Wireless Router that Could…Not

[Powertrip]

I have a linksys WRT54GR Wireless Router with Range Booster on a high speed 5 Mb cable modem. There are 3 clients. 1 10/100 PC on port 1, and 2 wireless clients, A HP Presario with a clean install of windows XP Home and a new Toshiba notebook running vista.

There are no problems with the 10/100 PC. The wireless clients are in a separate building about 15 feet – 20 feet away. I have had good luck with this routers range previously, but this time is the exception.

I have tried two different wireless cards and 2 types of wireless antennas. The first card was a belkin 54M PCI 5700 that would show good signal strength but only connect at 1.1,5 or 11 Mbits. At 1.1 you couldn’t browse, at 5 and 11 it was hit and miss. An omni antenna showed 3 other wireless networks in range with low siginal, perhaps causing interference.

The 2nd wireless card I tried in the HP was a surecom 108Mbit PCI 3026 card. It would only show low signal strength, but would connect at the full 56 Mbit speed every time, and seemed to work a lot better.

However on Sundays the client reports not being able to browse the internet or network shares, and is very frustrated with the progress (or lack of) thus far.

I tried the router on channel 1 instead of 6, and that seemed to help with download/upload speed tests but did not completely solve the problem.

What would be a good alternative router? Should I get a Range Boosted PCI card (dual antennas) instead? Is there anyway to see if interference is the problem?

Any experience with wireless networks with similar problems is appreciated!

[Panama Red]

I have a customer who had a similiar issue. He solved his problem by adding a Linksys WRE54G Range Extender. Here's Linksys info.

http://www.linksys.com/servlet/Satel...VisitorWrapper

I see you're in Canada but for info sake, here's one at Newegg for $78 US

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833124037

[glc]

Try channel 11.

You could replace one of the router antennas (it has dual antennas, correct?) with a "cantenna" and aim it at the other building.

www.cantenna.com

The best results would be with matching GR-series wireless adapters. I have a WPC54GR card in my laptop and it works quite well.