Need wireless guru's help, please.

Darrin · 30-05-2007, 00:37

I'm trying to get a better internet connection here at my house. This DSL crap is on its way out the door. I'm tried of playing with it.

So, I've got a friend at that lives at the airport (he's the airport manager) and he has cable at his house. He's about 2.5 - 3.5 miles in a straight line (clear line of sight from my house to his).

What kind of equipment would I need to be able to share his cable connection wirelessly from his house to mine? I'm thinking a couple antennas like these, one at each end. The one on my end fed into a router, and each of the three computers fed off that.

I'm probably completely screwed up in my thinking, hence why I'm here. If you folks could make some educated recommendations as to what equipment I should use, it would be greatly appreciated.

leowyatt · 30-05-2007, 06:30

I know we have a wireless line of sight connection here at work between 2 of our warehouses which are around 2 miles away so I'll ask today and see what we've done and let you know.

Mark · 30-05-2007, 11:48

I know someone else in the States who had a similar problem and managed to get wi-fi (DSL wasn't even an option for them). I can ask around if you want.

Anyway, the general principle seems sound - two focused unidirectional antenna pointed accurately at each other. It's the same technique that was used for inter-site microwave data links in the days before high speed internet really took off.

Will · 30-05-2007, 12:46

You'll need to mount them as high as possible, and bear in mind if it's very directional (As most high power/gain antennas tend to be) you'll need to be pretty accurate aiming. 3 miles is doable, especially if you've got LOS, however you'll need pretty decent kit.

mejinks · 30-05-2007, 15:04

I saw a site on wireless antenas where a guy used a strainer with a normal wireless antena in front of it and was able to get 3 miles range using just guesswork aiming. I will try to find the site for you.

There seems to be a few sites that use old satellite dishes in conjunction with stuff you would find around the home.

http://www.wwc.edu/frohro/Airport/Pr...Primestar.html

Hope this helps. I will continue looking for the site I mentioned earlier.

EDIT: Aha - http://www.usbwifi.orcon.net.nz/

Darrin · 30-05-2007, 19:37

Thanks for that link, mejinks. Some very interesting stuff there.

Darrin · 01-06-2007, 23:33

Any other ideas / info that anyone can throw at this?

I'm still stumped as to what exactly I'll need for equipment from my friend's cable modem to my router. I know I'll need something that'll turn the computer info into 2.4GHz signals, and then another to turn the microwave back in to computer signals (modem, duh), but no idea as to what exactly.

If anyone has experience with any particular models, I'd love to hear it. I'm on an extremely limited budget here, so I can't exactly afford to go buying equipment only to find out that something else would have worked better / cheaper / more reliable.

Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

Oh, just remembered something that might be pertinent : his cable supplier only gives out one IP address per account, so I'll need to put a router / switch in to divide the signal from the cable modem. I'll then need to divide the wireless portion of the signal at this end for the three different computers here. The part at this end isn't so much of a problem, I'd just use my existing router and hub, but I'm thinking I'd probably need to buy a wireless router for his end and a wireless LAN card for his computer, and run a second antenna up to transmit to my place. Or is there a way to plug CAT 5 cable to go wired on his part of it and only go wireless out to my place (trying to lessen the cost of buying parts here)?

Mark · 01-06-2007, 23:41

It depends how many PCs will be at your end.

If just one, then it's easy - you just attach a wi-fi card to your PC and either another card or a router at the other end. Set them to talk to each other like you would if they were both in your house.

If you need to connect more than one PC then it gets complicated. There are two options, WDS or a bridged network.

WDS (Wireless Distribution System) is designed for this, but you need relatively new kit at both ends and it's unlikely that really cheap hardware will support it. I have no experience as at the time one of my routers didn't support it.

The other option is to find a router that'll support client bridged mode. These are few and far between unless you want to spend mega-bucks (which you clearly don't). The next best option is to try and get your hands on a router that'll work with either Sveasoft or OpenWRT firmware. I have successfully set up a bridged wireless network using Sveasoft but haven't tried with OpenWRT.

Darrin · 01-06-2007, 23:59

Heh, maybe I should list what I have first, then we can discuss what I'll need.

What I currently have is a Westell B90 DSL modem (so what, right?), a Linksys BEFSR11 router, a no-name 6 port hub, and a metric buttload of cables going every which way but loose.

So if I understand it right, I could just unplug the DSL modem and replace it with a wireless modem with the antenna outside, right?

And then at the cable internet end, put in a dual port router with one side going wired to the existing computer, and the other port going to another wireless modem pointed at my house, right? Or am I totally wrong here? Would they just need to be wireless routers at each end? I don't know if I'm even using the correct terminology here. LOL

Graphical representation :

Black boxes are computers, green boxes are hubs, light blue boxes are wireless modems / routers, and the red line at the bottom right is the LAN signal from the cable modem.

Does all that look right? Or am I missing a crucial step here?

P.S. whenever I see your sig, Mark it reminds me of what many have said about the area between my ears!!

Mark · 02-06-2007, 01:01

OK, this is my understanding of how it all works. I'm self-taught on networking so I don't know a lot of the really advanced network topology and distribution stuff. Hopefully there's someone here who does and can either confirm or correct what I'm going to suggest.

At the cable end, you're very close. The wi-fi 'modem' is actually called an 'access point'. You can either use a combined router/access point or get them seperately. The former is usually less complicated and might be cheaper than the latter. This is standard stuff and you don't need anything particularly special here so long as it's reliable. That is if you want to go the bridged route. To go the WDS route, you'll obviously need hardware that specifically supports WDS, but the rest still applies.

It's your end of the network that causes a few problems. Unless you're going to go all wi-fi at home (I wouldn't recommend that), then you need hardware that will act like an access point in reverse (i.e. will allow your wired ethernet network to share the wi-fi connection. The problem is most cheap access points and even some more expensive ones don't know how to do this. So, you'll need either an access point that can do 'client' or 'workgroup' bridged networking, or one that supports WDS (if you're going to use WDS). You'll also most likely need another router here, so again you can use either seperate components or an integrated unit.

When I did this myself, I did it via DSL instead of cable, so I used a combined DSL modem/router/access point to do the DSL end of the network (actually it was a moderately expensive Draytek unit but that's just personal choice). At the remote end (other end of my house) I used a Linksys WRT54GS combined router/access point with the Sveasoft firmware mentioned above (I could have used OpenWRT but Sveasoft was easier and worth the $20 to me). After several hours of experimentation with numerous configurations of IP addresses, DNS servers, routing tables and god knows what else, I got it working. WDS in theory would have been easier, but like I said, my DSL modem didn't support it. I did say it was complicated.

Unfortunately, the custom firmware I used works on very few Linksys models (mostly specific versions of the WRT series), and a few others with similar internal hardware, so the options with that are very limited. You can probably use most of your existing hardware somewhere though to keep the costs down.

This article might help explain the wi-fi bit:

http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/tutorials...le.php/1563991

30-05-2007, 00:37	#1
Darrin Dirteh Kitteh Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Hiding out in Mormon Country Posts: 1,629	Need wireless guru's help, please. I'm trying to get a better internet connection here at my house. This DSL crap is on its way out the door. I'm tried of playing with it. So, I've got a friend at that lives at the airport (he's the airport manager) and he has cable at his house. He's about 2.5 - 3.5 miles in a straight line (clear line of sight from my house to his). What kind of equipment would I need to be able to share his cable connection wirelessly from his house to mine? I'm thinking a couple antennas like these, one at each end. The one on my end fed into a router, and each of the three computers fed off that. I'm probably completely screwed up in my thinking, hence why I'm here. If you folks could make some educated recommendations as to what equipment I should use, it would be greatly appreciated. __________________ A bullet may have your name on it, but shrapnel is addressed "to whom it may concern".

30-05-2007, 06:30	#2
leowyatt Chef extraordinaire Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Infinite Loop Posts: 11,143	I know we have a wireless line of sight connection here at work between 2 of our warehouses which are around 2 miles away so I'll ask today and see what we've done and let you know. __________________ "Dr Sheldon Cooper FTW!"

30-05-2007, 12:46	#4
Will BBx woz 'ere :P Join Date: Jan 1970 Posts: 2,147,487,208	You'll need to mount them as high as possible, and bear in mind if it's very directional (As most high power/gain antennas tend to be) you'll need to be pretty accurate aiming. 3 miles is doable, especially if you've got LOS, however you'll need pretty decent kit. __________________ *No No!*

30-05-2007, 19:37	#6
Darrin Dirteh Kitteh Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Hiding out in Mormon Country Posts: 1,629	Thanks for that link, mejinks. Some very interesting stuff there. __________________ A bullet may have your name on it, but shrapnel is addressed "to whom it may concern".

01-06-2007, 23:33	#7
Darrin Dirteh Kitteh Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Hiding out in Mormon Country Posts: 1,629	Any other ideas / info that anyone can throw at this? I'm still stumped as to what exactly I'll need for equipment from my friend's cable modem to my router. I know I'll need something that'll turn the computer info into 2.4GHz signals, and then another to turn the microwave back in to computer signals (modem, duh), but no idea as to what exactly. If anyone has experience with any particular models, I'd love to hear it. I'm on an extremely limited budget here, so I can't exactly afford to go buying equipment only to find out that something else would have worked better / cheaper / more reliable. Any and all help would be greatly appreciated. Oh, just remembered something that might be pertinent : his cable supplier only gives out one IP address per account, so I'll need to put a router / switch in to divide the signal from the cable modem. I'll then need to divide the wireless portion of the signal at this end for the three different computers here. The part at this end isn't so much of a problem, I'd just use my existing router and hub, but I'm thinking I'd probably need to buy a wireless router for his end and a wireless LAN card for his computer, and run a second antenna up to transmit to my place. Or is there a way to plug CAT 5 cable to go wired on his part of it and only go wireless out to my place (trying to lessen the cost of buying parts here)? __________________ A bullet may have your name on it, but shrapnel is addressed "to whom it may concern". Last edited by Darrin; 01-06-2007 at 23:38.

30-05-2007, 11:48	#3
Mark Screaming Orgasm Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Newbury Posts: 15,194	I know someone else in the States who had a similar problem and managed to get wi-fi (DSL wasn't even an option for them). I can ask around if you want. Anyway, the general principle seems sound - two focused unidirectional antenna pointed accurately at each other. It's the same technique that was used for inter-site microwave data links in the days before high speed internet really took off.

01-06-2007, 23:41	#8
Mark Screaming Orgasm Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Newbury Posts: 15,194	It depends how many PCs will be at your end. If just one, then it's easy - you just attach a wi-fi card to your PC and either another card or a router at the other end. Set them to talk to each other like you would if they were both in your house. If you need to connect more than one PC then it gets complicated. There are two options, WDS or a bridged network. WDS (Wireless Distribution System) is designed for this, but you need relatively new kit at both ends and it's unlikely that really cheap hardware will support it. I have no experience as at the time one of my routers didn't support it. The other option is to find a router that'll support client bridged mode. These are few and far between unless you want to spend mega-bucks (which you clearly don't). The next best option is to try and get your hands on a router that'll work with either Sveasoft or OpenWRT firmware. I have successfully set up a bridged wireless network using Sveasoft but haven't tried with OpenWRT.

01-06-2007, 23:59	#9
Darrin Dirteh Kitteh Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Hiding out in Mormon Country Posts: 1,629	Heh, maybe I should list what I have first, then we can discuss what I'll need. What I currently have is a Westell B90 DSL modem (so what, right?), a Linksys BEFSR11 router, a no-name 6 port hub, and a metric buttload of cables going every which way but loose. So if I understand it right, I could just unplug the DSL modem and replace it with a wireless modem with the antenna outside, right? And then at the cable internet end, put in a dual port router with one side going wired to the existing computer, and the other port going to another wireless modem pointed at my house, right? Or am I totally wrong here? Would they just need to be wireless routers at each end? I don't know if I'm even using the correct terminology here. LOL Graphical representation : Black boxes are computers, green boxes are hubs, light blue boxes are wireless modems / routers, and the red line at the bottom right is the LAN signal from the cable modem. Does all that look right? Or am I missing a crucial step here? P.S. whenever I see your sig, Mark it reminds me of what many have said about the area between my ears!! __________________ A bullet may have your name on it, but shrapnel is addressed "to whom it may concern". Last edited by Darrin; 02-06-2007 at 00:11.

02-06-2007, 01:01	#10
Mark Screaming Orgasm Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Newbury Posts: 15,194	OK, this is my understanding of how it all works. I'm self-taught on networking so I don't know a lot of the really advanced network topology and distribution stuff. Hopefully there's someone here who does and can either confirm or correct what I'm going to suggest. At the cable end, you're very close. The wi-fi 'modem' is actually called an 'access point'. You can either use a combined router/access point or get them seperately. The former is usually less complicated and might be cheaper than the latter. This is standard stuff and you don't need anything particularly special here so long as it's reliable. That is if you want to go the bridged route. To go the WDS route, you'll obviously need hardware that specifically supports WDS, but the rest still applies. It's your end of the network that causes a few problems. Unless you're going to go all wi-fi at home (I wouldn't recommend that), then you need hardware that will act like an access point in reverse (i.e. will allow your wired ethernet network to share the wi-fi connection. The problem is most cheap access points and even some more expensive ones don't know how to do this. So, you'll need either an access point that can do 'client' or 'workgroup' bridged networking, or one that supports WDS (if you're going to use WDS). You'll also most likely need another router here, so again you can use either seperate components or an integrated unit. When I did this myself, I did it via DSL instead of cable, so I used a combined DSL modem/router/access point to do the DSL end of the network (actually it was a moderately expensive Draytek unit but that's just personal choice). At the remote end (other end of my house) I used a Linksys WRT54GS combined router/access point with the Sveasoft firmware mentioned above (I could have used OpenWRT but Sveasoft was easier and worth the $20 to me). After several hours of experimentation with numerous configurations of IP addresses, DNS servers, routing tables and god knows what else, I got it working. WDS in theory would have been easier, but like I said, my DSL modem didn't support it. I did say it was complicated. Unfortunately, the custom firmware I used works on very few Linksys models (mostly specific versions of the WRT series), and a few others with similar internal hardware, so the options with that are very limited. You can probably use most of your existing hardware somewhere though to keep the costs down. This article might help explain the wi-fi bit: http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/tutorials...le.php/1563991 Last edited by Mark; 02-06-2007 at 01:05.