Tests of Wi-Fi equipment by Hawking Technology

Hawking Technologies offers a complete line of solutions required for networks at home and small business: from switches, hubs and routers, up to modems, print servers and web cameras.

Hawking do their best to provide users with reliable and modern network solutions, as well as provide high standards of client service and support. To provide maximum customer satisfaction and assert its market standing, Hawking gives highest priority to functionality, ease of use, reliability, and support. The latest developments of the company are aimed at use of the latest networking technologies such as Gigabit Ethernet, ATM, and fiber optics.

In this material, we are reviewing a few wireless network devices 802.11g separately, as well as estimating the worth of the kit both at functionality and the operational speed.

Note that security settings of this equipment allow using various standards and protocols which may put even sophisticated users at a loss, let alone the beginner. Today, it is no longer topical to talk about WEP since its protection has been successfully broken and you can find a lot of materials on that. Therefore, if you wish to secure your network, then you'd better give up WEP in favor of more reliable standards, e.g. WPA. By the way, there are two WPA modes: WPA Enterprise, and WPA-PSK. While the former was developed specially for use in the environment of large organizations and requires using a certificates server and a RADIUS server for user authentication, then WPA-PSK was developed for home users as well as for users at small organizations where there no authentication servers. In case of using the latter, the user has to specify the password to connect to the access point or a router. In case of WPA Enterprise, all that is done automatically. The below reviewed equipment supports two protocols - TLS and PEAP. A certificate issued by the certificate server is required for their operation. In the case of PEAP, the user name and password should also be specified. One of several standards can be used for encryption. Today, the AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) is regarded as the most reliable - to realize it, there is used a special chip which provides reliable data encryption and authentication and is the most efficient in terms of using hardware and software as compared to the previous standards. Note that AES is included in IEEE 802.11i. TKIP is its predecessor and was released as a temporary patch on top of WEP.

HWR54G Router

Hawking suggests using the wireless router HWR54G as the central device of a small network. By the way, a router of such class is rather convenient for use in small office networks to connect computers both via the hardwire and wireless network and granting them access to Internet. In implementing such a scenario, the network will be protected against intruders with the integrated firewall.

As regards the router's package bundle, all is standard here, there is all it takes to get started with the device: a power supply unit, the router itself, Ethernet cable, detachable antenna, installation and setup guide, a documentation CD, as well as a pack of screws in case you decide to fit the router on a wall.

The exterior of the router is quite typical for such devices - a small silvery-grey box about the same size as a 3.5" HDD. All the indicators are positioned on the front side of the router's upper part: Power, Internet (connection and activity of the external channel), WLAN, and four activity indicators of the LAN ports.

The rear panel of the router is taken by various connectors. There is a power connector, four LAN ports, a WAN port, a button to reset settings (hidden deep in the housing), as well as a RP-SMA connector to plug in an antenna.

On the bottom side, there are four rubber feet under which there are screws fastening the housing panels, two eyes for wall mounting (only in one direction - with the ports upside and the antenna), and stickers with the serial number and device specifications.

Router board

Set-up and administration

The router is set up only via the Web-interface using the http protocol, and no interfaces other than e.g. telnet are provided. By default, 192.168.1.254 is set as the address of the Web-interface, and to get access to it the computer should be within the network, that is, in the range within 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.253, mask 255.255.255.0. Note that the router has an integrated DHCP server, so if IP parameters on your computer are detected automatically, it suffices to refresh them through typing ipconfig /renew in the command line and then move on to the set-up procedure. The interface is made convenient enough and predictable.

To simplify the set-up, the user is suggested to use a wizard that offers to sequentially set parameters needed to get started.

After launching the wizard there appears a welcome window suggesting to start the step-wise setup. Press Next to select the type of connection for the external interface, then enter the settings appropriate for the selected type. At the final stage the wizard suggests that you should check the operability of connection.

To set up the LAN side, press the "LAN" button in the main interface window. Then the wizard suggests that you should specify the IP address of the router's local interface as well as enable the integrated DHCP server, and set the range of IP addresses.

Changing the password is also done via the interface - it's better if you set a reliable password prior to use.

To view the basic system settings, you don't have to go deep into the interface - just press the status button to get the info on parameters and the firmware version.

All the remaining settings are hidden in the Advanced section.

The router provides access control, so you can specify the list of services which will be blocked. Also, it's possible to specify a group of users for which these rules will apply and the schedule for such restriction. The list of predefined services is long enough - nevertheless, you can edit it.

The router supports dynamic DNS, that is, allows publishing your servers in the Internet without having a permanent IP-address. DDNS supports operation with the two services: DynDNS.org and TZO.com.

The router is also good enough in terms of support for specific applications - e.g. setting up operation of such applications like IP-telephony, various games, bringing the computer into the DMZ, or simply creating a filter of addresses - all that is a task that any user can easily cope with.

If a server (e.g., Web or FTP) accessible from outside is intended for use within the network, it can be set up in the next section.

It is not always convenient to use the setup wizard. Manufacturers have always been well aware of that and afforded the opportunity to change settings defined in using the WAN interface setup wizard. There is a separate section for that. There is nothing special in the settings - all that can be changed is seen on the screenshot.

Besides, the router allows setting up a few more parameters: logging, routings, the computer from which administration is possible, and computers that can be connected to the router. As regards the setup, having once tuned the parameters, you don't have to worry about repeated setup after reset since the configuration can always be saved and restored, if necessary.

USB adapter HWU54G

The second device of those that arrived at our test lab is a wireless adapter for the USB interface. Note that apart from the function of a regular adapter, it can be used as an access point. Certainly, its functionality will not be as abundant as in the above reviewed router. Nevertheless, it will let build a wireless network in the "field" conditions without using a dedicated access point.

The USB "trinket" is shipped in a stylish package in which you can find the printed version of the quick setup guide, a CD with drivers, software and documentation, as well as a USB extender for convenience of connection to the PC.

Externally, the adapter looks like a traditional flash storage device as small as cigarette lighter. On the upper part, there is a logo, the model name and the only indicator to display connection/activity. Note that the adapter can be carried around both tied to a string and with keys, that is, used as a trinket. For that, there is a hole in the cap, and you don't have to worry about the loss of the trinket because they are fastened strongly enough, at least, originally.

As regards the interior arrangement of the adapter, all is made in a compact and nice way. It's not at all easy to open it up neatly - the halves of the housing are linked with latches which can be broken if overly effort is applied. Inside, there is merely a miniature board with the USB connector firmly attached on it. The adapter is made on the base of the ZyDAS chipset which is in charge of the wireless network.

Configuration

To set up the device, it is suggested to us a special utility which can be found on the bundled CD.

The utility allows selecting the module's operation mode - an adapter or an access point, as well as set up all the necessary parameters. Besides, it affords the opportunity to view the list of available networks, as well as the signal level and the quality of communication.

To protect data, WEP and WPA standards using various methods of encryption and authentication are allowed. In using the former, you can choose the key length to be 64, 128, or 256 bit, and define up to four keys both in the hexadecimal and ASCII formats. If WPA is selected, PEAP or TLS protocols can be used (the certificate and the login/password pair should be used), or the WPA-PSK when the access password common for the whole password has to be entered. Note that the relatively new decryption-resistant AES protocol can be used for encryption.

In the "access point" mode, the selection of settings is not that wide. For example, the WPA is not supported - the maximum what can be enabled is the WEP of 256 bit key length, and of security tools the MAC filtration is used - you can create a list of allowed or banned addresses. Parameters traditional for the access point are also defined: the SSID (which can be hidden), the frequency channel, operation speed, power-saving and some other parameters.

HWP54G PCI-adapter

The PCI adapter is the third device of the kit that arrived to us for tests. There is nothing special on the outside but for the external antenna with a one meter cable. As regards the functionality, all is quite traditional and nothing special: traditional support for security - WEP, WPA; the only thing noteworthy is the support for AES encryption standard. All the wiring is made on a single board, the Ralink RT2560F is used as the wireless controller and runs jointly with the RT2525L transceiver hidden under the protective housing. Therefore, controllers of different manufacturers are used in all the three devices.

The adapter's package bundle is rather moderate - the adapter itself, an antenna thereto, a brief printed version of the installation & setup guide, as well as a CD with documentation, drivers and a utility. The utility is different from that used to set up the USB adapter but offers similar functionality. For faster switching between wireless networks, a number of profiles can be created and each profile can contain the required settings.

The Link tab displays the info on network connection status, including the quality of connection and the signal level.

The integrated search utility is convenient enough, it displays not only the channel and the signal level, but the type of encryption and authentication.

On the next to last tab you can select the adapter's operation mode (B or G) as well as enable/disable the protection mode and set the transmission rate.

Finally, the last tab displays the summary information on the utility and the driver.

Tests

For tests, we used the following hardware: a computer on the base of AMD Athlon 64 2800+ with 1 GB RAM and integrated Gigabit LAN controller on the Marvell chipset (here, wireless adapters are installed) powered by Windows XP Professional SP2; a dual-processor computer on the base of Intel Xeon 2800 with 2 GB RAM and integrated Gigabit LAN controller on the base of Intel chipset (was used as an Ethernet finite point) powered by Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition. To test the USB adapter for operation range, we used a notebook PC based on Intel Pentium M 1500 with 512 MB RAM, powered by Windows XP Professional SP2. To measure the speed, we used the NetIQ Chariot test system.

We ran a series of tests to measure the routing speed. The first two systems participated in these tests. For connection, we used Gigabit LAN controllers. To the LAN interface, we connected a computer based on the AMD processor, and Intel - to the external, respectively. For the inner interface, we assigned an address of the 192.168.5.õ template, for the external interface - 192.168.72.õ, with 255.255.255.0 as the mask. We assigned addresses from the respective networks to the computers as well. On both computers, we started finite points of the test system, and on one of the computers we started the Chariot test console.

As the tests showed, the speed under single stream amounted to 44.757 Mbit/s, and 45.959 Mbit/s with two streams. As regards the stability of the stream, it can't be regarded ideal but is anyway acceptable since the speed reduced for a short term to 1/3 of the average result. The maximum speed proved a bit higher than the average, and in both cases the difference was no more than 10%.

Somehow or other, the speed and stability demonstrated allow to assert that the routing performance will be enough for most scenarios of using the router. Considering that very few own the Internet channel as fast as 100 Mbit/s, whereas most users still have the access speed not exceeding 10 Mbit/s, so the router in most cases will cope with data streams. However, the recently wide-spread home-based networks running at 100 Mbit/s are able easily providing a channel that the router can't cope. So it might take longer to download another film or a disk image from the server in the neighboring house.

Speed of the wireless network

The first stage of test was about determining the running speed of various adapters at the same distance, as well as the effect of WPA on speed. The connection speed was selected automatically, the power saving was disabled. To run this series of tests, we connected one of the LAN ports (to exclude the effect of routing) of the router to our test server based on Intel processors, then second in the line were wireless network adapters, and conducted test metering. Note that the distance among computers - more precisely, between the router's antenna and the adapter's antenna - was about three meters. The data was transmitted from the router to the wireless client. When testing the bandwidth without encryption, the speed proved adequate enough for the 802.11g wireless equipment, however, with the WPA enabled the speed dropped substantially: by approximately 15% for the PCI adapter, and by about 30% for the USB adapter.

The second stage of testing the wireless network was about measuring the effect of distance on speed. Since only the USB adapter can be called mobile, only that device took part in this series of tests. Note that encryption was not used. In the series, there were three test measurements: at 3 meters away from the access point, without obstacles; at 10 meters away from the access point with the inner brick wall as obstacle; and 30 meters away from the access point + main brick wall in between.

As can be seen, the results of operation range tests proved rather middling. However, we should take into account the miniature size of the adapter itself where it is hard not only to fit the chips but to place the antenna. Therefore, with the miniature size of the adapter taken into account, the result is worth of praises.

Findings

Tests of the presented kit proved interesting enough, not only in terms of the produced results but also in terms of meeting this manufacturer, practically unknown in our country. The router showed dignified enough results for all the parameters, starting with the ease of administration, functionality, up to the performance. As regards the adapters, there is nothing unexpected either: the PCI version showed what it should and no more than that. The USB proved more interesting - apart from the functionality of the wireless network adapter, the model can act as an access point. But being an adapter, it supports the WPA standard, most topical today, and in the access-point mode it provides 256-bit WEP at best whose unreliability is already known to many not by hearsay. Summing up all the above, we can say that the equipment will be a good choice for home use, as well as for the network in a small office, that is, just what it is positioned for by the manufacturer.