Currently have two Apple Airport Extremes for my primary Wifi home network. One upstairs, one downstairs. Share the same SSID and settings, so it's one giant area of coverage.

I want to set up a separate network for security stuff; wifi cameras and some other future goodies. I don't want any of that gear riding on my main network, but I would like to be able to see the cameras when I'm on my main home network and not have to switch SSIDs to see what is going on.

Certainly I'd need an additional access point, but do I have to do something with the new AP's subnet and anything additional to get this to work?

Worst case, I could just use the existing network for the job, but my preference is to keep the traffic separate as much as possible.

 

Do you want your security stuff on a different subnet or is just a seperate SSID for the wireless cameras on the same subnet good enough?

Adding a new access point on the same subnet with a different SSID is easy to accomplish. Adding another subnet is a little more complex.

 

Thinking more about this, I'm not sure... I want to isolate the data as much as possible. But I also want to me able to see the other SSID and the cameras without having to switch SSIDs. In my simple mind, adding a new AP would be easy, but I'm not sure how I'd be able to see what's about on, without switching over.

 

You would need a router that allows bridging. Not sure why you would want to do it.

 

Porn

 

Avoid network congestion.

 

Don't think it will matter too much.

 

Here is how you add add a second wifi router and use it as an access point without much headache.

Let's say your current router has ip address of 192.168.0.1

Plug in the second router directly into ethernet port of your pc/mac.

Log into the second router and give it a static ip address of something that you know is not in use on your network, perhaps 192.168.0.2. Set the subnet mask to what your network uses, probably 255.255.255.0. Set the gateway to 192.168.0.1 (or whatever address your first router is)

After you set the IP on the second router you will need to reconnect to it with the new IP. Now disable DHCP server on the second router.

Setup the SSID on the second router however you like.
Save config.

Now plug the LAN side of the second router into the LAN side of the first router. The WAN side of the second router will not be used.

Any device that signs into the new SSID will get an IP address from the DHCP server on router one. Everything on your network, wired/wifi1/wifi2 will be able to talk to each other.

 

OK, thanks.


Another thought is to cut through all this bullshit and try to pull cat5 and use PoE cameras. I need to consider my ability to fish the cable through the walls.

 

Doesn't that just basically turn the router into a switch w/ wifi?

And yeah PoE is highly recommended for security camera install

 

doopstr, won't that will still end up routing all of the traffic through router one? I'd split up the network all together, and just set up 2 subnets: 255.255.255.128 x2. That way keep all of the traffic separate, and make the IP's a little cleaner, and everything should still be able to talk to each other.

 

Yes but it effectively isolates his camera wifi traffic to the second access point unless he is viewing the cameras from his laptop on the other SSID. He would have the same issue even if he used a second subnet as he wants to keep his laptop on the first SSID.

I agree that it's better to get PoE cameras. The wifi cameras would need power run to them so might as well just run PoE instead.

 

I wanted one of the new Airport Extremes... Until I heard there is no DDNS support...

 

Ended up getting two of the Axis M10 cameras.

http://www.axis.com/products/m10_series/index.htm

M1034-W and the M1054.

I had to go wireless for one because of where it needs to mount (the ceiling) so there's no easy way to pull a Cat5 to it for PoE. The other is effectively identical, except it does PoE.

I am going to just let the camera ride on the existing network.

 

Well after a couple weeks, I determined I needed a dedicated AP for the cameras. One camera is throwing about 2 meg/sec (HD cameras) across the network and running on 2.4GHZ, it was clogging things up a bit. Noticed some lag and hiccups streaming video from my mac mini to other devices across the my main network.

So I ended up getting a new apple airport extreme and taking one of my two older APs and making it for the cameras. Same subnet, allowed my main network to take care of the DHCP. Once it hits the camera AP, it gets thrown onto the cat6 gigabit run down to my closet where my switches sit and my server.

This has greatly improved things. Sucks to have to invest in another AP, but long term it was the right move. Thanks to all for the help.

 

I'm doing this at home. I have a router set up as a repeater bridged to my main router. The repeater has a separate ssid but on the same network.

 

I kind of cruised through the thread, but would a VLAN accomplish what you're trying to do?

 

Apple's APs can't create VLANs.