Improve Wireless Signal Strength & Range

Check where the Wireless Access Points, Wireless ADSL Routers or your Wireless Client adapters are located, are they near the following?

Wireless networks (802.11b, 802.11g) use the 2.4Ghz frequency band. So do cordless digital (DECT) phones, microwave ovens and some lighting systems. They might act as a good ‘radio jammer’. Move your Wireless equipment at least 4 metres from such devices and check Signal Strength again. The further away, the better. Also position them as high up as possible so that people or other objects are not in line of sight with your Wireless client equipment.

Are you using multiple Wireless Access Points/Routers?, or if you are picking up some other Access point (picked up from Windows XP)?

The closer two Wireless Access Points or Wireless Routers are using the same channel number (i.e. channel 11) the higher the chance of radio interference and loss of signal strength/quality.Take an Wireless adapter plugged into a Laptop computer and connect with your Wireless Router or Access Point. Now, walk to your Wireless Access Point or Router within around 2 metres of the device. Now scan for any other Wireless network apart from the one you are within 2 metres of.

If you see any other Wireless Network (apart from your own), that is using the same channel you must,

• Move the Wireless Access Points or Routers further away
• Turn off one of these Wireless Access Points or Routers
• Change the channel number (i.e. frequency) of one of these Wireless Access Points or Routers ( try and be at least two channels apart)
  

Check for any packet loss over the Wireless link

Most Wireless Client adapters feature client side software that ‘measures’ the signal ‘quality’ of the established link-the higher the value, the better. However, you can also check the ‘packet loss’ over the Wireless network. Most Wireless networks do have some amount of packet loss, no more than 5% is acceptable. Any more might slow the network down. Use the following PING feature while moving around with the Wireless enabled Laptop. If packet loss increases, you will need to move near your Wireless Access Point or Wireless Router.

On Windows, type START > RUN > CMD
At the command prompt, type ping {IP address of Access Point}
e.g. ping 192.168.0.2 –t
Now press Enter. Every second the device you are ‘pinging’ will respond with
something like this:
–t
Pinging 192.168.0.1 with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 192.168.0.1: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=255
Reply from 192.168.0.1: bytes=32 time<1ms TTL=255
Ping statistics for 192.168.0.1:
Packets: Sent = 2, Received = 2, Lost = 0 (0%)
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms

There are also a number of products you can buy to improve the range, including wireless Aerials that replace your router's existing SMA Aerial. Alternatively you might like to consider Wireless Access Points which can be used to 'Bridge' wireless network signals together. There are also a wide range of Wireless Dongles, PCI cards, PCMCIA cards and Routers available for both ADSL and Cable DSL connections.