Wifi through concrete walls.. Advice?

[Prime]

Hey guys, im at my dads in fl and i just set up my desktop.. but he has dsl so i cant setup a modem in my room.
So i bought a d-link n extreme pci card but im still not getting spped i want, only getting 60% signal. id say its going throught 2 or 3 concrete walls and i dont know where to go from here.. :bang head

Any soloutions advice?

[DocClock aka MadClocker]

Can't run a cable from the router? or place the router closer to the wall?
From my citizens band radio days, I would say use a bigger antenna, or make your own...the formula for a half wave is 468 feet devided by frequency in mhz...although some say 492/f mhz

I found some rather useful data from a ham operator's site linky (http://www.nr6ca.org/formulas.html)

[Dolk]

Cantana

[Prime]

whats a cantana?
andDocthe making your own part is flabergasting to me, but would i have to make 3 antennas?

[DocClock aka MadClocker]

Naw, just make one prototype and then just copy the rest :beer:

I used to be quite the antenna fabricator back in the day...I once mounted a trucker antenna to the top of a bird cage..4'x2' and talked all over town with it.
People couldn't believe that I was using a bird cage as a "ground plane". The DB gain wasn't that hot... around 5 or 6 but I could get ahold of anyone in town, and I even shot a little skip...sometimes called "sporadic E layer long distance communication" which in the CB world is totaly illegal, and if shooting skip on the cb band was legal, I would have a plaque that says WAS (worked all states) and one that says WAC (worked all countries).
The CB era was great for a short time..but I stuck with it till it pretty much died out. Nowadays all you hear is some drunk with an amplifier telling everybody to STFU because he thinks he's got all the power.
Woa! I got off on a tangent there didn't I? :screwy: Talking about antennas just brought a flood of memories back.
Someday I will fire up my Yaesu FT-101E or one of my modded cobra 29's and see who is still out there..now if I can just remember how to "load it up"

[Prime]

So what type of asian were you just talking in?

[Flurp]

If you dont mind spending more money.. get the wall outlet things... plug them into wall... one connects to router other to your comp... forget name but it's like a ethernet port jack that plugs into wall outlet

[Prime]

****, those arent cheap :(

[arkan]

http://802.11junk.com/jeffl/antennas/Misc/slides/lantern-reflector.html

Depending on the floorplan, you could just use reflectors to shoot the wifi signal around the concrete obstructions. Much cheaper than the powerline networking. The cantena would focus the wifi signal and boost it's power(and signal noise btw) but you'd still be pointing it at a concrete wall which would make it pointless. It's the rebar in the concrete that causes the problems. If it were brick it wouldn't be an issue.

[mage_x]

Ethernet cable sounds like the best option.

[Ben333]

Cantana

I think dolk means a cantenna. Cantennas are wifi antennas in cans, the can makes the signal directional and if you point the cans at eachother, the signal can go much further. I bet this would help in your case too. There is a proper way to do it involving math and antenna parts, but you can just wing it and get pretty good results. I'd drill a tight hole for the router's antennas in two smaller metal coffee cans and then cut a hole for a USB wifi card in another can and point it to the router's cans. http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&source=hp&q=cantenna&gbv=2&aq=f&oq=&aqi=

[Prime]

thats the thing though, the router dosnt have an external antenna. but with my laptop on the opposite side of the room the signal seems to be okay
i could try picking up an antenna cable to run it to the other side of the room. (in a can possably?)
But could i only run one of the antennas? Or would i have to extend all three?
http://c1.neweggimages.com/NeweggImage/productimage/33-127-219-03.jpg

[arkan]

thats the thing though, the router dosnt have an external antenna. but with my laptop on the opposite side of the room the signal seems to be okay
i could try picking up an antenna cable to run it to the other side of the room. (in a can possably?)
But could i only run one of the antennas? Or would i have to extend all three?




A longer antenna cable will cause a signal drop past a certain point. Cheap cable usually equates to poor shielding also.

If you build the cantenna, you can use one can for all three antenna leads. I'm not sure how the card would act if only one lead was receiving the boosted signal.

http://www.turnpoint.net/wireless/cantennahowto.html

Has good info and a calculator to aide in building one.

[Prime]

m only looking to extend it about 7-10 feet, any difference?

[arkan]

That should be ok if the cable is decent.