lareki4567

Hi everyone, I've been playing online a bit more seriously lately (mostly mid-stakes MTTs), and after reading some horror stories about compromised home networks, I'm starting to get a bit paranoid about security. Right now, my dedicated grind station is just plugged into the same standard router as the rest of the household gadgets—kids' iPads, smart TV, IoT lights, etc. I know this is bad practice because if one of those insecure devices gets hacked, my poker PC is potentially exposed. I want to completely isolate my poker machine from the rest of the LAN. I've read about using VLANs, but my router is just a standard ISP box that doesn't support them, and honestly, setting up a managed switch feels a bit above my pay grade right now. A friend suggested "air-gapping" the connection using fiber optics. The idea would be to run a fiber cable from the router area to my office and use a media converter external box at each end to convert the ethernet signal to light and back. He says this adds a layer of electrical isolation and makes it harder for sniffing tools to intercept traffic compared to copper, although I'm not sure if that's actually true for network security or just for electrical surges. Has anyone here gone to the trouble of physically isolating their grinding setup? Is buying a separate 4G/5G mobile router a safer bet than trying to secure the home line? I'm trying to find a balance between being secure and not turning my apartment into a server room. I'd love to hear how you guys handle network segregation for your poker setups. Thanks!