Week signal problem

[realmot]

I have an office in my garage and am using a paradyne 6218 modem/router. My neighbors and even one on the far side of my block say they get a strong signal from it. In my office I have an "excellent" signal but in my home, just 30 feet away, I have a "low" to "very low" signal and at times it even drops. I have tried a booster antenna on the unit in the house but it seems to make no differance. As I am new to wireless networking I assume I need a better card in the machine in my home. Is this correct? The card is a linksys. What do you recommend?
Real

[BOoBOo]

I am old school and still have wires all over the house. I prefer cat 5 cables only because they are cheap and easy to maintain. The wireless world keeps coming out with new technology and I don't like the fact when data is flying through the air even when its encrypted. If you want a cheap solution, get a cat 5 cable (25-30 feet) and just hook them up to your modem and drag them to your computer that is having signal problems.

If you prefer to still use wireless, you can upgrade your wireless network card in the computer since you said your neighbors are able to receive a strong signal.

[wired076]

You may still have problems no matter what you do depending on whether you buy more wireless technology and upgrade it if you have a magnetic disturbance that interferes with the wireless or if you have too many other wireless devices on the same band that are interfering with the signal.

It may also depend on the distance between the device and the room.

You could give other wireless technology a try but if it doesn't work you will have to use either cat5 or the newer ethernet cabling cat6 which supports gigabit connections.

[studylot]

as bobobo said " old is gold"

he has proved it with his example there. i do appreciate that
see if you really need to run around the house & do the internet use wireless otherwise use wires SAFE & EASY.

[realmot]

Thank you guys! The next question is how far can you run cat5? My router is in an office in my garage and to get to where I really wish I had a signal I would need to travel about 50 to 60 feet.

[wired076]

You should be able to run cat5 cabling as far as you like within your house. Good luck with it.

This distance should be fine but if the distance becomes very far the speed through the line may become reduced.

[realmot]

I will give the cat5 cabling a try this weekend. I don't mind giving up a little speed for some signal strength. The trick may be figuring out how to get the cable across the yard in an effective manor (I live in ND and the ground is well frozen and with a layer of snow as well). Thanks!

[wired076]

Maybe get some insulation cable or buy cat5 cabling that is insulated, use pvc pipe and put the cable inside and bury it the regulation depth below the surface into the ground. Remember where you have put it in case you need to get access to it again.

[Doomed]

AFAIK, cat 5 has a maximum distance of 150m. Any longer than this you'll start to get packet loss and most likely the network will drop back to 10Mbit. You probably won't end up going over this as the distance is only around 60 feet and I doubt you'll have enough cabling inside the house to reach that far, but it's good to know anyway.

[wired076]

Oh ok. So I guess I was wrong. I know now what it is. Thanks for the clarification Doomed. By the way what does AFAIK mean??

Good luck with the cabling. Have you tried it yet?