Propagating a Signal Through Old Walls?

avjewe asks: "I have a wireless (802.11) network in my 100 year old house. The walls are thick plaster, with enough metal in them to block the signal quite effectively. The floors, however, pass the signal just fine. Does anyone have any experience or suggestions as to how one can propagate a signal through a maze of faraday cages? I recently added an omni-directional antenna which, as one would expect, boosted the signal where I already had one, but didn't help the dead spots."

Comments

Instant PowerLine Etherfast 10/100 Bridge

[Razor's Edge]

Anybody have experience with Powerline technology in the home?

http://www.linksys.com/products/product.asp?grid =3 4&scid=33&prid=416

I've heard Siemens also has some good gear. Better than Linksys?

use the walls themselves...

[greywire]

I dont know if its possible, but could you actualy use the metal in the walls as an antenna? Just expose a part and attach your AP directly to the metal in the wall?

best solution

[JVert]

Do what parent does, if you really need wireless in each room then add an access point at each drop where you have you cabling. Its not that bad really, access points are getting very cheap and you can start with as many or as little as you want.

My solution

[teknikl]

My house is old, real old. We have wires running inside old gas light tubes for conduit and lots of knob and tube to mess with signals. The radiators don't seem to be much trouble, unless you're tx/rx ing right in front of one, course they are by the windows so it's never a problem. And yes, we have the old old plaster - very think stuff. Can't even nail in it. Still I managed to find a central location for my little netgear mr814v2 with a stock antenna to do its thing, after some trying. My perfect spot was at the VERY top (9ft up from 1st floor level - we have high ceilings) of the basement steps - attached to the ceiling. From this location it was: a) in the center of the house (very little signal leakage to outside world) b) in between the first and second floors c) hidden away where I could forget it was there and just use it. My advice is - mount it up a wall in the center of your home. Higher the better. For me... this was enough. I still have dead spots where the oversized central 19th century chimney simply refuses to pass a signal. That just means you have to sit on the OTHER sofa to check your email.

Re:My solution

[dchamp]

My house is a 2 story, 3 bedroom built in 1923, and has plaster over wood lath, not wire mesh... so I don't have quite the farraday cage issue.

My WAP (a DI-614+) is in the basement - about 5 feet off the ground on a shelf. It works great in the whole house, using just the stock antennas. Oddly, I get better reception on the 2nd floor than I do in the 1st floor living room right above the WAP.

Even though it's in the basement, I can still pick with netstumbler about 50 yard down the street with the laptop sitting in the front seat of my car. I'm running WEP and not advertising the AP....

100 year old plaster?

[millia]

don't worry, you're living on borrowed time. that plaster's about reached the end of its lifespan, and when you have to put up sheetrock, problem solved!

but seriously...
i have a similar situation, and i solved it by using my cellar to poke up cat5 and repeaters. (i've got a 65 year old house, but it's plaster *on* sheetrock- best of both worlds) my faraday cage used to drive me nuts- move 6 inches over, lose a signal. i just hid the repeaters behind furniture. *note* - i am a bachelor.

somebody needs to make a repeater/access point that fits in an electrical outlet wall-box, btw. what with schools wanting wireless everywhere, that would make it easy to do. i digress, however.

now, if you need to run cable, the trick some people do in old houses- take off the- aw dang it, words fail me. the boards around the periphery of the room, on the wall? take those off, and then raise em up about half an inch- run the cable there, and put quarter round molding in front to hide the gap and wire.

similarly, you can hide wire behind a picture rail. drilling a hole through plaster is always fin, though, as you know. (i always start a hole with, like, a 1/16th inch bit, then after i've drilled through, go back with the size i really need.)

if you try any of the verious antenna repeaters, let me know. i'd like to get a signal outside in the backyard...

Re:Sir

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Yeah - but we arene't sending 10+ MBPS 802.3 signal, either.

Powerline networking is using live, unshielded, untwisted electric wiring as a collision-tolerant physical medium to trancieve the equivalent of 802.11 datagrams...

It's "wired" wireless - for the scenario in question.

(Thinks me, to myself: "Was that a subtle troll?")