Recently my parents got broadband out in the middle of nowhere in rural Alberta. After setting up a standard Linksys WRT54GL (openwrt of course), they found the signal was reachable up to 400 feet away from the access point (across the yard--the AP is by an office window)! Not quite far enough to reach my Grandmother's house, but close. So I had them pick up another router, which I also configured to use OpenWRT. Following the simple instructions, I enabled WDS (wireless distribution system) and now the second AP acts as a relay, extending the wireless signal even further. Although the signal from my parents' home wasn't strong enough to penetrate the walls of my grandmother's house, the relaying access point is able to see the other AP from the garage, and extend the coverage into the house. So they have continuous wireless coverage across an area that now extends about 600' from the house where the broadband is actually terminated. Pretty impressive, I must say. Certainly I have never had wireless signal go more than 100-200' in Provo. They must have almost no 2.4 GHz noise out in the rural area. They are probably not getting the full 54 Mb/s, but I'd be surprised if they weren't getting 20 Mb/s across the WDS link, even in a light rain storm.
Has anyone else got a stock 802.11g router to reach that far (at 400' they could connect a MacBook to it still)? Anyway, If anyone is interested in setting up WDS between two APs with identical firmwares, it is very easy on openWRT. Just install the web interface and then the options are under network/advanced wireless settings. Just be aware that WPA2 will not work at all. But WPA1 (PSK1) works quite nicely. Michael /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
