Wifi range

[Kenneth in Texas]

Here's the scenerio: I have a satellite dish for internet. I have a metal building, I have a house with hardi-board siding. Modem is in the house. I need a signal from the house to my metal building which is 250' away from the house with a clear line of site. Satellite is almost half way in between house and metal building.

What the best/easiest/cheapest way to do this?

 

[Shaneard]

I ran underground cat 5 cable to ours and put in a wireless router. If it isn't underground cable with shielding if you have any lightning in the area it will fry the cable. Our router has been hit twice but the cable is fine. Ours is 110 feet.

 

[Redlands Okie]

I have the same setup except i am closer to 275 feet. I ran cat 5 in buried conduit between the buildings. The phone company modem has a wireless plugged into it and the cat 5 plugged into it also. Have a wireless on the end of the cat 5. Great coverage in each building and in good coverage in between them.

 

[Maxify55]

We used two of these:

Amazon.com: Ubiquiti PicoStationM2HP - Wireless Access Point - AirMax - 82.11 B/G/N (PICOM2HUS): Computers & Accessories

Hope this helps

1/4 mi Omni-directional range

 

[kelving884]

I had the same problem and fixed it was a WiFi extender. It's basically a WiFi repeter. They range from about $40 to $100.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Cabling is always better, but lightning can play havoc with that approach. I needed to run beyond what CAT 5 is good for, so I use RG 6 coax with Media Converters at each end back to Eithnernet. I put lightning protection at each end of the coax.

 

[Kenneth in Texas]

im looking to do this totally wireless, without burying any wire.

 

[Shaneard]

im looking to do this totally wireless, without burying any wire.

You can do it without burying it but wireless will be tough

 

[Industrial Toys]

Not tough, but not nearly as good (fast).

 

[vvanders]

Not tough, but not nearly as good (fast).

Totally depends, some people do 50mi point to point, although that's usually with more than 5 watts and on something lower than 2.4/5Ghz.

OP: Look into directional antennas + router with a SMA connection. You'll need one on each end pointing at each other but 250ft with a clear line of sight should be doable.

 

[newbury]

We used two of these:

Amazon.com: Ubiquiti PicoStationM2HP - Wireless Access Point - AirMax - 82.11 B/G/N (PICOM2HUS): Computers & Accessories

Hope this helps

1/4 mi Omni-directional range

I second that. My BIL has a similar situation in town.

Going from pin to pin (his office to his house)

it's about 150 yards with some vegetation.
He's been running it for about 5 years, basically using his practice's internet for ALL his internet.

 

[MAX28HST]

Check out Engenius Technology... Great solution based products:

Sector Antenna Promotion | EnGenius Technologies

 

[Kenneth in Texas]

Not tough, but not nearly as good (fast).

what i will need to do is check email and download attachments no more than a meg in size and i will be happy.

 

[beowulf]

There are very likely many, many members who know more about this than I do. However, I had a problem with getting a wifi signal in our gym which was about 50 feet from the house and about 110 feet from the modem-router. I tried signal boosters located at the other end of the house, access points and moving things around. Nothing worked. So, finally I bit the bullet and ran an ethernet cable from the modem-router all the way to the gym. Fortunately, I had already run a pvc underground conduit for a satellite tv cable and with a fish tape I was able to pull the new ethernet cable. Cable was not that expensive, tho I had to buy an new crimping tool for the cable. It now works perfectly.

 

[Industrial Toys]

I share my Internet with my neighbor about a quarter mile away. We use Engenius. I don't have the patience, but my friend does. He has spent untold days trying to troubleshoot that stuff. I can't see my own tower where the Internet comes in, so we used to send it to his place first, then back to mine. It worked good for a while, although took days to get it set up, but finally nothing but trouble.

That's when I just got coax and Verocity High Wire Media Converters. Now he, is on his own and I have a wonderful and reliable connection.

Even my IT friends don't know the terminology that Engenius uses. The most user unfriendly stuff out there. And we had radio failures to boot. Most under warranty, but neither of us can climb the tower (for fear) to the fifty or so foot mark, so it's a PITA when the radios fail.

Last time, we sent a young girl up the tower.

 

[ustmd]

Another vote for the Eugenius products.

I had almost the exact same situation. My shop is 270 ft from the house. Down hill with the metal barn in the way. If I stood on the roof of my shop, I could get a very weak and unreliable Wifi signal from Nighthawk router in the house.

I put one of these on a pole on the roof of the shop (same pole as the weather station) and bingo, I have internet in the shop that performs just like the internet in the house:

Amazon.com: EnGenius 11n 2.4GHz Wireless Ethernet Bridge/Access Point (ENH22): ENGENIUS: Computers & Accessories

The set up is a little confusing at first, bust I found some instructions on the internet (maybe even on one of the Amazon reviews) that made it easy.

 

[bigdeano]

I bought a high power USB wifi adapter on ebay. I can access my neighbor's wifi which is in his house 300' away from inside my house. It picks up many signals that the built in wifi in my notebook can't see. I use it sitting in my car to access free wifi hotspots in town without having to go inside the building. It has an antenna about 15" long. Only cost about $20 as I remember.

 

[jwstewar]

I installed the Engenious products to watch our 8 barn cameras. They work well, even though after about a week the cameras overload the Ethernet Switch in the barn and I have to restart the Ethernet switch. I'm in the process of installing another for a customer and their barn, I then have another set to install at a business so that he can use the Internet at his house, and also putting a proposal together to use another one for a barn camera system.

 

[Nutria57]

Cabling is always better, but lightning can play havoc with that approach. I needed to run beyond what CAT 5 is good for, so I use RG 6 coax with Media Converters at each end back to Eithnernet. I put lightning protection at each end of the coax.

I need to run about 750 feet and was considering this approach. Which media converter did you use as well as the lightning protection

 

[TractorGuy]

I bought a high power USB wifi adapter on ebay. I can access my neighbor's wifi which is in his house 300' away from inside my house. It picks up many signals that the built in wifi in my notebook can't see. I use it sitting in my car to access free wifi hotspots in town without having to go inside the building. It has an antenna about 15" long. Only cost about $20 as I remember.

Got a link?