I live in an apartment which is located across from a park and I would like to setup an access point that I could use to connect to my network while I am in the park. It would be nice to just be able to connect via my laptop's built in wireless, but if that is not possible I would consider a discrete external solution that was self powered or powered off the laptop.

My apartment is located on the 10th floor, so I am above the trees, but while I am in the park, line of sight would be obscured by the trees. I am not able to mount anything outside the building, but I do have a window that faces the park.


I'm not sure what is possible or what the associated costs would be, so I have two coverage scenarios in mind. The first scenario would be what I consider minimal acceptable coverage for it to be worth setting up. At minimum, I would like to cover roughly ~700 feet out from my window at ~90 degrees. If it were possible, it would be great to increase the coverage to ~2,000 feet at ~160 degree. But, like I said I don't know what's possible.

Any help you can give me in figuring out what is possible and what hardware would be necessary to do it, would be greatly appreciated.

I live in an apartment which is located across from a park and I would like to setup an access point that I could use to connect to my network while I am in the park. It would be nice to just be able to connect via my laptop's built in wireless, but if that is not possible I would consider a discrete external solution that was self powered or powered off the laptop.

My apartment is located on the 10th floor, so I am above the trees, but while I am in the park, line of sight would be obscured by the trees. I am not able to mount anything outside the building, but I do have a window that faces the park.

I'm not sure what is possible or what the associated costs would be, so I have two coverage scenarios in mind. The first scenario would be what I consider minimal acceptable coverage for it to be worth setting up. At minimum, I would like to cover roughly ~700 feet out from my window at ~90 degrees. If it were possible, it would be great to increase the coverage to ~2,000 feet at ~160 degree. But, like I said I don't know what's possible...

Under the circumstances, your most likely approach will use a high-gain panel antenna mounted inside your window, and a radio with decent Rx sensitivity, so that it can "hear" your laptop through the tree cover. Dual-chain 802.11n will work better than b/g, given the same antenna gain & radio Tx/Rx specs.

The radio built into the RB711UA-2HnD (or an RB711-2HnD if you're only connecting one device at a time) has decent specs. If you are already using a Routerboard in your apartment, the r52Hn radio is a good choice; the Ubiquiti SR71 series is also good, but check to make sure the particular model is supported by MT. You can probably connect it to a panel antenna aimed out the window, and still get good enough signal in a moderate-sized apartment.

As for antenna selection, the first one that comes to mind is the Itelite SRA-SE24014Dual, a 14dBi antenna/enclosure with a sectorial pattern of 90* x 18*. You might also use two higher-gain single-polarity panels--ideally in different windows (facing in the same direction), or at least at different polarities, to maximize RF separation. Use the shortest possible antenna cables to minimize signal loss.

Within those guidelines, a certain amount of trial-and-error will be required to find out how much is needed, and how much is overkill.

Hotz1, thanks for taking the time to provide me a little direction. I had guessed that in the end there would be some trial-and-error. I have been trying to do a little research on the matter, but could you elaborate on the use of two single-polarity panels. Would I use one with a horizontal polarity and then one with a vertical polarity?

Hotz1, thanks for taking the time to provide me a little direction. I had guessed that in the end there would be some trial-and-error. I have been trying to do a little research on the matter, but could you elaborate on the use of two single-polarity panels. Would I use one with a horizontal polarity and then one with a vertical polarity?

You could do that, or you could also separate the antennas physically, or both. Ideally you'd have them ~10' apart (e.g., in separate windows), though putting their polarities at right angles can reduce that distance substantially--to as low as zero, in the case of a dual-polarity antenna.

FWIW, unless you already have single-pol antennas on hand, one dual-pol antenna will probably be less expensive than two singles--though you may be able to find higher-gain panels in single-pol.