I have tried to find ways to boost the signal, but to be completely honest, my Linksys works great from a first floor in the house to an apartment above the garage with no issues.
Might be something in the floor causing the degradation in signal. Make sure your wireless cards are linksys, I have found that using other brand cards than router will potentially be a problem. Also, you can try running cat-5 upstairs and linking another router for the second floor. I know that is less attractive but it might work if you have something between the floors causing the problem.
Also, try buying a key fob that gives you signal strength to test it throughout the house. You can then try and move your antennas to get a better signal and test out easier (or take a laptop if you have one and have someone look at signal strength when you move the antennas). Hope some of that helps! JJ
I'll assume that the 3rd computah works well when moved to the 1st floor. If there's something wrong with the unspecified model radio on the 3rd computah, boosting the signal at the Linksys router will not help. Before engaging in remedial exercises, it would be wise to drag a known working laptop around the 2nd floor and check the coverage. If the laptop works well, but the 3rd computah does not, then you have some kind of radio related problem in the 3rd computah. This is fairly common with PCI wireless cards, where the antenna tends to be buried behind the metal case, against a wall, and under a table, which is by far, the worst possible location for any radio signal.
Linksys sells an add on power booster that allegedly works with some models of Linksys routers. They've discontinued the product and reports from the field show that it's not worth the effort. Not recommended.
If your 1st floor router is at one end of the house, it might be possible to attach an external panel or patch antenna and redirect some of the RF in the general direction. This will work but realize that antennas do not generate RF, they only redirect it. If you increase the gain in one direction, you lose it in another.
Methinks the cheapest and best solution is to add another access point on the 2nd floor. Run a CAT5 cable from the LAN port of the 1st floor router to upstairs. You can use a router instead of an access point if you disable the DHCP server and ignore the WAN port. The added CAT5 cable goes to the LAN port. To avoid interference between radios, use different non-overlapping channels (1,6,11) but the same SSID.
If you find that running the cable is a bit much, then you can check into WDS (wireless distribution something) which makes the 2nd access point act as a repeater. The advantage is no added wiring. The disadvantes are many. Both your unspecified existing router and added router need to be "WDS compatible" which really means the same brand and model. WDS cuts your bandwidth in half (or worse). You still need a good strong signal through the floors between the two radios. I don't recommend this unless you're desperate.
Incidentally, my guess(tm) is that your existing wireless router is in the ideal location for where all the wires come together and probably the worst location for RF (under a desk). That's what happens with an all-in-one unit that combines the router and wireless function. The router wants to live on the floor where the wires are, while the radio should be located as high as possible (bookshelf) for best coverage and view. That's why I usually suggest a seperate router and seperate wireless access point, which allows you to move the access point around for best coverage.
I have a Linksys wireless router connected to a cable modem on the main floor. 3 computers in the house share the internet connection via wireless. 2 work fine without problem and both are located close the the router. However the 3rd one receives very low signal and from time to time, the signal keeps dropping. The 3rd one is the furthest away from the router and it is on the 2nd floor.
I wonder if there is a way to boost the signal strength so that the 3rd one can get better signal. I'd prefer not moving the location of the router.
The signal pattern from the antenna is like a doughnut. You can improve the signal to the upstairs PC by turning the antenna at an angle, so it is pointed broadside at the antenna upstairs. Do the same wiht the antenna upstairs.
You might also add reflectors to both antennas.
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EZ10 is quick, the others require some talent.
Moving the router higher helps a lot. On top of a computer desk hutch instead of down lower makes a difference.
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