High-gain antennae for this situation?

[jakew]

Long-time lurker, first-time poster here. I'm trying to improve the performance of my trusty old WRT54G (v4--the antennae can be removed).

I live in a large 60s-era apartment building with concrete floors, masonry (plaster) walls, and intermittent load-bearing steel beams. My apartment is single-level so all devices are roughly co-planar. The poor old WRT54G has been tucked into a cabinet and put right next to a column in the office. I'm trying to improve reception in the living room. To make matters worse, on the other side of the wall is some very dense faux wood paneling. Assume that nothing can be relocated to a better spot. (See the attached layout sketch.)

Using inSSIDer on my Thinkpad (which has an integrated Atheros N 2.4GHz-only card), I can see 30 or 40 other 2.4GHz wireless networks about evenly distributed over channels 1, 6, and 11. So there's a ton of interference to add to the physical issues with the building. Windows reports the signal strength as 4 out of five bars and the reported hardware-level capability bounces around, often less than 54Mbps and sometimes down to 802.11b speeds. Real world performance varies from 300KB to 1.5MB/sec when transferring large files from the NAS on my network (which is wired to the WRT54G). My Blu-Ray player is able to stream standard AVI files from the NAS and Netflix movies without a problem, but the laptop really chokes on streaming.

In this situation, do you think that the standard high-gain antennae for the WRT54G are worth a try?

 

[jakew]

Okay, answering my own question here. I grabbed a pair of the Linksys 7dBi antennae from ebay for $20. I'm not sure that they increased my overall signal strength, but they seem to have increased its consistency. inSSIDer reports my network's RSSI as -50 give or take; however, compared to other nearby networks (even ones that seem stronger), my RSSI is very stable and flat. Others might start at -40 but dip down to -70 periodically. So to the extent that interference from above and below could have been getting in my way, these seemed to have helped.

 

[stevech]

7dBi will help a small amount in that this will improve the "fade margin".

An often ignored problem is that the signal from client device TO the router/AP is the "weakest link". Increasing the router/AP's transmitted signal strength way beyond that of the client doesn't solve the end to end bi-directional reliability/speed need. Think of the rock-band PA system analogy. Complicating this is that few routers/APs display the received signal strength on this weakest-link. You are correct in using more antenna gain and NOT trying to brute-force a higher powered Router/AP transmitted signal.

Interference: it's not how many SSIDs are nearby; it's how "busy" their SSID is. The worst is a neighbor that streams video a great deal. The cure is to simply choose a different channel, and use 1, 6 or 11 (2.4GHz band). Stay 3 channels away from an SSID you think is busy. There are a few WiFi tools that tell you how busy an SSID is. The mere presence of an SSID means little.

The real cure for weak signals (either direction) is adding an AP and connect that to the router via cat5 cable, HomePlug or MoCA.

 

[jakew]

Any recs on which program to use to detect activity on the neighboring SSIDs?

Agreed about the client--on the receiving as well as the transmitting end. I have a suspicion that either my Thinkpad Edge is a poor wireless performer generally, or Windows 7 can't stream AVIs to save its life. My Sony BDP-S580 Blu-ray player has no trouble streaming videos, even 720p mvk files.

I wish I could just drill into walls and add APs everywhere but it's not an option.

 

[StratmanX]

Any recs on which program to use to detect activity on the neighboring SSIDs?

inSSIDer

Free and well known on the forum. Thiggins has written about it IIRC.

 

[stevech]

I wish I could just drill into walls and add APs everywhere but it's not an option.

No need t drill into walls - if you use HomePlug or MoCA devices.

I don't know of freeware apps that display how busy each SSID is (channel utilization factor, by SSID).

 

[jakew]

inSSIDer

Free and well known on the forum. Thiggins has written about it IIRC.

That's the one I already use (see my OP and follow-up). Can it tell you the utilization of other SSIDs? If it can I haven't figured out how.

 

[StratmanX]

That's the one I already use (see my OP and follow-up). Can it tell you the utilization of other SSIDs? If it can I haven't figured out how.

No. All you get is identification of broadcasted SSID's and a signal intensity reading called RSSI. Non-broadcasted SSID's, electrical device signals, and data traffic of SSID's identified are not available. You will need to purchase software/hardware to obtain those measurements.

 

[small_law]

I'm new to playing around with routers, but I was in a similar situation with my apartment. The number of SSID's I can detect on 2.4 GHz is over two dozen. I've given up on trying to improve things with 2.4 GHz reception and went the 5 GHz route with a simultaneous dual band router. A surprising number of newer devices will support 5 GHz and the difference is significant. If you can reasonably get your critical equipment on a 5 GHz network, you many want to try it. The majority of people don't deploy 5 GHz networks; mine is only 5 GHz network I can detect in my apartment building.

 

[stevech]

No. All you get is identification of broadcasted SSID's and a signal intensity reading called RSSI. Non-broadcasted SSID's, electrical device signals, and data traffic of SSID's identified are not available. You will need to purchase software/hardware to obtain those measurements.

It's most unfortunate that freeware doesn't show channel utilization - because people get the wrong impression simply based on the mere existance of idle WiFi networks nearby. (idle means a beacon is sent on the SSID, and that beacon uses a tiny amount of the capacity of the channel).

In lieu of a good WiFi busyness tool, you can use ping -t 192.168.1.1 (or as you use) for long periods and see how often the pings are abnormally long. Better yet, use freeware "pingtrace" which does the same and draws graphs. Ping your router/gateway, not an Internet host. Run these tests several times- when neighbors' WiFi might be streaming video on the same channel, +/-3 of your chosen channel.

 

[StratmanX]

In lieu of a good WiFi busyness tool, you can use ping -t 192.168.1.1 (or as you use) for long periods and see how often the pings are abnormally long. Better yet, use freeware "pingtrace" which does the same and draws graphs. Ping your router/gateway, not an Internet host. Run these tests several times- when neighbors' WiFi might be streaming video on the same channel, +/-3 of your chosen channel.

Thanks for the tip stevech.

Tried "pngtrace" version 2.5 but didn't see a graphing option. Tested it only on my hardwired desktop but will try it on the notebook.

 

[stevech]

inSSIDer

Free and well known on the forum. Thiggins has written about it IIRC.

Does inSSIDer do % channel utilization, that is how busy (how much traffic is on) a given SSID is? I've read that it does not.

 

[StratmanX]

Does inSSIDer do % channel utilization

No. See my post #8 on this thread.