I previously posted on my efforts to overcome poor signal strength on a PC in a back room of the house.
I had done a quick and dirty fix to improve things by installing a flat steel sheet to reflect the signal to the PCI antenna at the rear of the XT case. This took it from about 43% strength to 56%.
It seemed that a reflector antenna was the best option to get round this.
Anyway, after searching the net for an easy looking wifi reflector to build, I settled on the EZ-10 simple corner reflector. What could be simpler?
First I checked out what moving the original Belkin PCI arial to a better position achieved by connecting the arial to a cable, and got
44% - not a very big increase at all.I suppose cable loss negated most of my gains in lifting it away from behind the PC (1 metre cable only).
Anyway, I then made up a simple corner antenna based on the EZ-10 pattern. I made it from 1mm brass sheeting and mounted the antenna in a piece of 10 mm polycarbonate sheeting held on by a couple of small PK screws.
The result - an impressive improvement - now showing 82% signal strength.
Given the corner reflector is only 4.5" square on each wing, and dead easy to make, it certainly had a huge impact on the signal strength.
Im pretty chuffed on the outcome.
Anyone else who has bad reception problems like this should check out this super simple reflector antenna.
All up cost was $22 Aus for the cable and connectors.
Cheers
Rob