Following the original discussion about the best way to get broadband over to another building several listmembers expressed interest in hearing how this was resolved.
The situation was that broadband came in to my house in the English countryside as ADSL terminating in a permanent microfiltered socket. Into this I had a router plugged, and into that an Airport Express. However this did not provide anything like a strong enough signal to penetrate several thick internal walls, let alone jump the car park over to the outbuilding that serves as my office. Nor did using another Airport as a relay. (It is not apparently possible to have multiple outlets off our ADSL point other than through a router). The best alternatives seemed to be to run some 200 feet of ethernet cable through a specially dug underground conduit - a labour intensive option - or to use line-of-sight WiFi. In the event we were able to run 100 feet of ethernet cable from the router out under the eaves of the roof to a powered high-gain antenna installed outside the house. This punches the signal straight across the yard to the office, and indeed over the whole valley. Needless to say I have used 128-bit WEP encryption to secure it. Although still conforming to the regulations governing WiFi emissions this has proved a powerful solution and less expensive than the alternatives. The antenna is a five foot white pole mounted externally and linked to a booster box indoors by five feet of shielded cable. The ethernet cable from the router plugs into the booster box. The key point is that the antenna needs to be relatively close to a power source, or rather the booster box does. The kit cost just over $100 from Netgear plus half that again for the ethernet cable. Not a bad outcome and one that could probably be deployed over considerably longer distances. Julian ___________________________________________________________________________ To unsubscribe send a mail message with a SUBJECT line of "unsubscribe" to <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> or <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
