Woosh reception

Forums › New Zealand Broadband › Woosh reception

Rickles

3108 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#7649 1-May-2006 09:54

Hi y'all,

Does anyone have advice on how to improve reception? At the moment my Signal Strength is 38 - 40% and and Signal Quality/Delta 13 - 15.

How can I improve these figures? Moving the modem higher (in the room) appears to worsen reception!

I am about 500/700 metres from a Basestation. Does the booster antenna add anything? Is there an external aerial available?

Thanks,

R.

juha

1317 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7

Trusted

#34366 1-May-2006 10:42

Rickles: Hi y'all,

Does anyone have advice on how to improve reception? At the moment my Signal Strength is 38 - 40% and and Signal Quality/Delta 13 - 15.

How can I improve these figures? Moving the modem higher (in the room) appears to worsen reception!

I am about 500/700 metres from a Basestation. Does the booster antenna add anything? Is there an external aerial available?

Thanks,

R.

Yes, the booster helps a lot. Definitely worth having, but it will limit your portability. It's also a passive aerial, so it comes with a stiff coax cable. Not very wireless, IOW.

Also, did you upgrade the modem firmware as Woosh requested?

See my blog entry here.

Juha

Rickles

3108 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#34368 1-May-2006 10:53

Hi Juha,

Thanks for reply. Yes, modem firmware is all up to date.

Do I understand correctly that the booster antenna will help, even if moving the modem itself around the room/house doesn't?

I've read that the booster antenna is attached to a window ... is that merely convenience or best practice because my window is on the opposite side of the house to the Basestation.

Cheers,

R.

juha

1317 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7

Trusted

#34369 1-May-2006 10:59

Rickles: Hi Juha,

Do I understand correctly that the booster antenna will help, even if moving the modem itself around the room/house doesn't?

I've read that the booster antenna is attached to a window ... is that merely convenience or best practice because my window is on the opposite side of the house to the Basestation.

Yeah, it will help boost the reception even though moving the modem doesn't. As with all aerials, you should point the Woosh one towards the base station. Otherwise there's not much point in getting one, as it won't pick up the signal. The Woosh signal doesn't penetrate buildings all that well which is why they tell you to stick the aerial to a window. I've had my one outside the house, as none of my windows face the base station either. Needless to say, that's a pain...

Juha

Rickles

3108 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#34371 1-May-2006 11:23

Juha,

Again, thanks for response and advice. Is the booster antenna reasonably weatherproof for outside installation?

Must say the increased speed this morning is brilliant ... tests show I'm getting well over 1Gb download speeds locally and way up there offshore too.

R.

juha

1317 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 7

Trusted

#34372 1-May-2006 11:27

Rickles: Juha,

Again, thanks for response and advice. Is the booster antenna reasonably weatherproof for outside installation?

Must say the increased speed this morning is brilliant ... tests show I'm getting well over 1Gb download speeds locally and way up there offshore too.

R.

Yeah, it'll hold up in the rain just fine but be careful if you have lots of lightning strikes in your area :)

Must set it up again here to see if I too will get 1Mbit/s downloads (1Gbit/s would be nice, but... it's probably a few more upgrades ahead :))

Juha

Conrad

5 posts

Wannabe Geek
Inactive user

#34376 1-May-2006 12:18

I had severe reception problems so I put the internal aerial on the roof on a tv aerial bracket and got some low loss cable. I now have really good reception even though I am at least 2 km from the POP and there is a slight hill in the way.

Get the "internal aerial" from woosh, it doesnt have a very long cable on it though. The internal aerial is not in theory capable of being put outside, in practice I have had it on my roof for a year. The cable it is supplied with is not good quality and so I had to get expensive low loss cable from the roof to the Woosh modem otherwise the aerial gain is quickly eaten up by the loss in the cable.

The low loss cable is hard to bend so can not go through tight turns, If you want to, you could put the aerial in a microwave proof plastic containter to give it some extra protection.

The POPs seem to use stacked antennae, which are very directional so if you are close to an antenna but in a dead zone the signal strength could still be low

To avoid spending money for no good reason I would confirm good reception by holding the aerial up in the air on a ladder etc. before committing to buying aerial cable and a TV aerial bracket. You stand on a ladder with the "internal aerial" wave it about and your friend tells you the signal strength, if you still cant get good signal forget it.

The other theoretical way round this problem is to connect the aerial to your modem in the roof cavity (or remote position in your house where there is good signal strength) and then to a wired or wireless router and then connect to your pc via wireless or a wired network. This gets around the losses in the aerial cable as it minimises the length of aerial cable you have to use. I dont like this idea as I like to keep an eye on the modem / router indicator lights and be able to reset them easily if required, the woosh modem also would need a power point at the remote location.

I also have had no end of problems getting a wireless router working with the Woosh IPwireless modem. Does anyone know how to get a Cisco/Linksys WRT54G working (version 5 firmware). I have contacted Linksys, Woosh help desk and IPwireless to no avail?? I borrowed a Belkin wireless router and it worked, however I like the Linksys wireless router its a nice blue colour and its got two aerials and I want to get it working...so much for buying the supposed best of breed Cisco Linksys.

HP

Shop now for HP laptops and other devices (affiliate link).

Rickles

3108 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#34379 1-May-2006 12:55

Juha,

>1Gbit/s would be nice, but... it's probably a few more upgrades ahead :))<

Ooops .... fickle fingers <BG>.

R.

Rickles

3108 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#34380 1-May-2006 12:59

Conrad,

Many thanks for your input ... good ideas to work through there. I like the idea of placing the antenna in a waterproof plastic box and using low loss cable <s>.

R.