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Indoor wireless reception - higher gain antennae helpful?

P

pantsaregood

Senior member
I have a friend who is stuck in a barracks with access to subscription wireless service and nothing else. The nearest access point to him is two rooms over, but his reception from it is awful. He's using a wireless AC adapter, but the access points only support 2.4 GHz B/G/N, so AC does him no good.

Would high gain or directional antennae help out at all? He doesn't have any ability to relocate the access point.
 
There is a small chance that it would help.

To be sure he should buy from easy to return vendor.

BTW in most cases AC would provide better Bandwidth if the signal is strong to begin with. If the Signal is too weak ito provide functional N, AC per-se would provide any significant Help.



😎
 
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What sort of adapter (PCIE or USB), with what sort of antenna (if any) does he have now? Even something as minimal as a separate, basic antenna that can be placed "out in the open" (rather than being stuck behind the back of his PC) might do the trick.
 
He's currently using a PCI-E wireless card. Antennae are relatively small omnidirectional antennae that came with the unit.

Haven't been in his barracks, but I'd suspect that it's something like 30-50 feet away.
 
The worst part about PCI/e adapters is that their antennas are stuck behind the PC and usually under the desk, so simply replacing a weak antenna with a better antenna only provides marginally better reception. What you need in cases like this is a breakout adapter, one that can be placed up and away from the PC, either on top of the desk or even a bookcase. A good example would be this Rosewill adapter. A better choice might be to use an old wireless router as a wireless access point connected to the PC via ethernet cable.

JackMDS's suggestion would work also, but is awful pricey.
 
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Before he starts spending "real money" on a new adapter, let alone a pricier solution, and assuming his card has a standard antenna plug (and I think pretty much any card with an external antenna would?), I'd suggest trying something like one of these, basically just to get the antenna out from behind the PC and/or to be able to move it around a bit to look for a sweetspot - 30-50 ft really isn't very far:

TP-LINK TL-ANT2405C 2.4GHz 5dBi Indoor/Desktop Omni-directional Antenna
TP-LINK TL-ANT2408C 2.4GHz 8dBi Indoor Desktop Omni-directional Antenna

ETA: Oh, right, I suppose that's probably what you meant by "hi-gain" antennae? (I guess I was thinking you meant something more elaborate/expensive...) Also, fwiw, is he in a position to ask whoever it is that controls the access point to see if its output can be cranked up at all (or be allowed to check it himself if the former person is too technologically clueless to do it?)
 
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