Extending Range

Hi,
I am currently working with the alfa...NH and the range isn't working.. assuming I even set it up correctly. Is the best solution to place down another raspberry pi and link them to the same webpage? OR should i splurge and buy a better wifi adapter?


Thanks,
David

I've noticed that the range of the pi built in wifi (w/o antenna) is about the same as the alfa. Also there is a huge buffer time for large movies even being just 10 feet away from the Pi.

I think I will just go with openwrt to get more range. I ordered a TP-Link TL-WR82N for 8 bucks on ebay plus 10 shipping just now lol

You need to make sure, that not the inbuilt Wifi is working, but the Alfa. Did you changed your configuration after adding the new wifi adapter?

I have gotten the wifi adapter working thanks to another thread about wifi adapters. However the range on my new wifi adapter seems pitiful. It is supposed to be long range and it doesnt extend beyond the raspberry pi's built in wifi adapter.

Any suggestions?


-Daveyman

Here are some of my notes from when I did this several months ago on a Raspberry Pi 3 for an Alfa AWUS036NH. Hope this helps:


To USE A USB WIFI ADAPTER:

To change to a usb wifi adapter, you MUST change the
/boot/wifi_card.conf file to read "wlan1" instead of "wlan0".
Otherwise, changing the hostapd.conf and piratebox.conf files
in /opt/piratebox/conf/ won't matter, because they will be over-
written at boot back to "wlan0".


DEFINING WIFI SETUP:

Define the txpower, channel, etc. of the wifi connection by modifying
the hostapd, piratebox.conf, and wpa_supplicant files.

To switch from wlan0 (the built-in antenna) to wlan 1 (the USB antenna) and change the power used by a wifi adapater, add the following lines to /opt/piratebox/conf/piratebox.conf:

#Iw physical interface
PHY_IF="phy1"

# Name of the wlan interface
INTERFACE="wlan1"

iw reg set GY
iwconfig wlan1 txpower 26 #Alfa won't actually output this much power. It's limited to about 50 mW, no matter what
#Alfa advertising claims!

# On which interface DNSMASQ should listen. -i is the parameter for dnsmasq
# Make it empty to disable
DNSMASQ_INTERFACE="wlan1"

In /opt/piratebox/conf/hostapd.conf add or modify:

interface=wlan1
driver=nl80211
channel=11