wireless bridging

vanderbadger

Hi everyone
I need to network up some old metal farm building which are about 100 metres from my house, have line of sight from one corner of house. I have played around with some linksys gear with highgain antennas (indoors) and its works just about, not really reliable though. I am beginning to think I will need some out door antennas to get any decent link, with that in mind can anyone recommend some any all in one bridge/antennas that I could use, looking for non expensive gear and non complicated if possible
I really only need to get a few cameras installed into these sheds and am trying to do it am simply as possible, I had hoped some of the wirless cameras might work but its abit hit and miss to be honest, I suppose the sheds being metal doesn't help.
anyway any ideas appreciated.

charlesD

I was in a similar position once when I moved into a farm house that was too far away from the road to receive cable internet or dsl.

I built an antenna using a design I found on engadget (engadget.com/2005/11/15/how-to-build-a-wifi-biquad-dish-antenna/). I can't remember the site but if you do some searching around there are a couple of other sites with similar antennas and I really combined several plans together. One of the sites showed how to use a gladware container as weather proofing...

It worked very well and the connection was well over a 1/4 mile away, probably closer to 1/2 mile.

Depending on the cameras, it might be easier to have them all record to a server that is located in your metal farm building and then connect this computer to your home network. This way you would potentially only need to make/buy one antenna and could hardwire the cameras into the computer. You would just want to make sure you are backing the files up to your internal computers for security reasons.

vanderbadger

thanks Charles
will take a look

vanderbadger

a friend recommended these to me
apparently they are very cheap, easy to set up etc
http://www.aerial.net/shop/product_info.php?cPath=76_96&products_id=465

BigEejit

I have used two buffalo WHR-HP-G54, cheap and cheerful and works like a dream. The setup I have is just what came out of the box, no special aerials or anything.

One is inside an old house and the other is inside a new house (broadband is in this house). There are no windows in the line of sight and there is a 40cm wall and a cavity wall between the two routers... the ground distance between them is about 80 meters. It has not dropped out once as far as I know in a few months so I assume that the power levels are ok.

The hardest part was setting it up, I had to put the two of them on a desk in front of me to get it working. Also as far as I know the ethernet ports on the remote router do not work when it is in bridge mode.

vanderbadger

but at least 1 port stays active right? I mean I could still connect it to a hub or switch on boths sides?

axer

Use either 2 Linksys WAP54Gs or 2 Linksys WRT54Gs. You can either make your own directional antenne or buy a directional antenne.

jamesd

My sisters house is 35 metres away ( just an empty field between us with no trees) from mine and i want to send my broadband across to her wirelessly - I have a linksys wrt54g and the signal is not fully getting to her (just outside her window with 1 signal bar), I have upgraded the firmware on it to the newest version of Tomato and turned up the transmit power from the default of 40 to 200 and it gets into her house with 1 bar but is slow for surfing - what would be my next route to increase the signal to her? Wireless N router? or a small antenna on the facia of my house or her's?

axer

jamesd wrote: »

My sisters house is 35 metres away ( just an empty field between us with no trees) from mine and i want to send my broadband across to her wirelessly - I have a linksys wrt54g and the signal is not fully getting to her (just outside her window with 1 signal bar), I have upgraded the firmware on it to the newest version of Tomato and turned up the transmit power from the default of 40 to 200 and it gets into her house with 1 bar but is slow for surfing - what would be my next route to increase the signal to her? Wireless N router? or a small antenna on the facia of my house or her's?

Probably best to get a directional antenne.

jamesd

Can a discrete antenna be got? something that will not be to visable externally as I dont want my broadband provider to see it as he often calls around to check on the wireless antenna (wirelss bbroadband)

bushy...

Get a pair of :

vanderbadger wrote: »

a friend recommended these to me
apparently they are very cheap, easy to set up etc
http://www.aerial.net/shop/product_info.php?cPath=76_96&products_id=465

You can hide them inside a bit of ABS pipe ( ABS is transparent at the frequency they work at, you'd have to test other stuff) , make it look like a vent or something.
Might work inside the roof too,depends what its made of .

BigEejit

jamesd wrote: »

My sisters house is 35 metres away ( just an empty field between us with no trees) from mine and i want to send my broadband across to her wirelessly - I have a linksys wrt54g and the signal is not fully getting to her (just outside her window with 1 signal bar), I have upgraded the firmware on it to the newest version of Tomato and turned up the transmit power from the default of 40 to 200 and it gets into her house with 1 bar but is slow for surfing - what would be my next route to increase the signal to her? Wireless N router? or a small antenna on the facia of my house or her's?

I found that the problem is not with the power of the router, but the power of the client ... i.e. the router in your house has plenty of power I would have thought if there is only 35 meters of empty field, but the transmit power of the usb or add in card on your sisters computer is probably very weak and barely making a return path.

Before I got a second WHR-HP-G54, i could see my sisters access point in the wireless setup app on my laptop, but couldnt connect because the transmit power was not good enough (this was with just double glazed windows between the AP and laptop)

About the ports not working on the bridge, i was wrong and have seen a thread on DSL reports where someone said it all worked after updating firmware...