I am a moron, please help me

[kayakbrian]

I build boats for a living, so all of this fancy computer stuff is totally beyond me. OK, here's the situation. I have a cheapo B series modem-router combo, speed where I live is slow so I'm not expecting faster. We're on an ordinary cable and our provider connects through PPPOE.

What I need is more range, we live on a small farm with lots of auxilliary little houses about 400 feet from the main house and I want to get internet out to them. Reading up it looks like I should be getting one of the top rated n series routers, it looks like I can run one off of my cheapo modem router, but I am deeply fearful that I'll take this thing out of the box, plug it in, follow the setup instructions, and it won't work for some goddamn reason. So that leads me to consider a modem-router, but I can't figure out if any of those have the same super duper range as the top rated routers. Maybe I should just get a router and try to make it work with the existing modem-router, or maybe I should buy a modem and seperate router, does an older modem slow down the speed? Dammit there are so many considerations and I can't figure them out. I need HELP!

Here is what I need:

1) range, I need to reach as far as I can, this is the most important thing
2) EASY set-up, I need to read instruction, follow them, and have it WORK, I'm find to spend more money for this convenience.
3) to know if I should go through existing modem-router to a new router, or buy a new modem and new router or buy a new-modem router.
4) Whatever I get needs to be ADSL and able to do PPPOE

Can somebody out there just tell me what the heck to buy. I'm hopelessly confused and I really need to get this done. Please, please HELP!

 

[thiggins]

Do you have clear (no trees or buildings) line of sight between where you have Internet and the outbuildings? If yes, there's a chance. If no, wireless is going to be dicey.

Are all outbuildings in the same general direction?

An N router isn't going to do you much good. N doesn't give you more range (although it might because you have such an old wireless router and radio technology has improved). N gives you more bandwidth at a given location.

Good outdoor AP/bridges could do the trick. But you have to have line of sight.

 

[darkknight]

Another good question is what kind of budget do you have? With this type of stuff, you may want to consider trying to get 2 access points that can act as a repeater. For example, you place wireless access point A as close as you can, perhaps even outdoors, towards the direction you want to extend wireless to. You said the wireless name (or SSID as the technical term) to be kayakBrian. You place wireless access point B at one of the outbuildings again as close to a direct line of sight to WAP A as possible.

When in repeater mode, B will pick up the wireless signal from A and simply repeat kayakBrian, essentially doubling your coverage. Now this process does require that the WAP's A and B are able to even establish a decent connection with each other, so take that into consideration. That 400 feet is really pushing it so if you have a clear line of sight, the better this will work and I'd also recommend 802.11n just to minimize any chance of interference as maximizing range is most important here.

Also make sure that whichever WAP's you purchase are capable of acting as wireless repeaters!

 

[stevech]

What I need is more range, we live on a small farm with lots of auxilliary little houses about 400 feet from the main house and I want to get internet out to them.

It's easy. Essentially, give up some data speed for longer range (laws of physics).

Get one of these (or equiv.)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...3168071&cm_re=engenius-_-33-168-071-_-Product

Configure it (we'll help) and connect it by ethernet cat5 cable to your existing home router, LAN port. Put it outside, say on eaves of home, and aim it in the general direction of out-buildings. You can use more than one if need be for directionality/coverage.

With a laptop or PC in the out-building, see if the connectivity exists and is good enough. If not, buy another one of the items above and place it at the out-building's eaves. Run the cat5 cable from it indoors and connect to a PC's LAN port. Or to a cheap ethernet switch and onward to multiple PCs.

This all assumes it's impractical to run cat5 cable to the outbuilding(s) via in-the-air hanging, or trenched (buryable cat5 cable). One cat5 cable can go up to 300 ft, maybe a bit more. There are ways to go longer.

Another solution is to use HPNA (LAN extension via power lines) - assuming the outbuildings' power is on the same breaker box. See the HPNA section here.