need dedicated wireless hub - considering Raspberry Pi - advice please
 

I was very close to buying a raspberry pi to use as a dedicated wifi hub for my home. There is a lot of information on the web about doing just that. After reading several tutorials and the comment threads I begin to wonder if I can get a reliable stable hub.

Right now I have a usb dongle on my desktop computer running ubuntu/arch linux. I have a reliable very fast by my standard 4g connection.

I realize that I could turn the desktop into a hub but I do some intense video work and occasional program compiling on the desktop. I would not want the desktop to interrupt the hub or vice versa.

My reasons for considering raspberry pi:

1. low power
2. compact size
3. little or no interruptions from a working desktop
4. I'd like to build a raspberry pi htpc eventually and this would be good practice.

My concerns about the raspberry pi hub:

1. internet comments lead my to believe people are having problems both getting it to work and keeping it working (my research has been exclusively about rasbian)

My question is whether the raspberry pi project is feasible and if not what alternatives exist that meet my original criteria.

Thanks a lot for any help.

Pi is OK, I run Agocontrol on mine and it has never crashed on me.

Building wireless access point is another story. I'd be concerned about quality and capabilities of wireless dongle. As a matter of fact, I'd get Ubiquiti AP instead. Like this one.

has been done
 

I stumbled on a web page written in portuguese. Someone has already done the rasberry pi hotspot with two dongles as I wanted it.

After reading it, I realized that I already knew how to get the 4g dongle working in Linux with wvdial. I also know how to ssh or vpn into the pi from my desktop.

The rest is command line network setup on the pi that I can find help with on the net.

Looking at the available dongles on Amazon and Newegg it looks like I've got about an 80% chance of getting a good dongle. Or a 20% chance of failure. This is typical of all hardware now. Corporate malfeasance and outsourced manufacturing pretty much guarantees that.

If anybody is interested I'd be glad to write a more detailed procedure with web links once I get mine working.

Seems for the money and time you could get a dedicated hardware device. If you just want to play then that is a different story and makes it well worth it.

All I have is usb dongle that connects to 4g using ppp. I currently use wvdial to connect. If there is a hardware device that can connect via ppp I'd be very interested in it.

If I could walk over to a box and push a button and have it connect I'd be very happy.

I just don't know of one and google isn't helping.

I figure $60 for the raspberry so that price or less for a device that worked would be a buy.

I use an Asus router. Seems to work on my T-mobile 4G lte hotspot. I've also used a 3G that I borrowed. Forge the brand. Netzero uses them.

If your connection at present is over 4G mobile, wouldn't you be better buying a MiFi device? :scratch:

Looking at Verizon, you could pick one up for $50.00 or so, no doubt other mobile networks have similar products.

Play Bonny!

:hattip: