Connecting two buildings together

Hi,

I am trying to connect two buildings networks together using wifi.

The buildings are about 600 meters apart, with line of sight from the
third floor, so we have no tree worries!

I was thinking about using a D-Link DWL-900AP+ at each site,
configured as a bridge, connected to the existing wired networks.

Will this work ?

What kind of antenna should I be looking at ? I have seen the
Flatenna website (www.tritium.co.uk), would this provide any benefit ?

Cheers

Dan Fulton

On 10 Aug 2004 05:37:11 -0700, (E-Mail Removed) (Dan Fulton)
wrote:

>I am trying to connect two buildings networks together using wifi.
>The buildings are about 600 meters apart, with line of sight from the
>third floor, so we have no tree worries!

Well, if you want something to worry about, think about interference
from other Wi-Fi radios. The higher you are, the more crud you hear.

>I was thinking about using a D-Link DWL-900AP+ at each site,
>configured as a bridge, connected to the existing wired networks.

DLinks doesn't sell those any more, but they're good units. Try to
get the "Rev C" model which is generally better and faster than the
"Rev A or B" models:
http://support.dlink.com/products/revision.asp

>Will this work ?

Yep. I have 3 pairs of DWL-900AP+ links running just fine. Set them
to 22Mbits/sec only mode and disable the 4X mode mis-feature.

http://support.dlink.com/techtool/DW...v_perform.html

Note that the DWL-900AP+ will only bridge 30 MAC addresses. If you
have a large network, you may need to look for a transparent bridge
that will do more MAC addresses.

>What kind of antenna should I be looking at ? I have seen the
>Flatenna website (www.tritium.co.uk), would this provide any benefit ?

Well, before you add antennas, think about a pigtail to connect to the
Reverse SMA connector. You'll find that the connector will not bottom
out and appears to be loose. The trick is to unscrew the nut holding
the SMA connector to the plastic case, remove the gold lockwasher, and
replace the nut. Then the R-SMA connector will fit.

For 600 meters almost any type of direction antenna will work. If can
place the units in a window, you might be able to get away with
something crude, like an aluminium foil reflector using the stock
antennas. See:
http://www.freeantennas.com/projects/Ez-10/

However, for a simple link, a pair of 8dBi patch (panel) antennas will
work just fine.
http://www.fab-corp.com/J1.htm (look for 8.5dBi panels)
I like the Maxrad "WISP" antennas. Also, keep the coax cable runs as
short as possible as coax cable are very lossy.



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