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General discussion

Too many 802.11s in one room . . . interference?

Feb 8, 2005 10:05PM PST

This is an interesting little experiment. The other day I was at school with 3 of my friends. One had an old HP laptop with a Linksys SuperG card in it . . . the kind with the really chunky antenna on it. Another had a Powerbook G4 with a normal Linksys 802.11G card. Yet another friend had a Compaq with a Netgear G card.

I was the only Centrino owner with my Intel 802.11G built in.

We were all having a hard time getting on our school's 802.11b network, and we were crammed into this TINY study room (literally about 8' by 6'). All the computers were on this little table, but when I would raise my computer above the level of the table, I could connect with fair signal. But when I brought it back down, my rate dropped to 1.0mbps and very low signal.

Then, when two of my friends shut down their computers, magically, I could get on the network.

Isn't that interesting? Is that documented? Too many G cards in one room causes interference?

Discussion is locked

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try changing the channel(s)
Feb 10, 2005 2:47AM PST

Greetings,

Yes indeed- too many wireless devices in close proximity can do just that. And my cordless telephone at home cuts mine out at home sometimes Sad. I've learned to change the channels on the router to get a better signal on my wife's laptop with less interference. But that won't help you guys since you are not controlling the signal at the source. Even trying another wireless cared won't solve the close proximity issue. Are there any free ethernet connections one or two of you could use in the room when working together(?)

cheers,
P

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Just as I suspected
Feb 10, 2005 3:28AM PST

Yes, there is one ethernet . . . I usually hog it and let the rest of them duke it out about wireless. Happy