Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some multiple
of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
attached to it. Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3 small
offices, clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a Dlink
DWL-520 PCI card. The first of these offices is relatively open to the
hallway running from equipment room, and its signal reception is tolerable -
about 40% on the Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't drop and the
speed is acceptable for internet usage. The computers in the other two
offices, however, will not work at all with the included Dlink antenna.
Because of the way the offices are positioned, approximately 3-4 additional
walls are brought into play between the computers and the router, as
compared to the first office. I purchased the Hawking corner antenna
thinking it might improve things attached either to one of the client
computers or to the Dlink router, with the omni antenna attached to the
client(s). With the omni on the router and the corner antenna on the
clients, I can just barely get signal. It's not enough to maintain the
link. Swapping the antennas around doesn't make any significant difference.
From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model, which
I've used many times.
There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm in
a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can make this
work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
Any input is greatly appreciated.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
JM wrote:
> I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
> Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some multiple
> of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
> I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
> our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
> attached to it. Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3 small
> offices, clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a Dlink
> DWL-520 PCI card. The first of these offices is relatively open to the
> hallway running from equipment room, and its signal reception is tolerable -
> about 40% on the Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't drop and the
> speed is acceptable for internet usage. The computers in the other two
> offices, however, will not work at all with the included Dlink antenna.
> Because of the way the offices are positioned, approximately 3-4 additional
> walls are brought into play between the computers and the router, as
> compared to the first office. I purchased the Hawking corner antenna
> thinking it might improve things attached either to one of the client
> computers or to the Dlink router, with the omni antenna attached to the
> client(s). With the omni on the router and the corner antenna on the
> clients, I can just barely get signal. It's not enough to maintain the
> link. Swapping the antennas around doesn't make any significant difference.
> From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
> waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model, which
> I've used many times.
> There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm in
> a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can make this
> work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
> Any input is greatly appreciated.
>
> Thank you,
>
> jm
So that's why CompUSA was selling that antenna for $10.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
3-4 walls! What are they made from, ferro-concrete or with some other
metallic material in them that is acting as a shield. It seems as if you are
quite lucky even getting sufficient signal into the first room.
It would seem as if the router should be located somewhere in the three
offices where it will not be shielded to the same extent. It may be easier
to ethernet the three offices back to a point where there is an acceptable
signal but then perhaps the complete link should be ethernet and not
wireless anyway. There are some situations where wireless is really not
practical and you may well have one of them despite good antennas etc.
Peter
"JM" <jm@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:8wG1f.1461$Hs.733@tornado.ohiordc.rr.com...
> I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
> Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some
multiple
> of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
> I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
> our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
> attached to it. Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3 small
> offices, clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a
Dlink
> DWL-520 PCI card. The first of these offices is relatively open to the
> hallway running from equipment room, and its signal reception is
tolerable -
> about 40% on the Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't drop and the
> speed is acceptable for internet usage. The computers in the other two
> offices, however, will not work at all with the included Dlink antenna.
> Because of the way the offices are positioned, approximately 3-4
additional
> walls are brought into play between the computers and the router, as
> compared to the first office. I purchased the Hawking corner antenna
> thinking it might improve things attached either to one of the client
> computers or to the Dlink router, with the omni antenna attached to the
> client(s). With the omni on the router and the corner antenna on the
> clients, I can just barely get signal. It's not enough to maintain the
> link. Swapping the antennas around doesn't make any significant
difference.
> From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
> waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model, which
> I've used many times.
> There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm
in
> a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can make
this
> work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
> Any input is greatly appreciated.
>
> Thank you,
>
> jm
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
"DanR" <dhr22@sorrynospm.com> wrote in message
news:BPH1f.1083$ht7.250@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com ...
>
>
> JM wrote:
>> I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
>> Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some
>> multiple
>> of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
>> I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
>> our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
>> attached to it. Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3
>> small
>> offices, clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a
>> Dlink
>> DWL-520 PCI card. The first of these offices is relatively open to the
>> hallway running from equipment room, and its signal reception is
>> tolerable -
>> about 40% on the Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't drop and the
>> speed is acceptable for internet usage. The computers in the other two
>> offices, however, will not work at all with the included Dlink antenna.
>> Because of the way the offices are positioned, approximately 3-4
>> additional
>> walls are brought into play between the computers and the router, as
>> compared to the first office. I purchased the Hawking corner antenna
>> thinking it might improve things attached either to one of the client
>> computers or to the Dlink router, with the omni antenna attached to the
>> client(s). With the omni on the router and the corner antenna on the
>> clients, I can just barely get signal. It's not enough to maintain the
>> link. Swapping the antennas around doesn't make any significant
>> difference.
>> From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
>> waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model,
>> which
>> I've used many times.
>> There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm
>> in
>> a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can make
>> this
>> work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
>> Any input is greatly appreciated.
>>
>> Thank you,
>>
>> jm
>
> So that's why CompUSA was selling that antenna for $10.
>
Wow . . . that doubles the pain. CompUSA got $49.95 from me for the POS.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
"Pierre" <rainsford@ihug.com.au> wrote in message
news:di7era$t4c$1@lust.ihug.co.nz...
> 3-4 walls! What are they made from, ferro-concrete or with some other
> metallic material in them that is acting as a shield. It seems as if you
> are
> quite lucky even getting sufficient signal into the first room.
>
> It would seem as if the router should be located somewhere in the three
> offices where it will not be shielded to the same extent. It may be easier
> to ethernet the three offices back to a point where there is an acceptable
> signal but then perhaps the complete link should be ethernet and not
> wireless anyway. There are some situations where wireless is really not
> practical and you may well have one of them despite good antennas etc.
>
> Peter
>
I was hoping to make wireless work because the building contains only
category 3 wire, and the architecture makes further wiring/rewiring
impractical. I've used cat3 before for internet-only networks, and I can do
it again here by robbing some spare pairs. It's just a jack-leg way of
doing it.
Can you believe the cabling folks used ALL category 3 wire . . . in a large
prominent church built less than two years ago??
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
JM <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
Wow... long paragraph.
> I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
> Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some multiple
> of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
The setup:
> I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
> our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
> attached to it.
> Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3 small offices,
> clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a Dlink
> DWL-520 PCI card.
> The first of these offices is relatively open to the hallway running from
> equipment room, and its signal reception is tolerable - about 40% on the
> Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't drop and the speed is
> acceptable for internet usage.
Okay. This would be a good place to test antenna improvements. Marginal
signal can be improved and observed.
Does this location work at all with the stock antenna? Do you see that the
6dB omni on the router makes a difference at this location?
> The computers in the other two offices, however, will not work at all
> with the included Dlink antenna. Because of the way the offices are
> positioned, approximately 3-4 additional walls are brought into play
> between the computers and the router, as compared to the first office.
If there is no signal, we don't know yet if we need 6dB of improvement, or
100dB of improvement. It might not be possible to work at that location,
due to some unknown factors.
> I purchased the Hawking corner antenna thinking it might improve things
> attached either to one of the client computers or to the Dlink router,
> with the omni antenna attached to the client(s). With the omni on the
> router and the corner antenna on the clients, I can just barely get
> signal. It's not enough to maintain the link.
So the antenna helps, just not enough.
> Swapping the antennas around doesn't make any significant difference.
> From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
> waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model,
> which I've used many times.
What does "Swapping" mean? Which various trials did you do?
If you went from no signal to some signal, you don't know how much
improvement you have.
Did you try the 15dB antenna in the middle location? Did it improve the
signal?
Did you try the 6dB and then the 15dB at the router, measuring the change
at the middle location?
The 15dB directional antenna might need to be pointed somewhere other than
what you expect. Did you try rotating and angling in all three dimensions?
In my layout, There are two exterior walls and about 50 feet between the
router and my laptop. A directional antenna on the laptop doesn't get its
best signal pointed directly at the router. I can point it toward a
hallway, through a window that seems out of line, or at a wall toward a
window in the other room. Straight through two walls is worse.
Rotating the antenna on its horizontal axis also makes a difference. I get
better signal with the antenna horizontal than I do vertical.
> There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm
> in a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can
> make this work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
> Any input is greatly appreciated.
It would be good to know if the 15dB directional antenna is better than the
6dB omni. If it isn't return it and get another.
A directional antenna at each end would be a good thing.
I have used the freeantennas.com Windsurfer EZ-12 with good success.
I can use my windsurfer equipped Netgear router through three or four
exterior walls to an outside location 100 feet from the router to a laptop
that has no additional antenna.
--
---
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley (Lake County) CA USA 38.8,-122.5
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
On Sat, 08 Oct 2005 02:52:52 GMT, "JM" <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
>I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
>Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some multiple
>of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
>I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
>our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
>attached to it.
I just received one of the Hawking HAI6SIP omni antennas and gave it a
try on a Linksys WMP11 pci card. It worked about as well as the stock
rubber duck antenna. There's a long thin cable on the Hawking antenna
which just about negates the 6 dB antenna gain, so you end up about
where you start. But you can move the Hawking antenna around more than
the rubber duck so that might help. I might try shortening the Hawking
cable when I get the urge to destroy.
Like Clarence says, the Windsurfer reflectors are good. I was able to
double my range with one on a Netgear MR814v2 router.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
<dold@XReXXHawki.usenet.us.com> wrote in message
news:di8mrv$aq4$2@blue.rahul.net...
> JM <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Can you believe the cabling folks used ALL category 3 wire . . . in a
>> large
>> prominent church built less than two years ago??
>
> If there was some volunteer work involved, yes. I see well intentioned
> folks who donate things that would be better left in their garage.
>
> --
> ---
> Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley (Lake County) CA USA 38.8,-122.5
Very perceptive. In fact, "some volunteer work" *was* done in this case.
The guy is a long-time professional, and this was his last job prior to
retirement. In his defense, the church decision makers never imaged a true
data network, and the wiring job is first-rate - very clean and efficient.
My beef is simply that he didn't use cat5/5e anywhere.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
>
> Wow... long paragraph.
Sorry about that. Thanks for muddling through it and posting such a
thoughtful reply.
>> I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
>> Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some
>> multiple
>> of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
>
> The setup:
>
>> I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
>> our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
>> attached to it.
>
>> Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3 small offices,
>> clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a Dlink
>> DWL-520 PCI card.
>
>> The first of these offices is relatively open to the hallway running from
>> equipment room, and its signal reception is tolerable - about 40% on the
>> Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't drop and the speed is
>> acceptable for internet usage.
>
> Okay. This would be a good place to test antenna improvements. Marginal
> signal can be improved and observed.
>
> Does this location work at all with the stock antenna? Do you see that
> the
> 6dB omni on the router makes a difference at this location?
The first location is working with the stock antenna. Yes, the 6dB omni
does make a difference of the stock antenna on the router. The signal here
drops by about 1-2dB when the corner antenna is on the router. However, as
will be clarified below, I have not exhausted my options for positioning. I
really only tried the corner in one position. I guess I assumed the
direction for this antenna to be obvious because of its design.
>> The computers in the other two offices, however, will not work at all
>> with the included Dlink antenna. Because of the way the offices are
>> positioned, approximately 3-4 additional walls are brought into play
>> between the computers and the router, as compared to the first office.
>
> If there is no signal, we don't know yet if we need 6dB of improvement, or
> 100dB of improvement. It might not be possible to work at that location,
> due to some unknown factors.
I made a mistake in my original post. Of the two "bad" office locations,
one (the farthest away) is using a Dlink wireless pci NIC. It, when used
with the corner antenna, will achieve approx 25% connection on the Dlink
utility, but it's not consistent, and the signal will drop as people move
in/out of the office and through the hallway by the door. I'm confident it
can be made to work.
However, the other office, which is one wall closer to the router, is using
a Hawking pci NIC. It will connect at the "bad" rating (on the Hawking
utility), but I cannot pull an IP address. It was late, and I did not
measure the signal level at that location.
>> I purchased the Hawking corner antenna thinking it might improve things
>> attached either to one of the client computers or to the Dlink router,
>> with the omni antenna attached to the client(s). With the omni on the
>> router and the corner antenna on the clients, I can just barely get
>> signal. It's not enough to maintain the link.
>
> So the antenna helps, just not enough.
Correct.
>> Swapping the antennas around doesn't make any significant difference.
>> From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
>> waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model,
>> which I've used many times.
>
> What does "Swapping" mean? Which various trials did you do?
> If you went from no signal to some signal, you don't know how much
> improvement you have.
By "swapping" I mean that I tried the putting the corner antenna on the
router and the omni on the clients and v/v. At least as far as my own
implementations, the overall performace decreased anytime the corner antenna
was on the router. In other words, it *seems* clear that the 6dB omni is
the better choice to be used with the router.
> Did you try the 15dB antenna in the middle location? Did it improve the
> signal?
The 15dB (corner) antenna performed about the same as the stock pencil
antenna *when attached to the router*. However, it seems to be a slight
improvement over the same antenna when attached to the client.
> Did you try the 6dB and then the 15dB at the router, measuring the change
> at the middle location?
I did not measure the difference between the two antennas in the bad
offices. I was running out of time and simply trying to establish
connection.
> The 15dB directional antenna might need to be pointed somewhere other than
> what you expect. Did you try rotating and angling in all three
> dimensions?
> In my layout, There are two exterior walls and about 50 feet between the
> router and my laptop. A directional antenna on the laptop doesn't get its
> best signal pointed directly at the router. I can point it toward a
> hallway, through a window that seems out of line, or at a wall toward a
> window in the other room. Straight through two walls is worse.
>
> Rotating the antenna on its horizontal axis also makes a difference. I
> get
> better signal with the antenna horizontal than I do vertical.
>
>> There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm
>> in a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can
>> make this work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
>> Any input is greatly appreciated.
>
> It would be good to know if the 15dB directional antenna is better than
> the
> 6dB omni. If it isn't return it and get another.
>
> A directional antenna at each end would be a good thing.
>
> I have used the "Hawking HAI6SDA Directional 6dBi 2.4GHz Antenna"
> http://www.hawkingtech.com/prodSpec.php?ProdID=143 with good success.
>
> I have used the freeantennas.com Windsurfer EZ-12 with good success.
>
> I can use my windsurfer equipped Netgear router through three or four
> exterior walls to an outside location 100 feet from the router to a laptop
> that has no additional antenna.
>
This is all GREAT input, thank you. You have given me a lot of ideas. So
much so that I'm going to go out there today (Saturday) and try to work this
thing out.
I will report my experience. In the meantime, any other thoughts you have
are welcome. I really appreciate your help. I've been in the telecom/data
business for 7 years, but I am a noob in the wireless stuff. I desperately
need to flatten out the learning curve.
Thank you again.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
On Sat, 08 Oct 2005 05:21:38 GMT, "JM" <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
>I was hoping to make wireless work because the building contains only
>category 3 wire, and the architecture makes further wiring/rewiring
>impractical. I've used cat3 before for internet-only networks, and I can do
>it again here by robbing some spare pairs. It's just a jack-leg way of
>doing it.
>
>Can you believe the cabling folks used ALL category 3 wire . . . in a large
>prominent church built less than two years ago??
CAT5e costs me $58/1000ft while CAT3 is listed at $75/1000ft. In
other words, since CAT5e is much more common, it's cheaper. Sigh.
CAT3 can be used for 10mbit/sec 10BaseT-HDX (half duplex) networking
quite effectively. Just don't try it at 100BaseTX. It may require
some trickery, such as using a managed switch or ancient 10baseT hub
to force everyone down to 10baseT speeds, but it will work. I've used
much worse cabling than CAT3 for 10baseT and survived. Same with 25
pair telco bundles.
If you run out of pairs, you might look into phone line networking as
in: http://www.HomePNA.com
If you have RG-6/u CATV coax cable runs, there are ways to make that
work also: http://www.multilet.com
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
Jeff Liebermann <jeffl@comix.santa-cruz.ca.us> wrote:
> CAT5e costs me $58/1000ft while CAT3 is listed at $75/1000ft. In
> other words, since CAT5e is much more common, it's cheaper. Sigh.
The old and rare stuff always costs more.
I suspect the electrician had some lying around from ten years ago.
That made it free for the church, a good deal.
And, as you note, cat3 was fine for 10BaseT, which would be just as fast as
a poor quality 54g connection, and better than an 11b connection. Much
faster to the office that doesn't work at all.
--
---
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley (Lake County) CA USA 38.8,-122.5
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
JM wrote:
>
> I was hoping to make wireless work because the building contains only
> category 3 wire, and the architecture makes further wiring/rewiring
> impractical. I've used cat3 before for internet-only networks, and I can do
> it again here by robbing some spare pairs. It's just a jack-leg way of
> doing it.
>
> Can you believe the cabling folks used ALL category 3 wire . . . in a large
> prominent church built less than two years ago??
>
> jm
>
CAT 3 may not be the latest and greatest but it will work just fine for
an office network unless they are moving giant files around.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
I just returned from the church after 2 hours of trial and error. I moved
my two antennas around, changed positions, etc. The most striking
revelation is that these Hawking units add very, very little to the
equation. With the 6dB antenna on the router and the 15dB corner antenna on
the client, I was able to achieve a continuous 26%-32% signal (using the
Dlink utility) at the farthest office. This was after repositioning the
router/antenna in the equipment room many times. That strength of signal is
just barely sufficient for internet usage, and certainly unacceptable as a
long-term solution. For comparison, I replaced the 6dB antenna with the
stock antenna on the router - leaving the 15dB corner antenna on the client.
I was hugely disappointed (in one sense) to see that the signal dropped only
a couple of percentage points (on average), not enough to effect the link in
any significant way. In other words, the "+6dB" antenna is virtually no
improvement over the stock antenna. In fact, it seems that any performance
increase has more to do with being able to move the 6dB antenna around
slightly by virtue of its 15" cable and angle adjustment. I don't think the
antenna itself adds one bit.
I believe the same can be said for the corner antenna. I'd like to know how
Hawking arrives at this "+15dB" rating. I simply don't see it - or anything
close to it - and I'm in a real-life situation trying every possible
position and combination I can come up with.
Can these free antennas, such as the EZ-12, be used to enhance either of my
Hawking antennas. I really think I'm close to making this work, if I could
just get another consistent 10%-15% signal at the clients. I've got a
customer who's been using a similar Dlink setup (sans Hawking units), who
never gets better than 40% on the Dlink utility, but they're very happy with
things. The links don't drop, and the speed is sufficient.
If I can't achieve 40%+ in these two offices, I'm likely going to steal two
pair off a phone extension and hang an AP in one of the offices. It's
probably what I should do anyway.
jm
"JM" <jm@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:8wG1f.1461$Hs.733@tornado.ohiordc.rr.com...
>I really need to improve the range of a wireless LAN, so I picked up a
>Hawking HAI15SC corner antenna. It has increased my range by some multiple
>of ZERO, almost regardless of how I utilize it. What am I doing wrong?
> I've got a Dlink DI614+ router in a small equipment room in the middle of
> our church. Currently there is a Hawking HAI6SIP +6dbi omni antenna
> attached to it. Approximately 70 feet south of the room there are 3 small
> offices, clustered closely together, each with a workstation running a
> Dlink DWL-520 PCI card. The first of these offices is relatively open to
> the hallway running from equipment room, and its signal reception is
> tolerable - about 40% on the Dlink utility, which means the link doesn't
> drop and the speed is acceptable for internet usage. The computers in
> the other two offices, however, will not work at all with the included
> Dlink antenna. Because of the way the offices are positioned,
> approximately 3-4 additional walls are brought into play between the
> computers and the router, as compared to the first office. I purchased
> the Hawking corner antenna thinking it might improve things attached
> either to one of the client computers or to the Dlink router, with the
> omni antenna attached to the client(s). With the omni on the router and
> the corner antenna on the clients, I can just barely get signal. It's not
> enough to maintain the link. Swapping the antennas around doesn't make
> any significant difference.
> From various trial-and-error, I'm convinced that the advertised +15dBi is
> waaaay off. I'm not even sure it's as good as the +6dBi omni model, which
> I've used many times.
> There is a little money left in our budget for this type of thing, so I'm
> in a position to buy "better" or more stuff if needed. I know we can make
> this work wireless, but I'm going to have to really tweak things.
> Any input is greatly appreciated.
>
> Thank you,
>
> jm
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
"George" <george@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
news:kYudnSDNrdqIhtXeRVn-hQ@adelphia.com...
> JM wrote:
>
>>
>> I was hoping to make wireless work because the building contains only
>> category 3 wire, and the architecture makes further wiring/rewiring
>> impractical. I've used cat3 before for internet-only networks, and I can
>> do it again here by robbing some spare pairs. It's just a jack-leg way
>> of doing it.
>>
>> Can you believe the cabling folks used ALL category 3 wire . . . in a
>> large prominent church built less than two years ago??
>>
>> jm
>>
>
>
> CAT 3 may not be the latest and greatest but it will work just fine for an
> office network unless they are moving giant files around.
You're correct, and I've decided to use one of the home runs to hang an AP
in the area of the 3 offices. I would feel much better having a hard line
to that part of the building, and cat3 will do just fine, as they really
only need internet access anyway. So the weak link won't be the cable. The
rated 10Mps for cat3, or anything near it, will easily accomodate their
roadrunner broadband speeds.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
JM <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
> any significant way. In other words, the "+6dB" antenna is virtually no
> improvement over the stock antenna. In fact, it seems that any
Someone suggested that the skinny cable lost about as much signal as the
antenna gained. I think that is true of the mag mount 5dBi antenna that I
have for my laptop. There isn't any more signal, according to Netstumbler,
but there are a couple of places where it works, and without it doesn't.
> I believe the same can be said for the corner antenna. I'd like to know
> how Hawking arrives at this "+15dB" rating. I simply don't see it - or
> anything close to it - and I'm in a real-life situation trying every
> possible position and combination I can come up with.
Here, the cable shouldn't be so much of a factor. 15dB is a lot. I saw
some other respondents say the 15dB Hawking was junk. I've only used one
product from Hawking, the 6dB directional, and it helped a lot, but then it
was from a PCI card where just moving the antenna out from behind the
computer might have made a difference. I didn't spend much time with it.
I think it was $10 after rebates. I plugged it in, and it was good.
> Can these free antennas, such as the EZ-12, be used to enhance either of
> my Hawking antennas. I really think I'm close to making this work, if I
> could
No. All of the freeantennas.com templates are designed to fit onto a stock
rubber duckie dipole (except one).
You could put the Windsurfer or two onto the router. A pair of them should
give better gain than one 6dBi external antenna. Did you remove both
rubber duckies when you added the Hawking antenna? I get very poor results
with one duck and one reflector on an SMC router.
You could put windsurfers onto the DWL-520 stock antennas. The location
behind the PC is still a problem, though. As I said, I had success with
the "Hawking HAI6SDA Directional 6dBi 2.4GHz Antenna" The link I gave
earlier didn't work. Sorry, I didn't check it earlier.
<http://www.hawkingtech.com/products/productlist.php?CatID=32&FamID=58&ProdID=122>
is the proper link, today, for the 6dBI directional.
Since all your gear is 11b, there would be no loss of performance in
running 10BaseT on the cat 3 that you have, verses a perfect 802.11b link.
What is the feed, anyway? If it's DSL, move the DSL modem into the office
with the three computers. Same with cable. Why is the router in the room
that it is in? Maybe relocate all the goodies near the three PCs and run
10BaseT back to the other room if you need it.
---
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley (Lake County) CA USA 38.8,-122.5
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
<dold@XReXXHawki.usenet.us.com> wrote in message
news:di9h77$32l$1@blue.rahul.net...
> JM <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> any significant way. In other words, the "+6dB" antenna is virtually no
>> improvement over the stock antenna. In fact, it seems that any
>
> Someone suggested that the skinny cable lost about as much signal as the
> antenna gained. I think that is true of the mag mount 5dBi antenna that I
> have for my laptop. There isn't any more signal, according to
> Netstumbler,
> but there are a couple of places where it works, and without it doesn't.
>
>> I believe the same can be said for the corner antenna. I'd like to know
>> how Hawking arrives at this "+15dB" rating. I simply don't see it - or
>> anything close to it - and I'm in a real-life situation trying every
>> possible position and combination I can come up with.
>
> Here, the cable shouldn't be so much of a factor. 15dB is a lot. I saw
> some other respondents say the 15dB Hawking was junk. I've only used one
> product from Hawking, the 6dB directional, and it helped a lot, but then
> it
> was from a PCI card where just moving the antenna out from behind the
> computer might have made a difference. I didn't spend much time with it.
> I think it was $10 after rebates. I plugged it in, and it was good.
>
>> Can these free antennas, such as the EZ-12, be used to enhance either of
>> my Hawking antennas. I really think I'm close to making this work, if I
>> could
>
> No. All of the freeantennas.com templates are designed to fit onto a
> stock
> rubber duckie dipole (except one).
>
> You could put the Windsurfer or two onto the router. A pair of them
> should
> give better gain than one 6dBi external antenna. Did you remove both
> rubber duckies when you added the Hawking antenna? I get very poor
> results
> with one duck and one reflector on an SMC router.
The DI-614+ I'm using is the rev b or c, whichever is the single antenna
model.
> You could put windsurfers onto the DWL-520 stock antennas. The location
> behind the PC is still a problem, though. As I said, I had success with
> the "Hawking HAI6SDA Directional 6dBi 2.4GHz Antenna" The link I gave
> earlier didn't work. Sorry, I didn't check it earlier.
> <http://www.hawkingtech.com/products/productlist.php?CatID=32&FamID=58&ProdID=122>
> is the proper link, today, for the 6dBI directional.
> Since all your gear is 11b, there would be no loss of performance in
> running 10BaseT on the cat 3 that you have, verses a perfect 802.11b link.
Well, that's sort of another issue, too. Originally I had not planned to
use the 614, but rather a DI-524, which is 802.11g. However, as I stated in
a post above, that thing is terrible. It is much, much weaker (as a
transmiter) than the 614. Rooms where I get 30% with the 614 will drop to
10% using the 524. Huge disappointment. I just assumed that Dlink would
retain their transmit power as the products evolved.
> What is the feed, anyway? If it's DSL, move the DSL modem into the office
> with the three computers. Same with cable. Why is the router in the room
> that it is in? Maybe relocate all the goodies near the three PCs and run
> 10BaseT back to the other room if you need it.
It's roadrunner cable modem internet, and it was terminated in the same
small equipment room where the telephone and alarm systems are. That's
where all the pipes and conduit enter/leave the building. Unfortunately,
the cable modem has to stay where it is.
However, after today's trip I've decided to use two pair of the cat3 that
terminates into one unused phone jack. I'm going to put a data jack in and
hang the router there.
>Someone suggested that the skinny cable lost about as much signal as the
>antenna gained. I think that is true of the mag mount 5dBi antenna that I
>have for my laptop. There isn't any more signal, according to Netstumbler,
>but there are a couple of places where it works, and without it doesn't.
That was me. The tiny coax is either RG174 (1.2dB/meter) or RG316
(1.1dB/meter). As I recall, they usually came with 3 meters (about
10ft) of either coax, which is about 3dB coax loss, plus about 0.5dB
connector loss. That would give the 5dBi antenna a net gain of about
2dB, which is about the same as the stock rubber ducky antennas.
There's no improvement over a rubber ducky antenna, but as you
mentioned, there is an improvement in the location of the antenna,
which makes a *BIG* difference.
Re: Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong?
JM <jm@yahoo.com> wrote:
> It's roadrunner cable modem internet, and it was terminated in the same
> small equipment room where the telephone and alarm systems are. That's
> where all the pipes and conduit enter/leave the building. Unfortunately,
> the cable modem has to stay where it is.
> However, after today's trip I've decided to use two pair of the cat3 that
> terminates into one unused phone jack. I'm going to put a data jack in and
> hang the router there.
I think so. None of that other equipment appreciates having good access to
the cable modem. That feed is only ~3Mbps anyway. Using existing cat3 to
run from there back to where the computers are sounds like a good deal.
--
---
Clarence A Dold - Hidden Valley (Lake County) CA USA 38.8,-122.5
Hawking 15dbi Corner Antenna - What am I doing wrong? 
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