I have a Netgear WCR614 Wireless router with a 2DBi antenna. I'm using a DELL notebook in a room about 12meter away from the router. The signal strength has always been weak, mostly 1 bar only from the WinXP wireless signal icon.

I'm thinking of changing the antenna to a 4DBi. I'm wondering if the antenna on the router has upgraded but the one on my notebook remain the same, will it actually improve? Or must I upgrade both of the antenna, router and client?

I can't even find your router in Netgear's website! Are you sure it's WCR614 and not WGR614?

If it's the WGR614, then I'm fairly certain that its antenna cannot be changed.

In the event that the antenna can be changed, then you would only need to change the antenna on the router and you will almost certainly see an improvement in your signal strength and perhaps link quality as well. I don't see a need to upgrade your notebook's adapter. Also, you can't really do much with Centrino based adapters in terms of increasing signal strength or link quality unless you want to solder an external antenna connector from the mini PCI card in your notebook and run the cable outside the notebook to connect to an external antenna. Some mini PCI cards have uFL connectors for this purpose, but it will look quite ugly.

USB based adapters very very rarely have external antenna connector capability. Same goes for PC Cards. Hunting for them in KL is like trying to dig for gold, and even when you find them, you'll be shocked at the asking prices

thanks for the reply.

sorry i got the model wrong. is WGR614 indeed. i tried taking off the antenna but it seem permenant fixed.. damn...

anyway, so the client antenna is irrelevant when we trying to extend the signal gain? i thought the signal works both way? router antenna send data to client antenna, client antenna send data to router antenna?

On the contrary, client antenna is not irrelevant. But you don't need to upgrade both sides, most of the time. If the router's antenna cannot be upgraded, then you'll need to do something to boost the gain on the client adapter. As an example, I use a PC Card wifi card coupled with a medium gain antenna, coupled with a signal booster, to blast through many obstacles such as walls and trees to connect to a wireless router more than 500m away. You can connect much longer distances with less obstruction in the way. And the wireless routers that I'm connecting to come with stock low gain 2dBi omni antenna only.

You want to do some fancy stuff? How about combining USB WiFi adapter and "penapis goreng pisang" to increase the signal gained? Like this:



http://www.usbwifi.orcon.net.nz/

Or if you have spare Astro dish, it is even better!

http://forum.mydefcon.org/viewtopic.php?p=...2db8d4bafd0ace3

I've recommended this before. try with different router radio channels and see which has the highest gain.
BTW, I use a Netgear with Centrino lappie and desktop fitted with Netgear card. I get full bars on lappy from next room and 80% on my desktop downstairs. I can even connect to my neighbor's home 2 houses away also using a WGR614..so?.

Also highly recommend you to download the latest card drivers (assuming its Centrino with Intel wireless card). the older drivers, especially Intel 2200BG are known to be buggy with signal strength like yo-yo.

http://support.intel.com/support/wireless/...b/CS-010623.htm

Yours is supposidly 12m away and 1 bar...is far from satisfactory and unacceptable. Go try as suggested..good luck!

This post has been edited by bsl555: May 26 2006, 02:26 AM

thanks for the help. i will try update the driver and see if it improves.

yup, 12m away and 1 bar is pretty bad...

The updated driver are improved mostly on stability. just install over the old driver, it'll automatically uninstall the old and overwrite new.
Nevertheless, you'd still have to try different channels for best gain. Default channel is NOT always best!.

Can this method be used to increase 3G signal?