I have a 900 MHz wireless broadband. Since the leaves came on the tress, of course in the direction of the tower/anntenna, I seem to have lost some signal.
Since I can not configure the WaveRider EUM3004, is there a program I can use from my XP box like Netstumbler to get me dBi readings?
I get different results from the web based "speed" tests.
Why do you think that? What's the symptoms? Do you own a chainsaw?
Different from what? Each other? No amount of signal is going to give you consistant speed tests. You seem to be posing from the U.S., try the Giganews speed test:
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modems are good but can't work miracles. And their bandwidth is limited compared to many wireless solutions, but that's the tradeoff for "non" line of sight operation. More accurately, it should be "near" line of sight. Still faster than dialup though unless something is terribly wrong.
Not the answer you want to hear, but probably the right answer: call your WISP and tell them your speed is dropping and you'd like them to check it out. If they're like most WISPs, they don't leave customers any configuration tools on the WaveRider because they don't want to have to be out fixing them all the time.
If you have a WISP that you can't get good service from you could mention to them that you're thinking of either switching to another service or fixing it yourself. There are a limited number of 900MHz antennas for WaveRider for sale over the net, Google up some and see if you want to tackle swapping out.
I meant to add to the last post but hit "send" before I did. As you probably already know, it may not be an issue with leaves or signal loss at all, it may be a more crowded network, somebody hogging the bandwidth using filesharing or other network issues.
Did you try any of the tools from the Waverider web site? It looks like they offer configuration and site survey tools, as well as snmp MIBs and pointers to SNMP packages like snmpc.
This looks like an absolute treasure trove of support softwware compared to the pathetic offerings at any WiFi site.
I downloaded the site survey software. This offers a NetStumbler-like product in a grown up company. It reads NMEA from my GPS, with some nice GPS-related display. It looks like what you want.
NMEA (National Marine Electronics Association) A U.S. standards committee that defines data message structure, contents, and protocols to allow the GPS receiver to communicate with other pieces of electronic equipment aboard ships.
NMEA Standard A NMEA standard defines an electrical interface and data protocol for communications between marine instrumentation.
Most GPS units are able to send their current position as an ASCII text string. Various programs on PCs use this stream to correlate your postion on a map, or just record it for plotting on a mapping program later.
NetStumbler accepts the NMEA data and logs it along with WiFi signals. Later, you can import that log file to a mapping progrm to give a map highlighting the location of Waypoints.
I verified that the WaveRider program displayed GPS satellite information and the positioning text on it's screen, when I connected my GPS.
Allow me to recommend learning and using SNMP. Here's how:
Download GetIF 2.2 from:
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install the program. This is a "MIB browser".
Download the Waverider MIB database from:
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copy it to the directory: c:\\program files\\getif 2.2\\mibs
Erase the file: c:\program files\getif 2.2\mibs\.index Running the program will automagically rebuild the .index file.
Run GetIF 2.2.
In the "host name" box, fill in the IP address of the Waverider modem. Use "public" for the "read community" and "private" for the "write community". If the ISP changed these, this will not work.
Hit the "Mib Browser" tab and hit "start". It should display a long list of OID's, names, and values. The signal strength and lot of outher stuff ill be in the list somewhere.
So does everyone else. Online benchmark test are not very consistent.
I couldn't resist, so I downloaded the Mobile Survey Utility 1.0 and tried it. Seems to work.
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don't have MS Map Poing 2004 so I can't export the data to a mapping program.
I ran into a small problem during installation. The Waverider Mobile Survey Utility install wanted to install MDAC 2.6 even though I already have MDAC 2.7 installed. It didn't give me the option of telling it that I did't want an earlier version installed, so I just let it do it's thing. The Waverider util worked, but my Visual Studio (dot.net based) monitoring tools acted funny. So, I went to the MS web pile and grabbed MDAC 2.8:
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the inevitable collection of security patches. Now, everything works fine.
It's interesting that the utility uses SNMP to get the signal strength and other system parameters. It's also kinda neat that it will export to an Excel spreadsheet. Also, it seems the eCos firmware is open source:
I have no idea. There are no instructions. MapPoint 2004 is mentioned in the description on the download page. My guess(tm) is that one of the saved data formats is MS Access. MapPoint will import Excel or Access data files.
It's not the only utility that will play back NEMA data logs and do "flight" playback simulations:
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The program is addictive and I've been known to waste huge amounts of time playing with it). Use STRM mpas and not DTEM or DEM.
Does it interface directly to Mappoint, or save data? I have Mappoint, so I could plot it and ship it back to you as a gif, or we could play with it via Webex.
Ah, Excel? Then I could definitely plot things and let you see the results.
One of the other tools uses SNMP but requires that you obtain a key from your ISP. All in all it looks like a most helpful web site, and geared toward reseller/WISP installers, which becomes a handy boon for hobbyists as well.
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