Wifi extender 1 mile across town

[kapauldo]

I live about a mile from where I work. It's a flat village and there is no direct unobstructed line of site between the highest point of my house and the office where I work. If I were to pull an imaginary string between say the second floor of my house and the office where I work, which is also on the 2nd floor, that string would go through some concrete buildings and some trees, and some wood houses.

I would like to use my home internet in my office. Is there any feasible solution for this? I've read about Amp wifi extenders and microwave, but I'm not sure how well they work with occluded lines of site. Does anyone have any experience successfully setting something like this up?

 

[Barty1884]

No direct experience, no. BUT, it's definitely possible - feasible is another question altogether, relative to your budget etc.

Directional antennas at both sites would (very) likely be needed - and the obstructions could prove problematic.

TPLink have some options, as do many others.
http://www.tp-link.com/ca/products/details/TL-WA5210G.html#over

There would be more to the distance calculation that just line of site though...... quite a bit beyond my knowledge, but I believe there's considerations for the curvature of the earth etc. IIRC, you're typically looking at placing the antennas maybe 10-20Ft higher to account for..... something :lol:

hopefully somebody else can give you some more detailed info.

 

[Snipergod87]

Not having line of sight is going to make this pretty impossible for that distance. There are long range high end wireless bridges and microwave, but microwave requires line of sight, and wireless at that distance will also really need line of sight, wifi doesn't work well through concrete and will get interference from wireless if there are other networks in the way. If you do want to attempt this you will want to use something on the 2.4Ghz band and a good reliable setup will probably cost around $1000

 

[kapauldo]

Not having line of sight is going to make this pretty impossible for that distance. There are long range high end wireless bridges and microwave, but microwave requires line of sight, and wireless at that distance will also really need line of sight, wifi doesn't work well through concrete and will get interference from wireless if there are other networks in the way. If you do want to attempt this you will want to use something on the 2.4Ghz band and a good reliable setup will probably cost around $1000

Thanks, what equipment would I need? This would save me $110 / month, so I don't mind spending $1K.

 

[Snipergod87]

As I said I not even know of such a thing would even work with obstacles. Looking around most products use the 5Ghz band which probably wont work for you at all. Ubiquiti has a range of products including some with 2.4Ghz support in their Air Fiber product line (Like the AirfiberX), although you would need to get a small antenna dish. EnGenius has some products as well. Finding and purchasing the products will be the easy part, the hard part will be pointing them properly espically if there are obstacles in the way, as there are highly directional if they are off by a a few degrees they might not get a signal at all.

 

[bill001g]

I suspect it will not work, it does not take much to block wireless.

The actual cost of the equipment is not huge. You can look at ubiquiti stuff, most likely something in their airmax line. If you had clear line of sight you could do it for about$100.

There is no way to predict how much signal will pass though objects. The older equipment that runs on 2.4g has a better chance. You main problem is that the amount of power you are allowed to transmit is regulated and you need power to get the signal through objects. Equipment that requires license can go more power but part of the license is to prove that you are safely using the equipment. 2.4g is the same frequency a microwave oven runs on, I am sure the people living in the houses you are trying to send the signal though do not want you cooking them.