OT: Standalone, network access, wifi hard disk?

[Lobster]

Totally OT but:

I was recently working 'backstage' at a large-ish conference overseas, where I was coordinating and finalising the speaker's presentations. There was a small team of people with laptops who (despite all efforts to obtain the files in advance!) had to accept last-minute powerpoint files from speakers clutching USB memory sticks, variously edit these, get them approved by the speakers and other bigwigs, and ultimately assemble them all on the 'show' laptop attached to the projector.

As you can imagine this was a pretty fraught process (the above is very much the potted version!), not least with 'version control' of the presentations. While in the throes of all this it occurred to me that the obvious way forward was to network all the laptops and have one central filestore accessible by all. I know that could be achieved by a small NAS drive and a wireless router; but I was just wondering whether there were any such drives available which effectively had the router part built in? This would make life easier as there would be less stuff to carry in cabin baggage, and in the absence of IT support staff an out-of-the-box solution would be best I feel.

Anyone know of anything like this, or any better ideas I hadn't thought of?

Thanks David

[Andy Burns]

There are plenty of them popping up now

[David WE Roberts]

You should be able to configure a laptop as a WiFi hub instead of a client, and share part of the hard drive. For that matter, with a WiFi router once you are all on the network as clients you could share files over the network. Both solutions would be cheaper than a dedicated hard drive. However the dedicated hard drive might make people feel more secure.

[John Rumm]

You have a few options...

As one said - configuring a laptop for the purpose is one option. A standalone NAS box is another. Most don't have WiFi - although some do. (Apple do one with storage and 802.11n IIRC). However a standalone WAP plugged into a NAS will do the trick - and they are cheap and small.

Another option to consider would be to use a router that also has a storage capability. For example some of the Draytek vigors have a USB port that will let you plug in an external hard drive or memory stick. Some also support 3G internet access (although often by using the USB port for a 3G dongle - not sure it they cope with a hub on the USB port). The latter might be attractive in a situation such as you describe, since you would be making available centralised storage and internet access.