For the Computer / Network Savy

[galahad25]

Anytime.  Good luck!

[NightOwl]

Hey all I can say Galahad is THANKS!!!

I thought there had to be some sort of device to do this sort of thing but didn't know what it was or what to call it.  Presently my printer is also used direct through the router and I didn't think about the loss of bandwidth due to the constant communication with the drive.  This ought to really do the job for me.

Thanks again. Once I get things up and running I'll let you know how it goes.  I have to replace a 2 bill electric motor before I can do this though so it will take a bit to get things lined out,  but now that I know what it takes I can budget for it.

Sincerley, NightOwl

[galahad25]

I haven't ordered anything from them before.  One last note though.  I would suggest using a network usb hub instead of the connector.  The connector works, but you would have to install some software on to the external drive and anytime the drive would be accessed it would have to have router reset.  Something that might work a little better for you is:
http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=Network+USB+Hub&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&cid=2487643285390403650&ei=6DObS7D1KpL8M_7kteYN&sa=X&oi=product_catalog_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CC4Q8wIwAg#ps-sellers
This will let you network the external drive, any printers you want to network, and other server applications.  This will take some load off of your router and free up bandwidth for you internet connection.

[NightOwl]

Wow:

Thanks Galahad, I really appreciate your finding it for me. 

Have you used Bixnet before?

Sincerely, NightOwl

[galahad25]

OK so I did some research and an ethernet to usb converter should work for this.  Here's a link:
http://www.bixnet.com/usb20torj10f.html
So you plug the usb in to the hard drive and connect an ethernet cable from the router to the converter cable.

[galahad25]

Sorry, I just saw you are using XP.  If your router only has network cat connections then you should go with something that allows connection with a network card.  Like:
http://www.buffalotech.com/products/network-storage/linkstation/linkstation-live-ls-chl/
otherwise you would need to get a stand alone modem (DSL or the like) that will take the network input and has a high speed usb or usb output for connecting to the external hard drive.

[galahad25]

I'm not sure if I've heard of this kind of setup where there is a shared drive connected directly to a router.  I would think there would be some type of controller between the router and drive itself.  What OS are you running?

[NightOwl]

Hi:

My thought behind making it a wireless net work drive was that I wouldn't have to lug the drive or computers around the house to do back ups. I know the hardwire is usually more secure than encrypted wireless unless tempest is an issue but  I really don't have anything that requires that level of  electronic security.  I didn't think about dropped packets during the process being an issue.  Doesn't the parity checking during the read / write  process provent data loss from this?

Sincerley, NightOwl

[sjng]

You want to add a TeraByte drive to your Router? If that is what you mean, I don't follow you. Anyway, most external drives have software that can be installed on each PC. I would install that software and on a monthly basis, I would move the external drive form PC to PC and make backups. USB will be faster, more secure and will not have any dropped packets of data that might occur if done wirelessly.

[NightOwl]

OK Folks:

For you that are more computer savy than I am:

I am wanting to add a shared  TB class drive to my router so that I can do full image backups from all of my home's computers.  I will probably do this using Acrontis on the Windows Xp Pro Service pack 3 Platform.  The problem is that most of these drives including iosafe which I like at the moment, all use USB 2.0 format and my wireless router uses either cat 5  hard wire or wireless.   Do any of you have a solutions that will allow this to be a true shared drive off the router.

Sincerely, NightOwl