Geekzone: technology news, blogs, forums
Guest
Welcome Guest.
You haven't logged in yet. If you don't have an account you can register now.


AndrewBright

2 posts

Wannabe Geek


#284228 8-Apr-2021 21:09
Send private message

Hi,

 

We've had patchy internet for about the last year and - long story short - I think the problem is with the wifi signal from our Vodafone Ultra Hub. I'm looking for advice about what to do next to solve this.

 

> We live in a small flat in a rural area near Christchurch. We have good signal strength to all devices. There are four of us living here and connecting to an unlimited internet plan. Speedtest shows about 20Mb down, 1 Mb up, 19ms ping. 

 

> We've had Vodafone run numerous line tests and they've always come back showing no faults or disconnections over 24 hours. A technician from Chorus has come out twice and is happy that the signal is strong and reliable to our phone jack.

 

> I've run a pair of connection monitor extensions for Chrome - one plugged directly into the modem by ethernet cable that showed no disconnections over a 48 hour period. The second monitored our internet connection over wifi during the same period and logged 80-ish disconnections. So the problem seems to be with the wifi signal/network rather than the internet service itself.

 

> We're in a steel framed building. I'm not aware of anything locally that could be interrupting the wifi signal but who knows what's out there. We have noticed some regularity to the disconnections but nothing concrete.

 

> I've tried changing the channel the signal is on but can't tell which direction to move in and no changes I've made seem to make any difference.

 

Vodafone will only help fix the service up to the phone jack so I'm not sure where to go from here. Does anyone here have any ideas, or can you recommend a third party technician that can help sort this problem? Thanks :)


Create new topic
Linux
11424 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted
Lifetime subscriber

  #2689622 8-Apr-2021 21:51
Send private message

@AndrewBright " steel framed building " not friendly for Wi-Fi at all

 

Edit: Copy of a post by @iainw

 

The biggest impact a steel framed house will have is a dramatic increase in multipath interference.

All that extra metal is going to mean a lot more signals bouncing all over the place.

If you use 802.11n, then this is a good thing and it will actually increase your range and throughput compared to a wooden frame.  If you use 802.11a/b/g then it is a bad thing, and your range will be shorter, and your throughput will be less.  You can mitigate this by making sure your access point supports antenna diversity (two antennas) - on consumer grade equipment, many times one of the two antennas is actually internal, so you can't always tell by looking at the picture.

As to coverage, assuming a fairly typical 25mW radio with a 2dBi antenna, this will give you 54Mbps at up to 80m through clear air with a reasonable margin of error.  Every GIB wall it goes through halves the signal strength (-3dBi loss).




MurrayM
2456 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified
Trusted
Lifetime subscriber

  #2689757 9-Apr-2021 11:04
Send private message

Would this be a good candidate for Vodafone SuperWiFi?


nztim
3816 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified
Trusted
TEAMnetwork
Subscriber

  #2689816 9-Apr-2021 11:14
Send private message

Steel frame = ethernet everywhere 





Any views expressed on these forums are my own and don't necessarily reflect those of my employer. 


Create new topic





News and reviews »

Air New Zealand Starts AI adoption with OpenAI
Posted 24-Jul-2025 16:00


eero Pro 7 Review
Posted 23-Jul-2025 12:07


BeeStation Plus Review
Posted 21-Jul-2025 14:21


eero Unveils New Wi-Fi 7 Products in New Zealand
Posted 21-Jul-2025 00:01


WiZ Introduces HDMI Sync Box and other Light Devices
Posted 20-Jul-2025 17:32


RedShield Enhances DDoS and Bot Attack Protection
Posted 20-Jul-2025 17:26


Seagate Ships 30TB Drives
Posted 17-Jul-2025 11:24


Oclean AirPump A10 Water Flosser Review
Posted 13-Jul-2025 11:05


Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7: Raising the Bar for Smartphones
Posted 10-Jul-2025 02:01


Samsung Galaxy Z Flip7 Brings New Edge-To-Edge FlexWindow
Posted 10-Jul-2025 02:01


Epson Launches New AM-C550Z WorkForce Enterprise printer
Posted 9-Jul-2025 18:22


Samsung Releases Smart Monitor M9
Posted 9-Jul-2025 17:46


Nearly Half of Older Kiwis Still Write their Passwords on Paper
Posted 9-Jul-2025 08:42


D-Link 4G+ Cat6 Wi-Fi 6 DWR-933M Mobile Hotspot Review
Posted 1-Jul-2025 11:34


Oppo A5 Series Launches With New Levels of Durability
Posted 30-Jun-2025 10:15









Geekzone Live »

Try automatic live updates from Geekzone directly in your browser, without refreshing the page, with Geekzone Live now.



Are you subscribed to our RSS feed? You can download the latest headlines and summaries from our stories directly to your computer or smartphone by using a feed reader.