Extending my house wireless

Take the laptop out to the garage and place it in the location where you want to place the desktop. If you have a good signal, all is well. If not, your best bet is to check out a high gain directional antenna for the WMP54G.

Wayne wrote:

I have a desk top in both my wood shop and in one of my garages running off a WRT54G over a distance of just a little over 200 foot....

I do use high Gain Antennas (Radio Shack Linkysy brand) on the access point... and I get a "fair"signal in both building :most of the time"...NOT ALWAYS...and the speed sometimes leaves a lot to be desired......

I just purchased a WRE54G range expander a few days ago that I am playing with .. .but have not gotten to the point that I can say that it works or not...... I do know the Range Expander demanded that I upgrade the firmwear in my WRT54G ....long story in itself.... in that I lost all my wireless connections after the firmware upgrade and it took almost all day getting everything back to square one and working ..

Just may have thrown some money away.... who knows... and honestly I do not care... I really do NOT NEED a wireless connection in those buildings...but what do you do with 2 old computers besifdes tossing them in the trash can...

Bob Griffiths

You could also go to the Sveasoft firmware for the WRT54G and see if upping the signal strength helps?

What we actually have are two radio transceivers. Boosting the power output of the AP transmitter will not increase the AP receive sensitivity, so the received signal from the garage may still be marginal.

On the other hand, a high gain antenna will maintain the transmitters power output over longer distances and increase signal strength of the received AP signal.

Happy Canuck wrote:

I had a similiar problem that you described. My Linksys WRT54GS was

next to the cable modem in the basement. As as result, half of my

house had essentially no signal. I played around with signal boosters

at the basement AP, however, they do nothing to improve the signal from

the laptop back to the AP. A wireless card with a directional antenna

may work for you since the computer will be a desktop, however, for my

laptop it didn't seem practical.

My solution was to buy another WRT54GS and use it as a repeater. I

installed the latest Sveasoft Alchemy firmware on both units which was

easy. In the Sveasoft forum there are "how to'" guides to set up the

second router as a repeater. The whole thing took my about 1 hour to

set up. The end result...I can plug the second router (repeater) into

any outlet on my first floor and it rebroadasts the signal to the rest

of the house. No part of my house is weak. Encryption/security is

unaffected. The transmission rate is half'ed, however, I notice no

practical diference. I love it.

Rick