Chapter 1 Introduction
ACR-201-G is an IEEE 802.11g compliant wireless Ethernet Bridge Station, with
a 100/10 -BaseT interface.
What separates the ACR-201-G from many other 802.11g-compliant radios is
that its 100/10-BaseT interface affords a true plug-and-play feature. This is
unavailable from other 802.11g Station radios that are based on either a
PCMCIA or a USB interface. They require the installation of a driver on the host
device. The ACR-201-G driver-free feature also means that the operation of the
radio is OS (operating system) independent.
The driver-free feature enables wireless connectivity for any computing
devices/systems with any OS (operating system), as long as the device has an
Ethernet communication port available. Ethernet-equipped workstations in a
corporate environment, for example, benefit greatly from this driver-less feature
because the IT workforce has one less driver to worry when upgrading an OS or
when salvaging an OS crash. Special computing/networking devices, such as
printer servers, POS (point of sales) machines may not even have an easy way
of installing a driver for a radio. In addition to supporting the connection of a
single computer or device to an 802.11g Access Point in a pure 802.11g Station
role, ACR-201-G also supports the IP-Bridging Mode, where multiple computers
can share the wireless access to an 802.11g AP through a single ACR-201-G
Station radio.
A built-in Web-based Utility program is provided for the users to configure ACR-
201-G. This Utility program can also be used to monitor the communication
condition when the radio is in operation. Once configured, the radio runs self-
sufficiently without the aid of any driver program in the device connected to the
radio. This Web-based Utility program therefore is intended to be, in most cases,
just a tool for the network operators. An end user simply plugs the pre-configured
radio into any device equipped with a RJ-45 receptacle without ever being
exposed to this Utility program. The details are described in chapter 3.
ACR-201-G supports the WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) -TKIP (Temporal Key
Integrity Protocol) and WPA-PSK (Pre-shared Key) security protocol in addition
to the standard 64 and 128-bit WEP encryption to provide the highest degree of
security to your wireless network.
ACR-201-G has a compact form-factor that blends easily into a home/office
environment. It also lends particularly well to portable applications. The
specifications are given on the next page.
ACR-201-G Technical Manual
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