Wireless Craze

I just put my old wired system back. Connect speeds are about 3-5 Mbps. Win XP all.

I had bought a Linksys WRT54GS with a PCI card and a notebook adapter for the laptop. I thought it would be helpful to be able to have it all wireless and the freedom to move around. Get rid of those cables. Well I was promised great range ( house is only 48 feet wide ) and comparable speeds. The way to go everyone said.

Well an alarm bell should go off when right next to these great devices are range extending antennaes for sale. What does that tell you?

I tried it for two days. Very low signal strength, speeds dropped to about

700k ! I tried changing channels, tweaking it with Linksys people, moving the router etc. No change. Reinstall adapter driver NG. I never did even get the notebook to connect at all!

What a circus. I guess most have the router on the desk next to their computer. Guess it works at three feet.

Linksys support people are very hard to understand and just read off a script.

I will eventually go back to it I guess after I research the bull.

Oh well. I feel better now!

Reply to
Anom
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Linksys sucks. Tried it last year.

i have a Hawking right now that is rock solid.

Reply to
Clyde Anderson

Although I prefer D-link, the Linksys WRT54G is a very good and stable product. I tried the GS version, but was not at all impressed. Anyway, in reference to your situation, could you be a little bit more detailed? For instance, have all of your attempts been made with encryption enabled, without it enabled or both? Are you using the WZC utility to manage your wireless connectivity or are you using another utility? Where in your home is the WRG54GS placed? Is it center in the home, placed high atop a shelf?, etc. Is MAC filtering enabled without entering the MAC address of the laptop? Did you follow the directions, precisely? Again, although Linksys makes very good and stable products, it is possible that you have a lemon.

Reply to
Doug Jamal

Ok. So the client is a Linksys WMP54G and WPC54G for the notebook. Is my guess correct?

What is the house made from? If poured concrete or aluminum foil backed insulation, you're going to have a problem going through walls with 2.4GHz.

It tells me that users are trying to stretch the limits of technology. Having aftermarket performance products available in the automobile market does not automatically assume that the basic automobile is junk. As for aftermarket performance products, you should see the prices in the aftermarket audiophile area. Would you believe $1000.00 power cords?

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antennas and overpriced power cords are there because there's either a perceived or real need for performance improvements.

  1. Did you try the laptop at a wireless hot spot to make sure it was working?
  2. Did you upgrade the firmware on the WRT54GS and the drivers on the client adapters?
  3. Any nearby sources of potential interference? (micrwave ovens, wireless TV xmitters, municipal networks, neighbors with wi-fi).
  4. Did you reset the WRT54GS to defaults and start over after Linksys support suggested their usual assortment of useless tweaks?
  5. Is the 700k kbits/sec or kBytes/sec? How were you measuring speed?

Well, something is wrong. Kinda sounds like a defective WRT54GS but I can't be sure from your description. It's unlikely that both the PCI card and laptop card would both be defective. If you suspect one part of the puzzle is a problem, you can always substitute.

My office WRT54G v1.1 has the stock antennas attached and is buried behind a pile of junk heaped on top of the server. Going through one plywood partition, a glass window, and a few bushes, I have no problem doing 100ft before I run into the neighbors houses on the opposite side of the street. If you can only do 3ft, something is broken.

True. Be sure to email Linksys sales and inform them that support was not able to salvage the sale. I'm sure they'll be thrilled.

Sorry about the problems, but you should have yelled for help before you gave up, not after.

I don't. However, you did give it a good try. I suggest you yell for help before giving up, not after.

Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

With a WRT54G running Sveasoft Talisman, and a Dell Inspiron laptop with a built-in Intel ipw2200 wireless adaptor, I get 1000' with two windows and a tree in the way! Speeds vary from 1 to 11Mbps, but I'm amazed the connection's there at all.

60' through two wood floors.

It's, unfortunately, not only Linksys. Support people are generally hard to understand - if not, they get promoted or move to greener pastures, and you never get to speak to them again.

Reply to
Derek Broughton

Hey, Jeff, is that actually the concrete, or the rebar in the concrete? It's probably not something I really need to know, but I've been wondering :-)

Not until you told me...

Reply to
Derek Broughton

It's the water. Concrete is mostly water. You get the same water attenuation with plants and shrubs. The rebar also blocks the signal but there's not enough of it to be a problem.

I dug out some numbers on attenuation of materials:

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of 6dB loss as cutting your range in half. 12dB is 1/4th the range.

I still can't believe somone would pay $1000 for a power cord. However, that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with the worlds supply of power cord operated devices that would necessitate a premium upgrade.

Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

Rest assured, your wifi experience isn't the normal status quo.

I'm with Jeff, something is definetly going on. He'll steer you in the right direction if you want to get it working as it should -- and break everything down into frames and bits, if need be, as well. :^)

Have you tried to see what the maximum LOS distance you can get between the two? That might be a good way to eliminate or determine if there is a hardware problem or strong RFI problem going on. (And, maybe, raise your neighbors' eyebrows if you try it outside.) :^)

Could just be something like an antenna not working properly. I'm sure, if it's a removeable antenna, you already tried un-attaching and re-attaching it, but could be a weak internal connection somewhere. I've already had to re-solder a contact point for one piece of hardware (a bridge) already because the thing fell behind an entertainment center once too many. Point was so fragile to begin with, that I wouldn't be surprised if many of them broke off just from shipments. (Not saying you should have to open something brand new up, but if it is something like that then returning it for a replacement would solve the problem.)

If it doesn't even work acceptably LOS, my suspicion is also that one of two is probably bad hardware as RFI would be unusually strong to cause such bad performance. Its still possible though. Security systems, baby monitors, cordless phones. Does the card pick up other SSID's, neighbors or wisps?

If it does work acceptably LOS, then the walls being RF shields, comes to suspicion. Got any cordless 2.4Ghz phones? How do they standup while going room to room? Do the walls break them up?

Cheers Eric

Reply to
Eric

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