Wireless Help...

[achernow.livejournal.com]

Ok.. Here's the situation...

My friend calls me and tells me that they tried to set up a wireless network in their house. None of them really know what they're doing with computers. Anyway, she said that some them had been working and had stopped and that some of them weren't working at all. Anyway, this is what I found....

As far as I can tell everything is set up properly on the access point as I can hit it from my friend's computer who is roughly 20 feet from the AP. The girl in the room directly above the AP(we'll call her roommate 2) is also able to hit it with no problem as well as the girl living directly below the AP (roommate 3). Now, here comes the fun part.

There is one girl upstairs (roommate 4) who cannot see the house's AP but can see APs from the houses next door. My first guess was that she was out of range of the AP but I moved her antenna (It's an external USB box) to the top of the door at the bottom of the stairs (line of sight to the AP) and it still did not "see" it. She is running XP Home on that computer w/ a Linksys USB adapter.

Roommate 5 has a laptop running XP that is unable to connect to the internet even though she can connect to the AP and obtain an IP from it.

Roommate 6's computer was not able to connect according to my friend but that roommate was not home so I could not verify this. (She is on the same floor as the AP).

Roommate 7's computer is located on the same floor as Roommate 3 but was password protected so I could not verify if it could connect (and they did not know).

Finally Roommate 8's computer is an old Pentium running Win 95 so yeah.. it's not going to connect anyway.

So what does everyone think? Can I save their network or should I reboot the AP and start over from scratch?

Comments

[rhonan.livejournal.com]

Roommate four sounds like her problem is might be that the AP in the house in question has its SSID turned off. Windows XP will always give preference to an AP that broadcasts its SSID over one that doesn't, regardless of what preference any other setting gives the APs. Which would explain why it is trying to connect next door. Roommate five could be a variant of that issue. What was the proximity of user5's laptop to the AP? What is roommate 6's computer running? If it's WinXP... See above.

[packethead.livejournal.com]

Could be that the neighbor's AP is operating on the same radio channels as the one you have configured. Find out what the other AP(s) are operating on, then set your AP on to channels in between. It may take a bit of work.

[masonstone.livejournal.com]

Make sure there are no bridges set up on the XP machines. Half the time when we fight with that we end up taking out bridge connections that don't need to be there.

[liquidmercurial.livejournal.com]

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!!!

Now that I am finished with that....

Like said before: change wireless channels to 11 or 1.

Make sure the SSID broadcast is on (temporarily if need be) to connect the XP to it. I've seen XP be REALLY picky about manually configuring a non-broadcasted SSID

but most of what I just listed was already said by other people.... I hate wireless issues.

OR, if you want, here's my canned email answer that I email to customers:

You can change the channel that the wireless is being sent on. You can also try any or all of the suggestions on this page: http://www.practicallynetworked.com/support/wireless_range_probs.htm The Practically Networked page has all kinds of resources for all types of home/small office networking.

The 802.11b (Wi-Fi) wireless networking is based on the 2.4 gigahertz band of the spectrum, which is unregulated by the FCC. So, anyone who wants to use high-frequencies can use this band. Microwave ovens, cordless phones, cellular phones, digital radios, HAM equipment, walkie-talkies and some welding equipment all utilize the same small stretch of frequencies.

Home construction can also affect the signal strength greatly. Standard wood-framed houses offer the best distances, but anytime there is metal or electronic equipment around, the signals can be diffracted and diffused. One of the first questions I always ask customers is if their AP main unit is located on the floor, or on the desk next to their monitor, or perhaps on the actual computer itself. If so, this will greatly reduce the range of the wireless signals. The best thing is to think of the AP in the same way as an AM/FM antenna, and place it as high as it can reach, and at least two or three feet from monitors, computers and things like speakers and subwoofers.