Wireless on desktop?

[TeaTimer]

Excuse me if this is the wrong section to post in but it was the closest I could find to the topic. I am a newbie to the personal computer so the reason for the naive question! I have a laptop currently working with a 2Wire wireless modem. We would like to also use a 2 year old desktop (with Linux) in another room. Is there any way to adapt the desktop so that it too could also use the same wireless signal? If not could the desktop use the signal via direct cable or similar? Thanks for this website.

[kendall.a]

You can have several computers connecting to a wireless router at the same time. Indeed, I have 3 computers plus 2 tablet PC's and a Roku all connected to my wireless internet; all at the same time.

[Ritho]

Originally Posted by TeaTimer

Excuse me if this is the wrong section to post in but it was the closest I could find to the topic. I am a newbie to the personal computer so the reason for the naive question! I have a laptop currently working with a 2Wire wireless modem. We would like to also use a 2 year old desktop (with Linux) in another room. Is there any way to adapt the desktop so that it too could also use the same wireless signal? If not could the desktop use the signal via direct cable or similar? Thanks for this website.

Yes your desktop can also use the signal as kendall said. A cable connection of course is the easiest to set up and generally gives the best performance, but wireless may be the most convenient. If your desktop does not already have a wireless card you will need to get one. There are internal cards that will fit into a PCI slot in your computers motherboard, but the easiest type to "install" is the type that just fit into a usb port.

There usb ones that are just a "dongle" i.e. they look like a usb memory stick/flash drive. Then there are ones that set on your desk and have a small cable that connects to usb at one end. These generally have larger antennas so they get a better signal than the stick style especially if your desk top is very far away from the wireless modem.

Since you are using linux on the desktop, most wireless cards manufactures
don't directly support linux with drivers. However, linux itself supports a large number of wireless cards, and there is even a tool available to install the windows drivers in linux. Still it would not hurt to do a search online to check linux compatibility of a wireless card before purchasing it.

Please feel free to ask any more questions you may have, or about problems you may encounter.