Maximum length of extension wire between AP and external antenna?

[spyrule]

Hello,
I've got a RT-N66U wifi router, running the latest Shibby version of Tomato (Tomato Firmware 1.28.0000 MIPSR2-123 K26AC USB AIO-64K)

I'm looking to replace the router/firewall with a dedicated Sophos box, but I want to continue using this device as a Wifi AP.

I live in a bungalow, and if I place my AP up on the main floor, I get zero wifi downstairs (my floor contains quite a bit of large older steel ventilation so...).

So I placed my AP downstairs (where me and the wife watch TV). So I'd like to run an antenna upstairs, assuming that I can run a wire that long.

So, what I'm wondering is how long of an extension can I add to the AP to an external wifi antenna before it loses too much signal/causes too much lag to be useful ?

Side note: I've tried a repeater, but I find, everytime I tried one, my devices would flip/flop between the two APs, and cause constant interruptions.

 

[digitaldoc]

http://www.makeuseof.com/answers/can-the-antenna-length-of-a-wireless-router-be-increased-to-extend-its-wi-fi-coverage/

I would not recommend the strategy you are proposing of wiring a separate antenna. Rather, I would either run a separate Ethernet cable to the floor that needs coverage, and set up an AP, or if this is not practical, I would use Powerline networking adapters to get the signal to the uncovered floor, and add an AP from there. If you name the 2nd AP with a different name, the devices should be able to hold onto the signal and not do the flip flopping between the 2 signals.

 

[bill001g]

The cost is not likely worth it. Microwave antenna cable is very costly and you will likely have to buy custom made cable assemblies. If the ends are not soldered on correctly you can get huge signal loss.

If you really want to do this you need to buy LMR600 cable. Even at this you are going to lose almost 5db of signal on 2.4g and 8db of signal on 5g at 100ft. This is more than the antennas you put on the ends in most cases.

You can get better cable for more money than lmr600 but it gets extremely difficult to install because of how stiff the cable is.


If you can run cables I would run ethernet....even fiber optic would be cheaper than microwave cable.

 

[HyNrgy]

agreed, do not want to do the antenna extension.

i have that asus router and run the merlin asus firmware and use it in wired bridged mode from another router and have no issues. There is lots of information on how to do wired bridged mode and help here too.

One important reminder is that reserve the ip for the second router/ap/bridged device in the first router and assign that ip to the second device instead of having it do dhcp that way if you need to do any configurations you will know what ip to use to get into router 2

 

[spyrule]

Well,
After a little more research, I'm going to replace the AP with a custom built Sophos UTM with wifi and place it downstairs, and then move my AP upstairs, which should completely solve my access.

The only thing that doesn't make sense to me, is how does a device switch between two APs without losing it's connection (say I'm streaming netflix on my ipad, and go from downstairs to upstairs). I thought for this to happen seamlessly, they both need to have the same SSID/Password ?

 

[bill001g]

It will never be seamless. You chose to manually do it or you let the software decide when thinks it should switch. In ether case you will see a small disruption because it must regenerate all the encryption keys. It should only be a second or two if it work ok.

The main issue with letting the software pick is it tends to stay with what it connects to and does not even look for another signal until it loses the first. This means you could connect to the first walk over and place the device on top of the second AP and it will stay connected to the first if it can get any signal. Not sure about ipad but on pc you can change the point it looks with roaming aggressiveness setting in the nic but if you set it too high it will constantly jump back and forth. The only true solution is a special driver used on some commercial AP systems so the centralized ap controller can tell the pc when to switch it sorta works like a cell tower system. Not cheap and tends to be a pain to keep the customer driver installed on everything.

Generally I prefer to control where I am connected to and when manually.