I have a main router and the other computers have wifi in my home. In the far bedroom I get only spotty reception as a couple walls appear to block the reception. Is there either a better antenna to put on the main router or a repeater I can buy to put in between the router and the far bedroom wifi to enhance range? Any info appreciated.
You can use either an antenna or repeater. I chose to use a repeater, just make sure what ever you use, it will work with your router. Check on your manufacturer's website for a list of products that will work with your specific router. If you wish further assistance, please advise what router you are using including the model number.
Gene
"snow" hath wroth:
Install a reflector on the wireless router:
If it works at all, the free reflector should help. I like the EZ-12 "Windsurfer".
If it's the walls, neither antenna reflector nor repeater will help much unless you can place the repeater so that the dogleg line of sight goes around the walls. Your best shot is to run a cable past the walls to connect an access point to your router.
The key is that it already works. The signal is getting there. A reflector will help. The signal needn't bore through the wall, either. My best line of WiFi from my living room is down the hall, not directly through a couple of outside walls in line with the router. If I'm outdoors using a cantenna on the laptop, the best signal is not directly from the router, but through a nearby window.
VNC or Remote Desktop, running between a PC at the router and a PC at the desired location, can be used to monitor the signal strength while adjustments are made in router positioning and reflector orientation.
The router should probably be up high.
snipped-for-privacy@XReXXhowXt.usenet.us.com wrote in alt.internet.wireless:
Reflectors are for longish distance and clear line of sight. The presence of some weak signal could be because of spurious reflections.
Better for OP to lower fregmentation and RTS/CTS.
Wireless is for portables and that means you have to deal with changing locations.
Yes.
Axel Hammerschmidt hath wroth:
I beg to differ.
Packet fragmentation is only useful for dealing with interference. The idea is that smaller packets will have a higher probablity of arriving than larger packets. The OP's original complaint was lack of signal (i.e. dead spots) for which smaller packets will do nothing.
CTS/RTS is only useful for dealing with "hidden nodes" otherwise known as collisions with client radios that can't hear each other. My guess(tm) is that the threshold for using CTS/RTS flow control is about 10 clients. Setting the actual threshold (minimum packet size to fragment) is somewhat tricky as you need to know the average packet size being used. This varies by type of traffic. Flow control tweaking isn't going to do anything for lack of signal.
Just to be complete, there's also a problem with setting the speed control. That's in the access point and is usually set to "auto". When the access point starts seeing interfernce, collisions, and weak signals, it slows down in order to improve the receive sensitivity and thereby improve the BER (bit error rate). However, if it's interference that's causing the problem, it will have interference at any speed, and end up at the very slowest speed of 1Mbit/sec. Dumb, methinks.
The problem is that 100% packet delivery at 1Mbit/sec is much slower than perhaps a 30% probability of delivery at perhaps 12Mbits/sec. I've been fixing the system speed for one of the slowest OFDM speeds (6, 9, or 12Mbits/sec) depending in internet connection speed, and getting much better results than leaving it at auto. This tweak also isn't going to do much for lack of signal.
So, what does one do for dead spots? In order starting with my favorite:
Hi, Placing router in a better spot is not an option?
Low signal to noise is also interference. Anyway, we do not know anything about the OP's environment. And it's worth trying fragmentation (and RTS/CTS) before the OP starts to annoy any neighbours with a stronger signal.
snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com (Axel Hammerschmidt) hath wroth:
Yep. If you have interference, it will show up as low signal to noise ratio. Nothing in the original posting that even hints at an interference problem.
True. But we know that he's trying to fix a "dead spot" which is not quite the right description. He's looking for a fix for: "In the far bedroom I get only spotty reception as a couple walls appear to block the reception." So, how is twiddling with settings going to improve signal strength?
As I stated. RTS/CTS flow control is only useful for collision control, specifically with hidden nodes. Need references? However, I agree. It's worth the effort twiddling with every last lousy setting and control just to see what it does and doesn't do. Part of Learn By Destroying(tm).
Interference can very well be the cause of spotty reception.
Because improving signal strength does not necessarily eliminate "spotty reception". Targeting a stronger signal against a reflecting wall does not improve the signal on the other side of the wall.
RST/CTS flow control is useful in dealing with many types of interference. In practice, fragmentation threshold and RTS/CTS are often combined.
"The goal of carrier sense is to detect when transmissions or interferences are happening on the channel, to withold of our own transmissions until a better time (we also avoid corrupting other people transmissions). Carrier sense uses the measure of energy strength at the antenna."
[...]"Most systems also perform virtual carrier sense through the use of RTS/CTS [4], which improves carrier sense information, eliminates hidden node effects and reduces the penalty of collision (shorter collisions)."
Note *interferences* in "The goal of carrier sense is to detect when transmissions or interferences are happening on the channel..." and that RTS/CTS "improves carrier sense information,...".
And before you point that out, yes RTS/CTS is very efficient when dealing with CSMA interferers and less efficient with non-CSMA interferences. But that doesn't justify your conclusion, that RTS/CTS is "only useful for collision control" with hidden nodes.
Do it anyway you think you can.
snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com (Axel Hammerschmidt) hath wroth:
Yep. The problem is that interference is usually quite variable. It comes and goes. There are very few sources of CONTINUOUS interference. See list at:
Reading the original question of: "In the far bedroom I get only spotty reception as a couple walls appear to block the reception." It would appear that the OP has already determined the cause of the "spotty reception". A few walls blocking the signal are simpler and more obvious problem than interference.
True. Reflections are always a problem. 802.11g does a fairly decent job of dealing with reflections as compared to 802.11b and
802.11. MIMO, beam steering, and beam forming do an even better job. Reading a bit between the lines, it would appear that the entire bedroom is a dead spot, which would imply that it's not a reflections issue. If you've ever had to deal with a reflections issue, you probably would have noticed that the effect varies enormously with location and position. Move a few cubits one way or other and the signal could easily be stable and usable. My guess(tm) is that the OP would have tried a few possible positions before asking for help. It's probably not reflections.Yep. In practice, improving antenna location, directivity, and gain are more commonly used to deal with interference issues. We've diverted substantially from the original question. I'll reply on the CTS/RTS flow control and fragmentation issues a bit later. Remind me if I forget. Lunch first.
Incidentally, the paper was from 1998 and deals exclusively with early analog 802.11 chipsets. I think (not sure) that modern all digital
802.11g chipsets don't use carrier detection for interference detection but only use data validity detection or preamble S/N measurement. If the data arrives corrupted, it's assume that something else interfered with the transmission. RSSI detection is just too slow and subject to blocking and overload. I gotta do some digging and reading to be sure.
I've been fighting this same kind of problem between my upstairs office desktop computer and my wife's downstairs kitchen computer. The aluminum faced wallboard is likely the thing that is blocking the signal.
I'm considering having a garage sale to get rid of my wireless equipment, then replace it with a household wiring LAN setup. I'd be very interested in hearing from those who have done this. How well did it work?
Aluminum faced wallboard? That would be annoying. If it works at all, though, you can improve things with directional antennas. If the downstairs PC is in a fixed location, it can get an antenna as well.
Remember that the stock antennas have a radiation pattern shaped like a donut. You probably want the antennas broadside to each other, maybe like a parallelogram. Except if you are trying to go through a floor, a bounce to a stairwell might be better... hard to say.
I have used the "Hawking HAI6SDA Directional 6dBi 2.4GHz Antenna" with good success on a Netgear WG311 PCI card. $20-30.
It fit the Netgear, and had an adapter that fit RP-TNC.
And the Windsurfer reflector on the router.
I've tinkered around with antenna positioning and location just about all I can. The setup works, but the downstairs computer signal is very weak, and if something bumps the antenna or gets in the line of sight the signal may fail.
I would like to change over to an LAN system that uses the house wiring instead of a Wi-Fi setup, but I have never talked with anyone who has used such a setup.
Gordon
That's cuz you never asked... I have 6 of the Powerline Networking things (they come in pairs)... Netgear has 14Mb for $99, 54Mb for $129, 85Mb for $149, and they announced a 200Mb one a few months ago, but I don't have one (needs a gigabit ethernet on the computer).. I not only use them for directly connecting computers to a network, but I was plaing around and put two of my WAP/Routers on them, and have a huge wifi area, and can share stuff wired too...
Got the netgear ones at Best Buy, but here's the link to the netgear site (if you can't get them locally, you can order them online)
It will work really well. Consider that most networks are wired for that reason and wireless is a fairly recent not as good but convenient choice. For non-portable computers my first choice is always wired.
I would use a Signal Seeker
Call me if interested:
Chris
614-255-5575
Nothing about spotty reception in the Wiki :-(
Good.
Installing a reflector on the wireless router was your suggestion
Spotty reception in the bedroom, which an entire dead spot, and the OP's already moved the walls around...?
The facts are, you don't know.
But flow control is much easier, and should it fix the spotty reception in the bedroom, the PO will have saved himself the trouble.
And the walls...
Well, the author does note, that RTS/CTS is [...] less efficient with non-CSMA interferences, implying that it can be used to improve spotty reception, when caused by interference.
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