Question Making a wireless hotspot?

[dominover]

I"m in the process of looking at building a wireless WiFi hotspot. I have a specific wireless adapter I want to use and it will typically be one which will have a good chance of picking up a WiFi signal if one is near. Basically this modem will pick up a better signal than my phone or laptop will.

So I will have a WiFi adapter, but...... to make this work I will need a PC to connect it to. This is where I"m stuck!

Is there a unit made especially for this (like a mini pc specifically for creating a hotspot), or can I use one of those mini pc blocks you can buy, which you connect
all your monitors and keyboards into? I am probably looking for something with x86 cpu architecture.

I can't imagine I'm the first to think this up, so I'm wondering if any of you know how to go about this. Below are some of the things I am trying to achieve.

1 - This unit must be small and portable as it should act as a strong portable wireless repeater or wireless signal booster.
2 - The pc component (keeping in mind that it will have a WiFi adapter plugged into it) will need to be able to run off a power bank if possible? OR something small and portable.
3 - Please keep in mind that I want to use my own modem. I realize some of these mini pc's come with built in modems but I want to use my own.

Any help on this project would be greatly appreciated as at this stage I am not sure where to start. Maybe hotspot isn't the right word, it could be a signal repeater I'm asking about!
Thanks

 

[ShawnWager]

What about MiFi? I'm using a Netgear MR1100 and I can't describe it any other way than amazing... AT&T still sells $30 unlimited data plans that don't have data caps and aren't throttled... I've almost hit a terabyte in a month!

It's a little ahead of its time so the firmware isn't perfect - but it has some amazing features so far. When I'm home it gets plugged into my main router's WAN port so I can watch Netflix and game on my PC, whatever I want. When I'm on the road, its can charge my phone and give free data to all my friends. I literally don't go anywhere without it!

 

[gggplaya]

Sorry for the late reply, tom's new forum isn't sending me email notifications like it used to.

The Travel Router I linked earlier only needs 5v usb power. It uses very little energy to operate. I also don't see the need for 5ghz band as most free wifi hotspots are all 2.4ghz for better distance. 5ghz does not travel very far through objects, walls, trees, hills etc.... It's very doubtful you'll receive good 5ghz signals at your barn. 2.4ghz I think is the only real frequency you'll get.

The removable antennas I think are key to getting the best signal, also using a directional wifi antenna to point to the signal source and mounting it high outside your barn will give you significantly better coverage.

A directional antenna like this will be very discreet, the sma connector should plug right into that little router: https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-Dire...wifi+antenna&qid=1551378122&s=gateway&sr=8-10