Atmel Wireless LAN Access Point, User Manual

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2. Wireless LAN basics
Wireless LAN network defined by IEEE 802.11b standard committee could be
configured as:
•
Ad Hoc wireless LAN, or
•
Infrastructure wireless LAN.
Ad Hoc network is a group of notebooks with wireless LAN PC card called a
BSS (Basic Service Set). These notebooks use their wireless LAN PC cards to
communicate with each other, and notebooks cannot connect to the
Internet .
Figure 2-1 Ad Hoc wireless network
The most obvious differentiation between Infrastructure wireless network and
Ad Hoc wireless network is that the notebooks in Infrastructure wireless network
can make use of the resource in the Internet through Access Point .
STA 3
STA 1
STA 2
Access Point
Internet
Figure 2-2 Infrastructure wireless network
To set up your notebook’s network as the type of “ Ad Hoc ” or “ Infrastructure ”
wireless network depends completely on your requirement. Generally, if your network
environment has an
Access Point , we recommend that you set it as “ Infrastructure ”
to connect to the Internet .
STA 1
STA 2
STA 3