Boosting a Wireless antenna?????

Is there a way off boosting a wireless router's antenna?? I was wondering if taking off the plastic bit and then soldering a longer wire onto the end and then hooking it up to a computer chassis would help... my theory is that by hooking it to the chasis, which is grounded to the house, i would turn the house into a giant antenna.. am i wishing?? or is there some sort or mechanics i don't know about behind all this... what about the outer rim?? what purpose does it serve?? Help me pls!

So you want to take a signal and ground it for better performance? Hmmm, that's gotta be one of the more "interesting" ideas I've ever heard.

Put a parabolic reflector behind it to double your gain.

They make boosters that work as relay-stations, but you have to realize that your data integrity will probably go down the farther distance you are and most likely by using a repeater as well

What about a power spike that grounds to the chassis of the computer and inturn goes to your router? I can see some problems with grounding noise on this one, but then again I'm not an electrician and it is only a hobby. How about a heating or water pipe maybe a newby metal lamp.

Come to think of it I have one right by my router, I might try that with a steel lamp. I would think aluminum would stink for this.

There are two ends to any radio system, the antenna and the ground. Shorting your antenna to the ground, is, well, a short. While it is true that most radios you'll use don't use the Earth as their ground (so it isn't "actually" a short), the Earth can soak up a good deal of electricity -- electricity that could remain in your antenna to produce the RF radiation that will be picked up by other antennas.

The solution is not to ground your antenna. Rather, modify the existing one one in a way that will work (a'la Maviryk's reflector suggestion [it need not even be parabolic!]), or get a new one (you can buy or build them).

In the case of upgrades, "bigger is better" dosen't always hold true. What you ideally want is something that is a multiple of the wavelength you are transmitting on. A 1/2 wave dipole, for instance (what could very well be on your router now) will only be a few inches tall, and provide 3dBi of gain. A 3' long piece of wire will not only be huge, but also probably not a multiple of the wavelength, and radiate in a way that causes weird dead and hot spots in reception.

The cheapest way to 'upgrade' your existing antenna is to throw a tin-foil reflector behind it. This will help direct the RF energy in one direction. It won't provide much additional gain, but it's dead easy and dirt cheap. An upgrade on this is a parabolic reflector, which provides much better direction of signal -- just don't go moving your access point or computer! Simple reflector designs are available if you look.

If you want serious improvements though, you'll need to consider buying (or building) a replacement antenna.

JigPu

You can also try to make somthing like a cantenna to get things working better. On my laptops PCMCIA card I once put some CDs under it and got a little boost in signal.

I've heard of the cantenna.. but isn't that for receiving??

get a pro antenna

www.aerial.net


I use 2 antennas from that site. The 9dbi OMNI for my AP and the smaller 5dbi omni for my usb wlan adaptor