EVER SETUP A WIFI ROUTER?
January 27th 2010 00:55
Wifi internet router
To the real techy guys, the idea of setting up a WiFi internet router is like breathing. You know, an effortless function that requires nothing, or it could be just like walking (without thinking where to go) just putting one foot after the other.
Unfortunately, the same is not true with ordinary guys. To many, the internet is still a mystery. The concept of millions of inter-connected computers all over the world, sharing information, has just not yet really sank into their heads. It took quite a while to sink in mine.
Oh, of course, they are already using computers for research but only pretty much like the way they are using hard bound encyclopedias. They know the information is there, but that’s just about it.
It is just like the way many computer and internet users… are only users. They have no idea how those things ever get to work, but they are working. So, you don’t expect them to figure out what goes wrong with a computer or the internet when something goes wrong. And neither should you expect them to install such complex sounding mechanisms as internet routers!
I was one such guy. No, not really. I had a bit of an idea how the internet works (an idea about a trillionth size of a flea). At least, that idea enabled me to think that the internet is composed of those millions and millions of computers connected to each other with mountains of endless jumbled analog and fiber optic lines.
Uh…don’t ask me how they got connected please!
Well, I managed to get my computer connected to a printer a while back and made it work, but I haven’t tried connecting two computers with a wire yet, much more make them talk to each other. Sure, there’s internet in the office. But we have technicians as well. And, somehow, they manage to make things work there like magic – and without using wands too!
Unfortunately, I live more than a hundred kilometers away from the office. It’s a subdivision in a foot of a mountain where landline based telephones and cable television had not yet reached. A service provider has just recently activated a Wimax in the area. I don’t know how he got there, but one day a sales rep of the service provider manifested in front of my door and sold me a subscription.
He was soon followed by Warlocks who climbed to the roof of my house attached something and activated my internet subscription. They rather vehemently refused to install a WiFi router in the house since they said I’m only good for one internet connection. Meaning, my internet activities should be confined in a room where they dangled the internet wire. They made sure it works and then they left. No further discussions.
But I am using a laptop and I like moving around the house, so I went looking for a wireless router hoping the store where I’ll buy it will have its own technician to set it up in my house. I found a router, the store has a technician but his butt is glued to his seat. He doesn’t go anywhere setting up routers.
I was only told after they have taken my payment and closed the cash register!
Aghast, I asked the store clerk how in the world am I going to use the router?
Blank stares confronted me, from everyone in the store. Everyone! Then everyone smiled, including the clerk who asked: “sir, since you said you are going to use the internet yourself, I believe you can read?” When I answered on the affirmative, he turned the box of the router around and while pointing at it said “Please, just follow the instructions.”
I was unconvinced. I suspected I was being taken for a ride. There were only about five steps to take (including: 1.Opening the box, 2. Attaching the unit to a power supply) if I follow the instructions. It was too simple, it can’t be right! There was not even a word there on how to switch on the unit! Ha!!
But then, I had no choice. I went home with the unit. As it turned out step one of the instructions (opening the box) was the hardest part. I had to attach some wires, but somehow, I didn't find them as hard to do as opening the box.
I followed everything to the letter and it worked! Did you hear that? I was able to set up a wireless internet router, and it worked! I didn't even have to switch the thing on since there is no switch.
You just put them together accordingly, plug it (it switches on by itself) and you are ready to go!
What is the moral of this story?
Some of those techy stuffs are only complicated because that’s how we think they are. What I have just accomplished was just pretty simple. The instructions were pretty simple too. I just followed them.
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