gonesailing13
Senior Member
Does anyone know of a wi-fi antenna booster that won't set me back 3-4 hundred dollars ? Everyone I looked at were over priced, at least for my budget.
Does anyone know of a wi-fi antenna booster that won't set me back 3-4 hundred dollars ? Everyone I looked at were over priced, at least for my budget.
Does anyone know of a wi-fi antenna booster that won't set me back 3-4 hundred dollars ? Everyone I looked at were over priced, at least for my budget.
I have the Wave Wifi booster which works fine.
The problem is it is getting very hard to find a hot spot that is not protected.
I can usually pick up at least 50 networks, lucky if there is one that is not password protected and strong enough to be usable.
Is there better systems out there that will pick up a cell tower over twenty five miles away?
You can do cell towers at pretty decent ranges if you generally have line of site and use a directional antenna.
While I haven't tried it, the Wilson Electronics cellular boosters with an omni antenna mounted high on a mast could have a pretty significant effect on cellular coverage as long as there is no intervening terrain.
I bought something, I believe it was an "Alfa" brand or something similar for about $30 a couple years ago. It bosts weak sgnals and is better than the internal receiver in a laptop.Does anyone know of a wi-fi antenna booster that won't set me back 3-4 hundred dollars ? Everyone I looked at were over priced, at least for my budget.
I would look at his device with an external antenna. It uses a 12 vdc power supply so could be wired into battery power, seems to be easy to use and has a 4 port ethernet hub. I went with a high dollar system and don't think it is any better than this. I find more often than not I am Wifi tethering my Iphone to the hotspot and using it for internet access.
Amazon.com: EnGenius Technologies 4-Port Wireless N300 Media Bridge and Extender (ERB300H): Computers & Accessories
Antenna
Amazon.com: TP-LINK TL-ANT2415D 2.4GHz 15dBi Outdoor Omni-directional Antenna, N Female connector, weather resistant: Electronics
Cable
Amazon.com: TRENDnet Low Loss Reverse SMA Female to N-Type Male Weatherproof Connector Cable (8M, 26.2ft.) TEW-L208: Computers & Accessories
In other words, at home, your home network connected to broadband or cable or phone, you set up your own Wifi and you're good to go.
On the other hand, with open Wifi you may as well invite everyone into your computer and even with an encrypted commercial Wifi, you are hoping that network has not been compromised, either with or without the owners knowledge.
That's some additional thread drift but two things:
WPA is important because even people knowing the password cannot see your traffic. WEP doesn't have that advantage and should be feared in the same way as open WiFi.
Note though that a VPN protects your network traffic in both directions even on a completely open network.
That's some additional thread drift but two things:
- A quality VPN will secure your connection, even on an open WiFi router. Expect to pay about $70 per year today for that service ("quality" being the important term above).
- Having your own WiFi at home with an open router is also a security problem but I'd assume that everyone with a home router uses WPA security/passwords today.
The thing to be very careful about is an open marina WiFi system. The marina keeps it open because they are tired of answering the, "what's the password" question. In that case, anyone else, including the 14 year old in the condos next to the marina, can easily view your traffic including some email passwords. A few years ago, someone on Panbo told me that I was making that up. So I used a couple of free tools and provided a packet dump showing a password in the open of another device on the marina's WiFi setup.
WPA is important because even people knowing the password cannot see your traffic. WEP doesn't have that advantage and should be feared in the same way as open WiFi.
Note though that a VPN protects your network traffic in both directions even on a completely open network.