Dummies, Wireless

You may want to consider reading Chapter 18 on troubleshooting before you
finish your planning. Some good tips in that chapter talk about setting up and
tweaking your network.
Adding printers
Chapter 4: Planning a Wireless Home Network
In addition to connecting your computers, you may want to connect your
printers to the network. Next to sharing an Internet connection, printer sharing
is perhaps the biggest cost-saving reason for building a network of home
computers. Rather than buy a printer for every PC, everyone in the house
can share one printer. Or maybe you have one color inkjet printer and one
black-and-white laser printer. If both printers are connected to the network,
The shape of the radio signal transmitted to the
rooms in your home is determined by the type of
antenna you have attached to the AP. The standard
antenna on any AP is an omnidirectional
antenna, which broadcasts its signal in a spherical
shape. The signal pattern that radiates from
a typical omnidirectional dipole antenna is
shaped like a fat doughnut with a tiny hole in the
middle. The hole is directly above and below
the antenna.
The signal goes from the antenna to the floor
above and the floor below, as well as to the
floor on which the AP is located. If your house
has multiple floors, try putting your AP on the
second floor first. Most AP manufacturers claim
a range of 200 feet indoors (at 74 Mbps for
802.11n and 54 Mbps for 802.11g). To be conservative,
assume a range of 80 feet laterally and
one floor above and below the AP. Keep in mind
that the signal at the edges of the “doughnut”
and on the floors below or above the AP are
weaker than the signal nearer the center and on
the same floor as the AP.
Because of this signal pattern, you should try to
place the AP as close to the center of your
The RF doughnut
house as is practically possible. Use a drawing
of your house plan to locate the center of the
house. This spot is your first trial AP location.
Draw a circle with an 80-foot radius on your
house plan, with the trial AP location as the
center of the circle. If your entire house falls
inside the circle, one AP will probably do the
job. Conversely, if some portion of the house is
outside the circle, coverage may be weaker in
that area. You need to experiment to determine
whether you get an adequate signal there.
If you determine that one AP will not cover your
house, you need to decide how best to place
two APs (or even three, if necessary). The
design of your house determines the best placement.
For a one-level design, start at one end of
the house and determine the best location for
an 80-foot radius circle that covers all the way
to the walls. The center of this circle is the location
of the first AP. Then move toward the other
end of the house, drawing 80-foot radius circles
until the house is covered. The center of each
circle is a trial location of an AP. If possible,
don’t leave any area in the house uncovered.
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