Cabling

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Because of a fitful wireless connection between our wireless router/modem and Pc4 (in front of house study) Im considering running a 25m cat5 ethernet cable between them. However this means that I will be running the cable outside of the house. Can anyone tell me if the cable could be affected by adverse weather please? Would there be a degraded signal?

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If all the connections are inside and protected from weather, having a cable outside should not cause a signal degradation problem. You did not say if you intent the cable to be over the house, attached to the side of the house, on or in the ground, etc, but any of these solutions should only be a last-resort solution. A wireless connection in a house can/should be strong and stable. If yours is not I would recommend doing some tests to find the problem. Is the problem at the router or PC end, is the problem a range problem or do you have a local interference issue. Range problems can be addressed by putting in a simple, inexpensive repeater or by getting a wireless-N solution (new hardware). Interference problems might best be handled by wire, but it depends on the details. If it is faulty hardware on either end, then replace the offending unit. When you consider wire cost and your time to install it, a new wireless solution is not a bad alternative.

Paul

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Hi Paul – thank you for the prompt response.
This soo frustrating, the wireless connectivity I mean. We have a Netgear DG834N (bought in February 2008) This stands vertically at the back of the house in my office. on the 1st floor at the front of the house is my Son’s study. Distance, direct line, 30 feet; in between there are 3 walls and 1 ceiling. When my Son had his laptop the connection was sometimes flakey. Now he has a new desktop with a wireless card and aerial. His PC is running WVista HPE. It detects the network name ok, but will not map a shared drive. As I’m very new to Vista I don’t thinks I might be looking in the right direction(s)! We have managed to connect twice, but only for approx 15 mins until the connection dropped.
Any help will be happily received.

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Does this Vista machine have a USB wireless connection?

DaveA I am so far behind, I think I am First
Genealogy....confusing the dead and annoying the living

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DaveA: the connection is a pci slot in the back of the pc.

The homeplug doesn’t work as I understand that the plugs have to be on the same ringmain (mine are not) and that they have to be connected directly to the wall socket (not through extension leads)

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Mine aren’t on the same ring-main; one is downstairs; one is upstairs. They need to be on the same electricity meter. If you use the piggy-back 200Mbps ones from Solwise, you could bypass your second problem, provided you can get from your homeplug to your PC/homeplug to your router easily with ethernet patch cables.

BATcher

Plethora means a lot to me.

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Stephen,
So you already have a wireless-N router and a good one. This should be more than adequate for your 30 ft range unless you have copper screening in your walls . It may be a pain to do, but the first thing I would do is bring the upstairs PC down into (or near) the room with the router and go through the connection dance and see what the resulting connection is like. If the result is anything other than a strong and reliable connection then I would check the Vista setup first , then the pci card and finally the router. I do not have Vista so I cannot suggest a setup diagnosis.

Paul

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Thank you Paul very much.
Having done a clean and full re-boot of the modem yesterday, per the Netgear website – FAI : hold in the reboot swith (paperclip’s best) 20 sec, turn off power for 20 sec, repower 20 sec [so the reboot swith is off for 1 min].
Today the upstairs lapton (running Xp) picked up the network straight away, the Vista Pc took 20 mins to identify it and has now connected! We will see. Thanks again.

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Great !
I would guess that given your hardware and your house geometry you should be fine.

Paul

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When on the Vista machine. right click the “Network” icon and select Network and Sharing Center”. There tell use what you have turned on and off, or give us a screen shot of it.

A few things to check is
Network Discovery should be on.
The network name should be listed on the left side of the white pane, if it is not the same as other machines, click Customize (right side of screen). At home the setting for Location type should be “Private”,

In the blue bar on the far left side, there is a “Manage Wireless networks” entry. Find your network and double click it. Now select “Connect atomically when ………” BUT, if you do NOT broadcast the network name from the router, then you need to select “Connect even if the network is not broadcasting”

DaveA I am so far behind, I think I am First
Genealogy....confusing the dead and annoying the living

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> unless you have copper screening in your walls…

Would reo (steel reinforcement mesh and bars) in a concrete staircase and balconies qualify? If these are in a direct line between a laptop and our wireless router, things deteriorate rapidly. At other times everything is rosy, with good speed and signal strength even in the backyard 30m+ (100ft) from the router.

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Yes, reo such as you describe would surely put a damper on your internet party . In this case you would have not only some reduced field strength, but also a big multipath problem which may be the killer.

Stay off the steps.

Paul

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Why not use the Homeplug method of ethernet-over-the-mains-power-cable? Probably faster than wireless! Two ‘nominal’ 85 Mbps homeplugs have worked flawlessly for me for the last two years and 14 days… Now you can get ‘nominal’ 200 Mbps versions.

BATcher

Plethora means a lot to me.

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