Sudden Wireless disconnections

[kirab]

Hey all, I've got an interesting problem
So basically I've owned a Linksys WRT54G router for a few years and even when my laptop's two floors away, I still had a somewhat ok connection that never dropped (signal status was mainly low however). The issue is that in the past few months I've been getting a lot of disconnections which are pretty random. It'll say that it's working fine and then all of a sudden I get disconnected, and I get reconnected anywhere between 5 s - 15 mins. I know the problem has to do with the range because in my sister's room, the connection never goes out like that. My theory is that since more people have been getting wireless connections in the neighbourhood, that the interference is causing my already weak connection to die out (although I'm not sure if this is true).

So what should I do? Buy a new G router /w speed booster (although I'm not sure this would improve the range), or buy one of the new non-standard N routers? Or something else all together? Thanks for the help.

[glc]

Try a different channel. Default is 6, try 1 or 11. Update your firmware.

[kirab]

Thanks for the quick reply. However, It might take a few days to get back to you guys and tell you whether its working or not because there have been times when there were whole days when there were no disconnections, but the next day for example, I would have trouble staying connected.

[glc]

I had to experiment with channels to keep my sister's wireless connected - there were 5 available networks sitting in her kitchen. The hazards of living in high density housing.

[kirab]

Ah, so new connections do indeed have an impact on interference. That would probably explain it. I'm using the newer firmware now and so far there have been no disconnections today.

[kirab]

Updated firmware, tried channels 1 and 6 to no avail. And a few days later the laptop's HDD fried (which is not in any way related to the wireless disconnections of course), as can be seen in this thread: http://forum.pcmech.com/showthread.php?t=177930

Once I get a new HDD, I'll test the wireless on channel 11.