Techniques for improving wi-fi speed and distance (1)

One thing you can be sure of today is the features of a wireless router, such as 1000 feet Mbps throughput and transmission distance, which are just a digital daydream. The fact is that these speeds and distances do not appear in your home, in your office, or anywhere on earth.

If you are disappointed with the transmission speed and distance of wireless networks-who are not disappointed? -- There is a lot of work you can do to extract the last bit speed and the last 1 feet distance. I spent a few hours optimizing my network, increasing the indoor transmission distance of the network by more than doubled, from 90 feet to 200 feet and increased by 150 feet in my backyard ), at the same time, the performance is increased by 15 times-and all of this happens on an old 802.11g router that has been in use for two years.

Some of my skills are basic, such as where to place a vro and how to place it. Other techniques are more complex and require dedicated equipment, but they can make a new world. In addition, I have prepared a troubleshooting list for those who do not know what to do when the data connection Performance drops.

The beauty of modern Wi-Fi devices is that they can be used together, so you can build networks with the best devices of the same type. For example, my network uses routers from one manufacturer, antennas from another manufacturer, printing services from a third manufacturer, and wireless customer devices from several different companies. You can think of it as a wireless United Nations: global cooperation makes your online life easier.

Placement: Location, location, location

The location where you place your vro and how to place it are the most important and often overlooked for creating an efficient wireless network. Most people put the router in the first place. This is a major error.

You can think of a router as the center of the connectivity sphere, and the connection is extended from its antenna to every direction. My advice is to place the router as close as possible in the physical center of the residential or office that it must cover. Start with a floor plan or sketch and draw a diagonal line from each corner to determine the center position.

Of course, some people, including me, cannot use this suggestion. Maybe the center of the building has a wall or brick chimney, or, as I do, the network cable is introduced into the building from the worst possible location. If, for some reason, you cannot place the antenna in the ideal central position, do not be disappointed. I will give you a solution later.

Now, please visit here to find a good home for the router. Avoid corners, especially in the old house), because the corners weaken the signal when the signal is worn out. Do not place the router in the closet. A good place to place a router in a conspicuous manner is a bookcase or entertainment center.

The router needs an AC power outlet and a connection to your cable or DSL data source, but do not panic if the DSL or cable modem line in the building is in an inconvenient location. You can use a targeted antenna to see "antennas and amplifiers: increase signal strength" below) or extend your DSL or wired cable line.

If you select the latter, you will find that it is a dirty and costly project to build a line through the wall so that your router can be placed in the desired place, which will cause damage. As another option, you can consider using the fine-coaxial or ethernet cable from FlatWire TV. Cables wrapped in 1 feet of tape can easily be inserted into walls.

After drawing the FlatWire line to the desired position, apply a thin layer of adhesive or plaster on it and then paint it; it will be your secret. The length of this cable is 10 to 20 feet, and the cost of the entire project should be between 80 to 120 USD.

Router configuration: Details

After everything is put in place, turn on the router power, enter your security settings For details, see "how to protect the wireless network "). Then, adjust the router to the maximum speed. Many router manufacturers are set to run at a rate of 75% or -- worse -- auto-adjust. I found it best to adjust the signal rate to the maximum possible.

Finally, set the vro to use only one 802.11 protocol. In hybrid mode, it is equivalent to a Wi-Fi world because it can be used for 802.11b, g, and n clients), which reduces the data rate. Because only the 802.11g client is used, the performance of the router is nearly doubled. The distance from 1 Mbit/s to 2 Mbit/s is increased from 70 feet. Of course, you must ensure that all connected devices are set to use the Protocol you selected. If not all of them support the protocols you choose, you must either give up this suggestion or spend money to purchase new devices .)

Antennas and amplifiers: increase signal strength

Almost all wireless device manufacturers use cheap antennas in their own products. A typical wireless router is equipped with a small patch line antenna with a gain of 2 DBI. However, the market now has antennas that are much more capable of transmitting and receiving data.

For those of us sleeping in high school math and science classes, including myself, the dBi value for measuring the antenna power uses logarithm values. Every 3dBi increase means that the power is doubled .)

Better antenna installation is easier than you think-that is, if your antenna is detachable. This is risky, but if your antennas are outside the vro and you rotate the antennas several times in a counter-clockwise fashion and they fall, you're lucky. If this is not the case, your router antenna cannot be easily upgraded.

If your antenna is detachable, installation of the new skyline does not involve any software. After removing the old antenna, you only need to install the new antenna and connect the power of the router.

It may be difficult to select the right antenna because there are too many antennas available in the market. The simplest antenna broadcasts signals to all directions, which is suitable for the layout of routers placed close to the center of the building. For example, the HGA7S high-gain pole antenna of Cisco-Linksys has a gain of $50. The gain is nearly three times the gain of the antenna equipped with a typical router, Which is 7dBi, that is, the signal power is more than doubled. The problem is that they are too long and often fall down; fortunately, the company provides a clip to keep them upright.

However, if you are like me, you cannot place the router in the middle of the house, there is also a way, because the targeted antenna will send the signal in the conical mode to a specific part of the house. These antennas are not perfect-there are always some leaks at the rear of the antenna-but such leaks can actually become an advantage to provide connections to the equipment behind the antenna.

For example, I place routers and antennas around 8 feet away from one end of a long house. My main work area is at the left rear of the antenna, but I still have a good connection effect in this area.

In my configuration, I used a pair of Hawking Technologies Company HAI7MD high-gain 7dBi oriented compact antenna $40 per device), which would transmit signals to the other end of the house to cover the whole house. They increased the transmission distance of my vro from 90 feet to 125 feet, even though one end of the basement is separated by several stone walls.

If there is a blind spot that a high-power antenna like mine cannot cover, it is time to investigate what an amplifier is called a signal amplifier. This type of devices placed between routers and antennas increase the broadcast power.

I use a Hawking HSB2 high-gain signal amplifier. It increases the network broadcast power to 500 MW, which is about 10 times the output power of a typical router.

When adding a signal amplifier, remove the antenna from the router and connect the antenna cable to the amplifier input end. If your router uses an internal antenna or an external antenna that cannot be disassembled, you 'd better choose to use a wireless or power line extender instead of an amplifier .) Next, connect the output end of the amplifier to the vro and connect to the power supply.

Thanks to the use of the targeted antenna and amplifier, the distance between my network transmission has increased to more than 200 feet, and the signal now covers the entire basement.

The last suggestion for indoor users: Wireless Communication requires two parties, and the client receiver is as important as the router. The secret to built-in Wi-Fi laptops is that they often use low-gain antennas hidden in their bodies.

The best way to solve this problem is to use an external wireless network adapter-this solution is equally effective for desktop computers. I chose Hawking's HWUN1 Wireless-300N USB adapter for $75), which has a pair of transient line antennas available for 802.11b, g, and n networks. It increases the signal strength at the edge of my network from 15% to 80%.

The most amazing thing is that these two antennas can be replaced with high-gain antennas as described above) to further increase the signal transmission distance.