. You will notice there is now a new connection available, called Host. Close the box. As a last step in configuring this host system, make sure to share any resources (printers, files/folders etc.) that you would like to make available to the other ad hoc members.

Now, to configure the client systems that will connect to the host. Each of those must also have a wireless 802.11 card and the appropriate driver installed. The card will be a PCMCIA card in the laptops and a PCI card in any desktop systems, unless the computer comes with wireless capability built in. Next, locate the Wireless Networks icon in the system tray. Right-click it and select ‘View Available Wireless Networks.’ Choose the detected Host system and click the Advanced button. Then click the Advanced button on the Wireless Networks tab and select the same ad hoc configuration as the host computer. Close this window and click OK.

Right-click again on the Wireless Networks icon. Select the Host SSID, and check the box that says ‘Allow me to connect to the selected wireless network, even though it is not secure.’ Click on the Connect button. A confirmation prompt will pop up to tell you that you have established a peer-to-peer connection. Repeat the process for each of the other client systems. A quick look at My Network Places will confirm that all the systems are visible to each other, and you are good to go. Even though it only took a few minutes to create the network, it’s all you need to go web browsing, map drives from one system to another, and share files and folders, CD-ROMs, printers and other resources

By the way, since RemoteScope doesn’t need a server, you can use it on an ad hoc network like this, which opens up all kinds of additional possibilities. Enough perhaps for a whole other tech tip.

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