Straightforward out-of-the-box solution for extending WiFi range

My grandmother, in another state, has the same problem that everyone else has, which is that her standard home broadband wireless router just isn't powerful enough to feed the entire house.

So she asked me if she needs a new more powerful router.

Googling, I find *this* AP device, which purports to solve the problem:

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Before I ask her to buy it, does anyone have experience here with that problem (of extending range inside a house)?

The option to move the router from the basement doesn't exist, due to the hard wiring, so, it has to go up two floors.

The out-of-the-box suggestion is because she's not going to do much configuration. I can do some of the configuration for her, but, it mostly has to be *designed* to extend the range of a WiFi router.

Currently she has a Linksys WRT54G so, maybe, an N router will extend her range. But that's why I ask what her options are.

Any other suggestions for improving range that a noob can perform out of the box (i.e., she's not gonna make a can'tenna).

Reply to
Danny D'Amico
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UPDATE:

After many hours of trying to get the settings just right, just now I was able to tremendously extend the WiFi range of my laptop, as a test, simply by connecting a Ubiquiti NanoBridge M2 feedhorn (sans dish antenna) to the Ethernet port. Here is my signal strength at the feedhorn, as seen through the laptop:

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Notice the noise is a tiny at -99dBm while the signal strength is huge at -44dBm (with a SNR of -44 - -99 = 55, if I did the math right).

This gets me 130Mbps between my Linux laptop & the home broadband router.

Here are the network settings that were necessary to make this work:

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And, here are the access-point specific wireless settings to make it connect to my home broadband router's SSID:

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With the dish antenna, that Nanobridge M2 has a gain of 41dB (i.e.,

23dBm transmit power + 18dBi antenna gain), which is far too powerful.

Since that calculates (if I did the math right?) to over 12 Watts, I had to lower the gain by removing the dish ... which dropped the gain down to 23dBm + 3dBi, or 26dB (which is a 0.4 Watts).

Even that was far too powerful for use in my house, so I dropped the transmit power of the feedhorn radio down to 6dBm, so with the 3dBi feedhorn-only gain, the screenshots above are at 6+3=9dB (0.008W) EIRP.

Even with the gain reduced as low as I could make it, I still got a connection strength of -44dBm and a connect speed of 130Mbps, so, it's at least a proof of concept that this is one way to extend the WiFi range of your laptop.

My goal will be to try to connect to my home broadband router from a mile or two down the road... so that's what I'll try next.

PS: Jeff Liebermann should be proud of me!

Here's the howto I wrote up ... (it can also be used at coffee shops!) BEGIN: How to use a Nanobridge M2 as your laptop wireless NIC!

  1. I reset the Nanobridge M2 radio to default settings as per this video:
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I connected the POE to the Nanobridge M2. I reset the Nanobridge M2 back to factory defaults by holding the reset button down for 10sec (until all LEDs flashed)

  1. I set the Nanobridge M2 to be the Linux laptop wireless NIC as per this video:
    formatting link

  1. I turned off the wireless NIC inside the laptop with the hardware switch. Note: I could just as well have run this command on Ubuntu 13.10: $ sudo ifconfig wlan0 down

  2. I set the IP address of the laptop to be on the 192.168.1.XX subnet. $ sudo ifconfig eth0 192.168.1.99 $ ifconfig (make sure eth0 is 192.168.1.something & that wlan0 is not up)

  1. I physically connected the Nanobridge M2 to the eth0 port of the laptop.

  2. I pinged the Nanobridge M2 $ ping 192.168.1.20 PING 192.168.1.20 (192.168.1.20) 56(84) bytes of data. 64 bytes from 192.168.1.20: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=0.572 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.1.20: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.460 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.1.20: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.286 ms etc. (control C to escape)

  1. I logged into the Nanobridge M2 $ netscape 192.168.1.20 (ubnt, ubnt)

  2. I set the "Network" tab as follows: AirOS:Network Router (default is Bridge) WLAN Network Settings->DHCP (default is DHCP) LAN Network Settings->IP Address->192.168.10.20 (default is 192.168.1.1) [x]Enable NAT [x]Enable DHCP Server Range Start=192.168.10.100 Range End =192.168.10.200 Change->Apply

  1. I rebooted the Ubuntu PC (with the wlan0 card still turned off)

  2. I set eth0 to be on the same (new) subnet as the Nanobridge M2: $ sudo ifconfig eth0 192.168.10.101

  1. I pinged the radio: $ ping 192.168.10.1 PING 192.168.10.1 (192.168.10.1) 56(84) bytes of data. 64 bytes from 192.168.10.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=1.15 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.10.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.255 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.10.1: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.310 ms etc. (control + C to escape)

$ ping 192.168.10.20 PING 192.168.10.20 (192.168.10.20) 56(84) bytes of data. 64 bytes from 192.168.10.20: icmp_seq=1 ttl=64 time=1.71 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.10.20: icmp_seq=2 ttl=64 time=0.308 ms 64 bytes from 192.168.10.20: icmp_seq=3 ttl=64 time=0.242 ms etc. (control + C to escape)

  1. I logged into the Nanobridge M2: $ netscape http://192.168.10.20 (ubnt, ubnt)

  1. I set up the "Wireless" tab to connect to the home broadband router SSID: AirOS:Wireless SSID->Select (I sorted the signals by signal strength & encryption) I selected my WPA2-PSK encrypted network SSID. I scrolled to the bottom & hit select. Change->Apply

Note: I also had to set the DNS server by turning off DNS proxy Primary DNS server = 8.8.8.8 Secondary DNS server = 4.4.4.2

Voila!

Once I set up DNS (which wasn't described in the video), I was able to connect to the Internet, and, in fact, am using this connection to type this up to help myself (in the future) and others.

END OF: How to use a Nanobridge M2 as your laptop wireless NIC!

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Of course, that 130Mbps is only between the laptop and the router.

The actual Internet speeds from my rooftop antenna to the Internet, about 20 miles away from a real wire, is almost ten times slower than those speeds, at about 10ms ping, 19 Mbps down, & 18 Mbps up:

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One mistake I made that I just corrected is that I hadn't enabled the NTP time server on the Nanobridge M2, which I hadn't used for months, so the time & date were off in the prior screenshots.

Here's the latest, with the power dialed down as low as I can possibly make it, and even then, I get -39dBm signal strength from my laptop to my home broadband router, across floors and walls in the house:

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I can't wait until daylight to see how far I can go to connect my laptop to my home broadband router.

ADVANTAGE: This method should extend the WiFi range of the laptop up to a few miles (depends on the antenna & access point though).

DISADVANTAGE: 120V power is necessary to run the POE, so, I can't do it on foot; but I can test it a mile or two away from the house in my car with an inverter.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Hi, Do you work fpor Ubiquiti? Nothing new you are doing there.

Reply to
Tony Hwang

Hi Tony,

Two things I've always wanted to do:

  1. Increase the range of my wifi signal *inside* the house
  2. Connect to access points which are miles away

What I was documented is the first step, which is to increase the range. The second step is to connect to an access point that is miles away from that laptop.

I haven't done *that* yet, but, the potential now exists.

First, I had to be able to connect to an access point, period. It took me a long time to figure out *how* to do that.

Now that I've done that, my *next* test is to see if I can connect to my home broadband router from a couple of miles away.

It will be fun, to see if I can do that (but I need to find my inverter because this particular solution requires 120volts).

I'll report back if/when I'm successful.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

There's a store in Chicago that specializes in DX WiFi. They are called

3gstore.com They also have forums for wireless hacks. Very busy boards.
Reply to
dave

Naah. I *wish* I worked for Ubiquiti though, as I really like that they make equipment that is *powerful* and easy to use!

I'm really salivating now over the UniFy access point wifi extender:

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A friend and I installed one at a neighbor's house today, and the WiFi range was FANTASTIC! It went to every single room in the house!

We even turned off the SSID from the Netgear home broadband router, because it was no longer needed, except to be used simply as a wired switch for the access point and desktop computer.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Heh heh ... I *wish* I worked for Ubiquiti! But, if I did, I'd probably know what I was doing! :)

Yes. And no. Depends on what you mean by "mobility".

I've tried the classic USB WiFi range extenders, for example, and their advantage is small size (some are dongles, which don't even need AC power while others are small boxes about the size of a pack of playing cards which also need 120VAC).

The problem I had with these classic range extenders is that they were miserable to set up on Linux. Absolutely horrid support for the Linux drivers. The reason is that they're consumer equipment; and the consumer is on Windows or Mac, for the most part.

So, *for you*, these $100 solutions (give or take $25) *should* work fine to extend the range of your laptop for a few hundred feet.

On the other hand, the solution I tested out, costs the same (roughly), as that consumer gear, but, the Nanobridge feed horn solution has far more gain (both in the transmitter and in the antenna) than the puny consumer gear.

The beauty of the Ubiquiti equipment is that it costs the same as the consumer gear (give or take a few). But, it's far more powerful.

Personally, I think we're all idiots for buying the consumer gear, mostly because it's too expensive for too little gain, so everyone has to extend the range with even more crappy consumer gear.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Yes. You are correct. My results depend on reasonable aiming.

Here is a picture of my ubiquiti feed horn and wires:

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That is a 23dBM radio with a 3dBi antenna, which, if you find that kind of gain in consumer equipment at any price, I'll be amazed.

That's 26dBm of gain, which is 400 milliwatts of power (EIRP).

Now look at these four screenshots, taken during my testing:

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Notice the signal strength with the tail pointed toward the router was a whopping -38dBm! (that's huge!)

When I tested it, at my house, connected to my laptop ethernet port, I pointed the tail end of this Nanobridge M2 at the home broadband router from one floor away, and got fantastic signal strength, which you can also read on the unit itself by user-settable LEDs:

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When I pointed the tail *away* from my router, it still had a connection strength of -61dBm, and, as I twisted the nanobridge feedhorn around, I obtained values in between.

Now, let's compare that to the Lenovo laptop, which has a high end Intel Centrino N-spec WiFi card: $ lspci SHOWS: Intel Corporation Centrino Ultimate-N 6300 (rev 35)

$ iwconfig SHOWS the NIC has 15dBm transmit power. At 2.4GHz, that gets me a respectable -54dBm as shown by the results below:

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Let's summarize:

  1. The business-class laptop has a 15dBm NIC with probably about 1/2 dBi to (at most) 1dBi integral antenna, for a gain of about 16dBm; it garnered a signal strength of -54dBm.
  2. Turning off that WiFi NIC, and attaching the 23dBM + 3dBi Nanobridge M2 feedhorn to the laptop Ethernet port, I get a signal strength of -38dBm when the antenna is aimed correctly - which is a stupendous 16dBm more signal than with the internal laptop card. Since every 3dB is a doubling of power, that's 2x2x2x2x2=32 times more signal strength!
  3. However, with the feedhorn tail purposefully pointed AWAY from the router, I still get a respectable signal strength of -61dBM, but, that signal strength is four times less than what I had at the laptop without the feedhorn.

So, yes. You are correct. The signal strength *does* depend on aiming; but, when it's aimed right, you can easily get thirty times the signal strength than your (high end) laptop has alone.

And, best of all, there is absolutely no need for *any* drivers! This is more important for folks like me who are on Linux, than it is for Windows or Mac users - but - it's still nice to know that there are absolutely no drivers needed - since the interface is via the standard Ethernet port of your laptop and the web interface to the radio.

YMMV

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Ah. Alignment, while problematic with consumer equipment, is absolutely beautiful with this professional equipment!

Let me count the ways ...

Notice I'm *not* using the dish that comes with the Nanobridge M2 radio. I'm just using this feedhorn and the POE power supply and an Ethernet cord connected to the laptop, so, my antenna is 3dBi (which isn't all that directional) as opposed to 18dBi with the dish (which is still not all that directional):

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Even so, notice that the feedhorn has a set of LEDs (which the user can configure) which tell you instantly what the signal strength is at any one moment:

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Also bear in mind, that antenna installers are often in precarious situations on top of poles and trees and the like, so, there is, in addition, a visual signal strength meter, as shown here:

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And, notice the unchecked box in that last screenshot: "Alignment Beep" which beeps like Sputnik telling you the signal strength even if you had your eyes closed.

Lastly, notice that the main page of the web interface to the radio also shows you the signal strength and quality metrics:

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Point is, when you're connecting to an access point that you can barely see with $3,000 Steiner binoculars, alignment is everything.

So, rest assured, you'll *know* exactly where the access point is in any situation that you're in. So, it won't be hard to point the feedhorn at the AP, although it might require holding it there to keep it pointed.

I would think, at a distance of, oh, say, 300 to 500 feet from a typical Starbucks-style access point, that you would just need to be pointed generally in the same direction; but I would need to test this on the road (with an inverter in my car) to be sure.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

We're getting ten times the gain here ... and, bear in mind, we're *not* using the 18dBi dish that came with the Nanobridge M2.

I'm just using the 3dBi feedhorn alone, without that dish. Why? Because the dish would be too big to carry in my laptop bag! Plus it would be too big to set up on a Starbucks coffee table!

Given that we're just using the feedhorn, let's compare the specs of my Lenovo laptop against that of the Nanobridge M2 feedhorn.

Looking up the specs for the antenna gain on my Lenovo W510 laptop, I cant' find a spec on the antenna gain, but I see that they list all their laptops at no more than 3dBi (I suspect it's about 1/2 dBi to 1dBi, like most laptops - but I don't know):

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The antenna gain on the Nanobridge M2 feedhorn isn't published either, but the Nanobridge web server itself reports it as 3dBi:

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The iwconfig command tells me that the laptop NIC is transmitting at 15dBm of power:

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While, we know from the specs, that the Nanobridge feedhorn transmits at 23dBm maximum power.

Given that, and assuming the antenna gain figures above, we are comparing:

LAPTOP = 15dBm + 1dBi = 16dBm (40 milliwatts) FEEDHORN = 23dBm + 3dBi = 26dBm (400 milliwatts)

Notice the feedhorn is ten times more powerful than the laptop alone. Now, let's compare that with my real-world test results:

LAPTOP gets -55dBm (0.003 microwatts)

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FEEDHORN gets -39dBm (0.1 microwatts)

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This is two orders of magnitude more power, in my real-world test! For the same cost as consumer equipment, which isn't as powerful.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

I'm not sure I understand. I'm not using the 15dBi dish. I'm just using the 23dBm feedhorn and it's integrated 3dBi antenna.

I connect just the feed horn to the laptop Ethernet port and turn off the laptop's internal WiFi card.

The feedhorn has no problem pointing at the access point, as I described in another post, because the feedhorn is designed, from the start, to be easily aligned to an antenna that is

20 miles way.

So, aligning the feedhorn to an access point inside a coffee shop that is only, say, a half mile away, is trivial.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Hi Amanda,

It's not so much that I'm disappointed with the antenna on my laptop (which probably has a gain of about 1/2 to 1dBi), that I'm wanting to get my laptop to connect to an access point that is as far as a mile or two away.

In that case, there's no hope that the laptop can connect. It's just not designed to connect more than a few hundred feet.

However, the Nanobridge M2 is designed to connect to an access point that is as far as ten to twenty miles away.

So, with just the feedhorn, it seems I should be able to extend the laptop's range at least to a half mile, to maybe a mile.

I have to test this though - but it seems clear that the feedhorn would easily allow the laptop range to be extended to a few hundred feet (at the very least).

PS: I don't know how much you can change the power of the Linksys WRE54G with DD-WRT. I suspect the router default is around 18dBm (like most consumer routers) with a default antenna of something like 5dBi - so the range would depend on how much DD-WRT allows you to change the transmit power - and whether or not you replace the default antenna with a more directional antenna.

QUESTION: Do you know the dBm & dBi specs for that router and what DD-WRT can change with respect to the dBm and whether the antenna is easily removed and replaced?

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Hi Dave,

I disagree.

My contention is that the pro radios I'm using are just about the same price as a high-end consumer router - yet - their power is tremendously higher in the pro equipment (which is designed to be cheap & powerful).

To make matters worse, it's actually pretty hard to walk into Fryes to pick out a home broadband router, and to find the antenna and transmitter gain listed on the box. I've tried, It's damn near impossible.

You know why?

I don't; but, I suspect it's because they're all very weak (probably around

15 to 18dBm with something like 3 to 6 dBi antennas).

So, I agree with you that, to get higher-gain consumer routers, you're going to pay through the nose, simply because it's really hard to shop intelligently.

Luckily, the gain figures are all published for the pro equipment, since gain is almost everything when your access point is twenty miles away.

So, my key contention, which is not intuitive, is that the pro equipment is actually just about the same price as the consumer equipment, but, it's vastly more powerful.

Take, for example, this $70 MIMO 802.11n access point which you wire to your modem (or to your router or to a switch):

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It will knock the pants off anything I can find at Fryes at the same price. :)

Here's the datasheet:

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I challenge someone to find a more powerful consumer radio in the same price range! Note: The UAP-LR is 27dBm + 3dBi = 30dBm (1 Watt)

PS: No, I don't work for Ubiquiti - although I wish I did. :)

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Hmmmm.... we're talking hundreds of feet greater range.

Just putting a router in a more advantageous spot within an office isn't going to get you a few hundred feet greater range, in most cases.

It's not a bad idea, of course; but we're talking a goal of orders of magnitude greater range here ...

If you're talking about the test I ran, which extended the range of the laptop (as opposed to extending the range of the router), I had turned off the laptop's internal radio with the hardware switch on the side of the laptop.

So, in *my* tests, the only radio was the Nanobridge M2 feedhorn which was tied to the laptop's Ethernet port.

So, from the laptop's perspective, there was no radio. There was just a 'wired' ethernet connection.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

I bought these for a customer to connect two buildings because the labor to run an outdoor aerial cable was more than installing the wireless link. ^_^

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TDD

Reply to
The Daring Dufas

You mean you turned the radio off? SSID can be hidden or broadcast. I never heard turning off SSID> Unify is pretty new models. Another DIY source is Mikrotek which may cost less.

Reply to
Tony Hwang

Way too technical and OT...remove "alt.home.repair" from your poly-posting...you geek! *L*

Reply to
Bob_Villa

We used the Unify $100 6 Watt (yes, 6 Watt!) access point (they call it Long Range). It gave 5 bars to all the Apple equipment for the first time ever, in that house, anywhere they wanted it.

Turned out, we moved it, so, now they changed the router setup to have both the SSID from the router being the same as the SSID from the access point.

That the access point overpowers the signal of the router (which is on a different non-overlapping channel) doesn't seem to adversely affect them.

Reply to
Danny D'Amico

Hi, Do you use inSSIDer pro version or even free version? I think having same SSID is not good. Won't it create confusion when connecting?

Reply to
Tony Hwang

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