Just curious how far your Wi-Fi access point is from your desktop computer.
The access point my desktop connects to is about a half dozen miles away. An antenna is plugged into the RJ45 Ethernet port on the desktop. The signal strength, even at more than a half-dozen miles, is about -55dBM.
Just curious how far your nearest WiFi access point is from your desktop?
On 10/9/19 12:52 AM, Arlen _G_ Holder wrote: [ The usual pointless shit ]
"Ma, call the plumber, the toilet's backed up again."
Hi pjp, Thanks for that information where you have a transceiver, like I do, instead of a cable or dsl modem, about a kilometer away, line of sight.
Our transceivers are essentially equivalent in function to the cable modems that most people who live in suburbia or in cities have in their homes.
My setup, like yours, is also WISP, where, being rural, we don't have access to cables or pipelines either - just like you. We have wells. We have septic systems. We have thousand gallon propane tanks. We even have our own electrical generators, since the power company is highly unreliable. (For example, tonight, the power is scheduled to go off, as one temporal example - for about a day or two - as far as we know.)
The only "utilities" that we have which are public are the electrical and phone wires, but, like you, we're way too far from the station for DSL to ever work.
Like you, I have to aim my antenna at the nearest access point by sight, where there's also an "aimer application" in the radio which beeps ever faster, and lights up various colors (red orange yellow green blue, etc.) as our signal strength increases. Since we're in a windy area, we sometimes need to manually re-align the antennas, where, as you've likely found out, we can eyeball it pretty closely (within a few decibels anyway).
If you know what equipment you're using, that would be of interest. I'm using a Rocket M5 from Ubituiti, on the 5GHz spectrum, transmitting at near or about the legal limit for the USA (which, luckily, is higher than it seems to be in most other countries for some reason).
The radios are set to never exceed the legal limit - but they need to be set up pretty close, since the distance is miles (about 10 km) to the nearest WiFi Internet access point.
Do you know your transmit power?
I was on the 2.4GHz Wi-Fi spectrum for the longest time, but when I ran waterfall spectrum analysis, it was horrid how much noise there was from all sorts of frequencies, not all of which were WiFi signals.
Even our cellular is a bit dicey where we are, as T-Mobile gave me BOTH a cellular repeater and a femtocell, so I can either pick up cellular signal from about 10 or 15 miles away (or so), or, I can pick up the cellular antenna that is literally inside my house (both work but the femtocell seems to connect more reliably, based on the software utility on my iOS and Android cellular devices).
Here's a picture of just some of the access points in my house, where the iPad shows the physical size of the access points. That black device on the shelf to the left of the blue router is the cellular repeater from T-Mobile (all the carriers provide repeaters & femtocells):
Where you are, what do you use for amplifying your cellular signal?
Wifi access point is off, I use ethernet.
My desktop isn't wireless ... but the comp hooked to the TV and the one hooked to the stereo are , and the WiFi router sits on a shelf above my desk . Right next to our DSL modem .
Mine too. Where my machines are, catercorner on first floor to modem on
2nd floor I get about 3X speed with ethernet vs wifi.Pay attention folks. Our resident cesspool of useless discussions isn't talking about your in the house WiFi modem. He's talking about Wireless internet service.
Close enough. Perhaps once speeds reach wired, none will need wired. But not me as towers are behind a hill where I live. I involves the home and is an on topic topic.
Just curious how far your Wi-Fi access point is from your desktop computer.
The access point my desktop connects to is about a half dozen miles away. An antenna is plugged into the RJ45 Ethernet port on the desktop. The signal strength, even at more than a half-dozen miles, is about -55dBM.
Just curious how far your nearest WiFi access point is from your desktop?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------- To answer the OP, I use a neighborhood wifi for insecure use. Only get about 1/2 block away near my bedroom window. Move out of the bedroom and connection is lost.
It's 54 Mbps optimum but normally connect speed goes down to 1 Mbps.
For secure stuff, I still use dial-up.
On 10/9/19 9:36 AM, Gary wrote: [ nothing of interest ]
Piss off Arlen.
I think the real answer is "WiFi access is relatively rare among AHR users".
We sure don't have it where I live.
Cindy Hamilton
Hi pjp,
Thank you for your information, where it's nice to converse with someone who has the same or similar WiFi experience as I have, which, we have to admit, is different from the experience most people have.
For example, we control our modem settings to some extent, whereas, for most people they likely can't even log in as the administrator, to check or change a setting, or to upload firmware, or to change the frequency, or transmit power, or whatever.
As for what you care about most, I agree that download speed is important, although, for VOIP, jitter is also critical (particularly when it gets over about 10 ms or so).
Our download speed is often about the same as our uploads - is yours that way? Out here, most (but not all) the WISP advertises symmetric speeds but often the upload can be half the download, but just as often, it's more.
Who knows why.
Out here in the mountains, a single tree can encroach into the Fresnel Zone such that neighbors can have drastically different end results, using the same equipment.
Interestingly, and sadly, just like with Windows, sometimes we have to reboot our "modems" (yes, I know they're not modems, but most people reading this won't know what a transceiver is, nor that it's, essentially, a modem anyway) - just to get our speeds back.
Why? o I don't know why.
Maybe someone here who knows more than I do can explain why my speeds jump when I reboot the modem, where, it's kind of just like Windows, in that way. o Why does rebooting the modem instantly "fix" the slow speeds?
Thanks for your perspective, which, as I noted, most people on cable wouldn't have the knowledge of, if this conversation weren't public.
Like you, I'm happy with what I can get, over the air, for my WiFi connection to the Internet - where - I just ran a speedtest (see below), mine are as follows at the moment (but it changes greatly over time of course, depending on the weather, the time of day, etc.):
That's about 24/14, which is kind of typical for me, where it can drop to one tenth that, but rarely get more than double about that speed (which is pretty pathetic if we compare to typical cable speeds - as the transmission of the signal over miles takes its toll on lost & jumbled packets).
Thank you for that perspective on torrenting, where, when I torrent, I generally add a VPN to the mix (although truth be told, I'm almost always on VPN anyway, as a matter of habit), where the VPN takes its toll in speed penalties.
I don't torrent all that often though, where mostly I watch videos on the Android phone (or, with emulation, on Windows, where it runs even faster than on Android due to the memory and CPU advantages of a desktop).
The beauty of watching videos on Android is that, for free (I only use freeware), we NEVER need a Google Play account (even to subscribe to video channels on YouTube), and better yet, we never see an inserted advertisement on YouTube, and we can download any YouTube video, bar none, at any quality level available, and, better yet, we can strip out the video so as to listen to the audio (which is what I do most), all offline, so that we don't have to worry about our bandwidth coming in fits and starts over the kilometers between our devices and our Internet connection.
The functionality on Android for such things literally wipes iOS off the face of the earth, where I'll leave it at that, and with this reference:
Given we have slow speeds since our ISP is over the air, it would be nice if this type of freeware existed on the common consumer desktops! o Have you been able to get NewPipe freeware running yet on Windows?
In fact, my cellphone battery was dead where I had to watch a YouTube video on the iOS-based iPad, where it was appalling that iOs users have to see ads in YouTube (even though I use "Music Tube" and "Video Tube", which are 'supposed' to suppress the Google ads, which, they do - but they insert their own, which accomplishes nothing useful overall).
As noted, the beauty of Android functionality kills that of iOS, even on the desktop, where the Android apps run _better_ on the desktop than they do on Android itself (due to the hardware, of course). (The Mac can't hope to catch up, as the recent admission by Apple yesterday that Netflix iOS app will never be on the Mac shows strategically, for the most popular apps.)
My point is that video speeds ARE a problem for me, as they are for you, where we just have to be clever about intelligently choosing free apps which easily download the videos (or strip the audio) without any added bandwidth of advertisements.
Thank you for that additional information about routers and switches, where, if I snapped a photo of my setup, you'd likely be appalled at the number of routers and switches entangled in the rats nest.
Basically, when I replace a router, I set up the old router as either a wired repeater or as a wireless repeater, where, interestingly, again, the stellar difference between iOS and Android shows up in spades, when you watch them switch between what are the same access point SSIDs, but obviously quite different BSSIDs.
As you are likely aware, one of the greatest things about having to figure out how to get our Internet and cellular in a rural area, is that we learn how to diagnose and debug signal strength, noise levels, and bandwidth issues.
The utilities available on Android, for example, kill those available on the desktops, unfortunately ... such as what I have on my Android phone that I wish were all ported to the desktops (although some are):
Even with free Android emulation on the desktops, the cellphone is better. o Genymotion tutorial I wrote to help others do what I did on a desktop
o Bluestacks tutorial I wrote to help others do what I did on a desktop
o Andyroid tutorial I wrote to help others do what I did on a desktop
It's just sad that this functionality is almost always either non existent, or far less powerful, or not free, etc., on the Apple platform... sigh. o It's a fact iOS devices can't even graph Wi-Fi signal strength over time
Thank you for that information that you use older desktops, as do I, where most of mine don't have WiFi built in, but where I just plug a spare antenna into the Ethernet RJ45 port, and voila - they can pick up signal at
-55 decibels (which is pretty good signal) that is literally coming from 10 kilometers (about 6 miles) away, over the air, line of sight.
Like you, I don't want to depend on wireless (or the cloud); so what I do for all my devices (iOS, Android, Windows, and Linux anyway), is use them as USB sticks, which is easy to do for all but iOS but which is also easy to do on iOS if you know how (which takes a bit of thinking first - but once you know the trick - any iOS device is turned into a free USB stick in seconds over USB cable).
Luckily, most of us own all the platforms, so we can switch between them as we see fit, where a dual boot Linux and Windows, for example, allows us to use the iOS device as a USB stick, to simultaneously transfer large video files to and from any device to and from any other device, over USB. o Simultaneously slide Windows Linux iOS Android files back and forth over USB at 7GB per minute speeds using 100% native devices (no proprietary software needed)
Note that almost nobody knows how to do that simple task from the desktop, for iOS devices, because it requires knowledge of a trick to WRITE to the entire visible file system of the iOS device - which isn't in the least intuitive - but which works great once you know that trick (where even the ad hoc system files on the iOS device are visible to the desktop user that knows the simple tricks).
In summary, because we have such slow Internet connections, we have to keep "stuff" off the Internet, where we learn how to be self sufficient connecting to WiFi access points which are miles away over line of sight, and working around the need for wifi by using wires inside the house whenever possible (e.g., USB works great for large video file transfers and for backups of entire mobile devices to and from networked storage devices, all without adding anything to the desktop or mobile device by way of special software).
You just have to know the tricks, such as some of these: o Do you have a working cross-platform PASSWD database for Windows, Linux, Mac, iOS, & Android on your home LAN?
o Can we come up with a free, ad free, cloud-free calendaring system that works with Windows and Linux and mobile devices?
In summary, if you know the technical tricks, people like us, on very slow Internet connections, find that there's almost never a need to use the "cloud" to store our private data (e.g., calendar, photos, backups, passwords, etc.) and we find tricks for viewing movies without ads and we find ways to watch movies for free offline without the inevitable hiccups of fits and starts that would happen over our slow connections were we to attempt streaming over the air.
Thanks for all your information where it's nice to know what others do when they are forced to figure out ways to make use of Wi-Fi access points miles away from their desktops.
This was the antenna for a setup like that in a house we rented in Montana. They were in a valley and no access to broadband any other way so there was an antenna in the middle of the valley and all of the houses connected to it. It was dog slow. I suspect 10-12 houses were sharing a 10meg DSL or something. Sometime it felt like dial up.
Hi Cindy Hamilton,
Yes you do. o Everyone has it.
Let's say, for example, you can "see" your friend, who is, oh, say, a dozen kilometers away from you line of sight, similar to what Ammammata posted:
On Thu, 10 Oct 2019 09:32:21 +0200, Ammammata wrote: >>at home, the ISP antenna is about 12 km away from home >>max current speed in download is about 30Mb
Guess what?
If you and your friend buy two "antennas" (as explained) o You can connect to each others' access points (a dozen miles away)
Since there is always another access point you might want to connec to o All you need is the equipment (which is inexensive) & the know how
It's the know how which is expensive ... where this post to JP Gilliver explains some of the advantages you can obtain with that know how...
On Thu, 10 Oct 2019 14:15:04 +0100, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > in this case all the 'groups seem relevant to a discussion of wifi > (although we seem of course to be talking about two different sorts, the > in-home and the ISP [is the latter even referred to as "wi-fi", or just > "wireless"?]).
Hi Ammammata & J.P. Gilliver,
I post a lot of tutorials & helpful posts that benefit the Usenet potluck o Where I strive to add details which verify the facts
Like you, I agree that all desktop users benefit from better WiFi options o Particularly when they, like Ammammata, can access APs 12 km's away
At 30Mb/sec, no less!
To that end, it was also useful that pjp shared that his AP is 1km away o Where the point is that anyone you can "see", you can share with
That's useful in a pinch - when good old American ingenuity is required o Like when a neighborhood needs to set up WISP as we did ourselves
To that end, I just now added a few more 5GHz frequencies to my "antenna"
Where I also had to physically add a sticker (believe it or not) to the antenna, as per FCC rules since the revised UNII rules legally modified the previously approved FCC ID, and, more to the point, it modified the previously set up available frequencies (and, more importantly, it changes the legally allowed EIRP, particularly at the fringes of the band, in order to reduce emissions).
This apparently had multiple instant benefits, not the least of which were additional bands in the 5GHz spectrum and lower emissions in those bands.
With that change, I'm apparently attaining instantly better speeds!
I recommend users who want to connect to access points miles away, to keep in mind the distances people like pjp, Ammammata, and I can attain with reasonable speeds (with APs literally easily a dozen kilometers away).
Let's say I have a coax cable coming in my house to my cable modem and my desktop PC has no WiFi receiver installed.
Cindy Hamilton
Hi Dan Purgert,
This is about power - changing feet to miles - at the same cost as before.
Take a look at this photo I just snapped for you, showing this setup works when directly connected to any PC to amplify the power from feet to miles:
The cost on the Microtik web site is about fifty dollars:
You were mostly correct in your assessment, where the main take away is that one end is a standard female RJ45 which means any male-to-male Cat5 cable plugs it into anything you normally plug a RJ45 connector into.
For example, I'm sending you this from a powerful and yet inexpensive Mikrotik antenna plugged directly into the back of my desktop at this very moment, where a quick search on Amazon shows costs similar to normal routers that everyone already has (but which only travel a few hundred feet, which is infinitesimally puny compared to what this stuff does):
I wish to clarify that the Wi-Fi equipment is the same (essentially) as what EVERYONE already has in their home already - only better.
Bear in mind this Wi-Fi equipment is no different, fundamentally, from everyone's SOHO router in almost everyone's home & office, and, more to the point, the equipment is no different fundamentally from _any_ Wi-Fi "amplifier", "repeater", or even "dongle" that people habitually attach to their desktops and laptops to increase Wi-Fi connection distances.
The main difference isn't even price - as these radios which can connect to APs miles away cost no more, in general, than any decent router does at Frys here in the Silicon Valley.
The main difference is essentially POWER (which transmits to "distances"). o Those Wi-Fi access point distances are what this thread is all about.
And, of course, size (the antenna on these things adds 30 decibels alone!)
We have heard reports from users whose APs are as little as 1 km to as many as a dozen times that distance - which _any_ desktop can attain, if the user has the know how and the equipment discussed in this very thread.
Each of my desktops, in fact, has one such antenna attached to it, where the desktop I'm on right is plugged into a Mikrotik router & antenna:
And only a loon would define wifi access at your home as meaning you have to put in eqpt at some 'friend's house' kilometers away to make it possible. I'm with you, there are various wifi hotspots in the area around here, but none that I can pick up at my home.
Hi Cindy,
That works perfectly, Cindy. o Remember, this is "standard" Ethernet stuff (Cat5/RJ45 & all that).
That's the elegant beauty of having the knowledge described in this thread! o It plugs directly into your computer - as long as you have an RJ45 port.
Please take a quick look at this photo I just snapped which shows the connection from my DESKTOP RJ45 port to the "router & antenna".
The cost of that setup is about what you pay for a SOHO router. o And yet, the POWER is infinitely greater
As an example, you'd be hard pressed to get even 20 decibels EIRP out of your SOHO router, whereas the antenna alone on this setup could easily be
30 decibels or more - and that doesn't even count the transmit power.So, for the same amount of money as people spend to have repeaters in their house, they can set up something like this, if they have the space and knowledge, instead.
And, for the same amount of money that people spend to send wires to the deepest darkest most inaccessible parts of their house, they can simply set up an antenna like this to beam the signal.
In fact, I have multiple antennas like this set up OUTSIDE my house, which face the house in order to beam the signal back INTO the house (and to the pool and to the barn and to the shop, and to the driveway gate, etc.).
Notice all this can easily be done with a cable modem setup. o All you need is an RJ45 port in your desktop or laptop computer.
I have a single WiFi router that reaches all over my house and a little bit outside. It really is all I need to access the Internet from my tablet while I'm sitting on the sofa or out on the deck.
Cindy Hamilton
I don't use WiFi hotspots. You never know where they've been.
Cindy Hamilton
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