On 8 Jan 2010, at 15:49, Grant wrote:
... That's a good idea, but I'm actually able to pick up the difficult AP's with the same dongle when its normal omnidirectional antenna is attached instead of the strong directional one. Could a failing antenna exhibit this behavior?
I'm extremely sceptical of these cheap external aerials. If it were an expensive one from a specialist supplier then I might have higher expectations, but I'm pretty sure a customer of mine used one similar to yours, and they used to use a book to balance it at an angle to try & get reception. This was between offices on adjacent floors, almost one right above the other (surely less than 20' sideways).
If this is important to you, look at building your own directional aerial - there are plans on various "guerilla wifi" sites, and it seems like it's not hard to build an aerial which will get you very good results indeed.
Stroller.
