Understanding the wireless router range extender aka wireless repeater.

With a wireless router range extender aka wireless repeater, you can go miles more at minimal cost.

Taking it Long-Distance: Wireless Extension Points

Let's now consider how far your wireless can go. Actually, the answer is quite simple: as far as your budget allows.

In fact, even though wireless transmitters have a range limit, you can always decide to install wireless extension points, also called repeaters, to improve the signal and increase your network's range even further.

What is a Repeater?

The further away you go from the origin of a wireless signal, the weaker it gets, until it becomes impossible to receive at all. Regardless of the money you spend on high-powered wireless equipment, you will ultimately get to a point where it's impossible to stretch your network any further.

To solve this problem you can run wires out as far as you wish your network to go, and 'break it out' into wireless using a wireless access point. However, this can involve some troubles: why would you install a significant quantity of wire simply to cover an area with wireless access? You could just install ports in the wall instead, right?

To overcome this problem, some companies have started to manufacture wireless repeaters, even if they don't belong to the wireless standard. These are basically 'extension points' that function as a relay that takes the existing wireless signal and makes it more powerful by enlarging the range of the signal each time.

If your repeaters are placed correctly, you will be able to move computers far away from the wired part of the network (the router or access point) and still make them work. But, keep in mind that the ranges of the points must overlap, as a repeater will never be able to repeat a signal it doesn't receive.

How Do They Work?

To make the whole process clearer, try to remember that wireless networking signals are actually just radio signals. What repeaters do is to simply take all radio signals they receive on the same frequency (2.4Ghz) used by wireless communications, and strengthen as well as re-broadcast them by utilizing their power. Since the whole process doesn't damage the signal, it can be repeated as frequently as you want.

Theoretically, by putting wireless repeaters one after the other for several miles you can significantly extend a wireless network. In addition, extension points are quite inexpensive as they don't require all the computer technology needed in a router or an access point.

For example, some businesses are using a combination of repeaters and directional antennas (they keep the focus of a wireless signal going in just one direction) to connect two LANs that are far away from each other.

This solution is cheaper than having to worry about the problems that may arise by doing it via the Internet or installing their own wires underground. One day, similar technologies could be of great help in building wireless networks that will cover entire cities and towns.

Choosing a Repeater

Nowadays, only a limited choice of bigger manufacturers are available when it comes to choosing a repeater, provided they even have one in their product range. Different manufacturers tend to give different names to their repeaters, such as 'Range Extender' (D-Link) or 'Range Expander' (Linksys).

Before you actually buy a wireless extension point, think about the following issues.

Make sure that it will be compatible with your existing equipment. This is really important because there is no guarantee that it will work on your network, as there's no formal standard for wireless extension points. If you can, stick to the manufacturer who supplied the rest of the equipment. If not, look on the Internet for people who've succeeded with your particular combination or stay with one of the big manufacturers.

Another thing you should figure out is if the extension point contains Ethernet ports. Even though it's not an indispensable feature, it can be helpful if you wish to have the extension connected to a wired network. This is especially important if you intend to connect two LANs wirelessly, even though Ethernet can also be useful if you want to connect devices when something fails to work properly and you have to do some network troubleshooting.

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