Customer Reviews

Cisco-Linksys High Gain Antenna Kit for TNC Connectors HGA7T

5 star:		(39)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(14)
1 star:		(33)

 

 

Folks, these antennas, as well as the stock antennas, have an omnidirectional (same in all directions) horizontal radiation pattern. This means that, when installed in a suitable location, the most significant reception gains will be seen with equipment that is on the same level as the router itself. Most of the "these did nothing for me" stories appear to be from people who have the router downstairs and the equipment upstairs, or in the basement. These antennas are NOT designed to improve reception between floors in a home.

2.4GHz signals are heavily attenuated by walls, foil-clad insualtion, and other building materials. Interference can also be present from cordless phones, microwaves, wireless cameras and other gear in this band -- adding an antenna can make these types of issues WORSE. Changing the channel your wireless router uses can help, since chances are most of your neighbors are using the same channel you are. Some routers have a built-in site survey utility to help you locate an unused channel.

If you are having trouble reaching a particular device through several walls, or between floors, try a directional antenna as these will concentrate the radio energy where they are pointed. Some reviewers have pointed to a site that illustrates how to make a directional antenna with index cards, glue and foil -- this is a rudementary directional antenna but will surprisingly provide excellent results in many applications.

In summary: If you purchased these antennas and they did not work or made the problem worse, you need to reconsider the type of installation (multi-floor, multi-wall, etc.), sources of interference, channel selection, blocking materials such as foil-clad insulation, as well as proper antenna selection.

These antennas have been tested in my labs using very sensitive wireless network testing equipment and the perform exactly as specified. The sad thing is that the industry doesn't do a good job of explaining what the "specifications" mean for the average user. Here's the basic foundation you need:

Antennas come in three basic types: omni-directional, semi-directional and high-directional.

Omni-directional antennas, such as these Linksys antennas, radiate the network signal out in all directions around the antenna. Think of it like the ripples in the water when you stick your finger directly down into it. This is the way an omni-directional antenna works.

Now, when you increase the gain of an omni-directional antenna, you flatten the signal or what som have called the doughnut. In other words, you increase the distance "out" from the antenna, but you decrease the distance "up" from the antenna. For example, if you have the antenna in a vertical position (it is pointing up), a higher gain indicates that the signal travel farther out from the antenn in a pattern parallel with the floor/earth and it doesn't travel as far perpendicular to the floor/earth.

The semi-directional antenna is an antenna that transmits the vast majority of the signal in one direction out and up from the antenna. Think of it like placing a speaker against a wall and facing into the room. In the room, you will hear the sounds clearly. Behind the speaker and the wall, they will not be so clear. This is similar to the behavior of a semi-directional antenna.

High-directional antenas usually look like a satellite dish with either a solid or a mesh panel behind the antenna. These antennas, as you might expect, have an extremely narrow signal pattern. There are rarely used in home networks are are mostly used to create links from building to building over greater distances (sometimes many miles).

In the end, the antenna will not have as great an impact on your home wireless network as the wireless router or access point will. If you can get a wireless router or access point that uses greater output power with the lower gain omni antennas, you will likely be more satisfied with the coverage of your wireless network than you will be with a network that includes lower output power and high gain antennas (assuming your clients have semi-directional antennas or equal gain radios). This is a general rule of thumb for home networks.

Sadly, one of the best home wireless routers is now off the market (the Buffalo WZR-RS-G54); however, you may be able to find others with simila specs. Look for devices that offer 100 mW output power and external antennas (in case you want them for tweaking). In the new 802.11n line, the Engenius ESR-9710 offers very good performance in my lab tests and is reasobably priced at under $100. It does feature 100 mW of output power. For this with a little more pocket cash, the EnGenius ENG-ECB-3220 will give you 400 mW of output power; however, I have not had the chance to test the latter.

Happy WiFi-ing!

Tom Carpenter

Very interesting to see how many people aren't having much success with these antennas. I would be interested in how everyone is measuring their signal strength and their placement of the routers.

I'm in an older house where it is long and narrow with hardly any open spaces.

I'm using these antennas on a WRT54G on one side of the house, in conjunction with the WRE54G repeater on the other side of the building.

I used Netstumbler, and the Dell wireless utility that came with the internal wireless card. I get the same readings for signal strength on both programs.

Before adding the antennas, I was getting an average of -50 to
-55 dBi strength 10 feet from the router. After adding the antenna's, I am averaging -36 to -39 dBi.

Sitting 15 feet from the WRE54G repeater the signal gained exactly the same from -50 to -36 dBi after adding the antennas to the router for some reason.

The worse strength I received in my house jumped from -92 dBi to -67 dBi.

I bought these because my Linksys router was disconnecting at the most inopportune time with my Play@TV multimedia wireless receiver downstairs. I keep the router upstairs as that is where my main drydock PC is. I've noticed fewer disconnects since I got the antennas. I also bring my laptop home from work on occasion and when the weather is nice, can use it for browsing even in the garage, which is about 100 feet from the router. This was good for checking a motorcycle part in inventory against what was actually on my bike. Why did I give it 3 stars? Well, maybe they just should have given the antennas to us with the original router. Why as an aftermarket product? I sheepishly handed over the 40 bucks...

I had a great experience with this product.

Very easy to install: just unscrew the old attenae, and screw these on. That's it! Much easier than the Linksys range extender, which has some install horror stories written up here in Amazon.

Results: where I used to have 1 Mbps in my house, I now have 36 Mbps. Where I used to lose a signal, I now have 11 Mbps.

Well worth the investment. Cheaper than the Linksys range extender. I wish all technology was this easy.

First of all, let me say that I don't own one of these and have never used it. You may wonder what kind of an idiot would write a review for something he's never used.

Well, this is why. I was about to buy this unit when I read Mr. Samuel M. Livingston's very knowledgeable review below where he discusses the fact that all antenna's such as this one are horizontally directional, meaning they work best in the plane perpendicular to the direction the antenna is pointing.

Well, my router is in the basement and ALL the computers that use it are on floors above it. Hmmmmm. You know, I had always wondered why my Linksys router had antennas mounted on highly articulated joints that allow them to rotate in any direction.

I went down to my basement and pushed the antennas down so they were parallel to the floor instead of parallel to the wall. POOF! Every computer in my house gained an additional bar of reception. I didn't need a high-gain antenna kit any more.

Thank you very much, Dr. Livingston... I presume?

This product is not the Holy Grail to solve all your networking connectivity issues. In the appropriate situation, this product works very well. In my case, I needed a little extra "push" in signal strength to be able to connect reliably in the main living area of my house. Due to the construction of my home, my wireless distance is limited (I have a dedicated cable line in a FROG. The room is surrounded by foil wrapped HVAC ducts). Prior to installing the antennas, I had a signal/quality of 20-30%. This made internet connectivity spotty. After installation, I note a quality /signal in the 40-50% range.

Again, we are all looking for different things from our wireless connection. I use mine mainly for checking email, browsing the internet, and on line gaming. A signal of 40-50% is more than suitable for this. If I am updating windows or downloading other large files, I tend to go ahead and hard wire my laptop.

Chances are, if you are getting no signal in areas of your home/office, these antennas arent going to help you. Trying a repeater will probably help you more. If you are looking for just a little extra signal, this product is for you.

I was looking to get just a bit more distance in my home. This gave me the extra 10% to 15% that I was looking for. Don't expect significant improvement though. Positioning of the wireless router and of the antenna themselves will help a lot. It takes some trial and error. Too bad the antenna cost almost as much as the wireless router itself. I would have given a 4 rating, but the price pushes it down to a 3 in terms of value.

I installed these this weekend and saw a nice improvement. Like some posters have said, it's not the "be all end all" to your problems, but if you are having some minor issues and want a bump in power these worked great.
I had been using a pair of antennas from Radio Shack and saw minimal improvement, then I tried the old half moon tin foil thing and was suprised how much that helped. The problem with that is it is very directional, and in my home my router is in the middle of the house on the top floor making it challenging to focus the strength.
Once I installed these I saw a bump on netstumbler to -50db, and very very consistent, there were no ups and downs which the old antenna had. That in itself is an improvement. My two deadspots also went away. I haven't been outside to see if it's increased the range, I'll do that later. I'll probably add that half moon thing again and see how strong the signal gets in a focused direction also. Not the solution for my problems, but fun to play with. :)
It is a lot of $$, but can solve some problems.

I was going to buy the high gain antenna but find the info regarding building your own directional antenna

http://www.freeantennas.com/prod03.htm

I download the template and built the add on to my antenna in about 10 minutes out of cardbox and some left over wire mash screen that I had to cover the gutter from leaves. My before signal strength was about 50%, the after is 75%. Keep in mind if you need to increase the radio signal for 360 degrees, then buy the high gain but if you just have a problem of one of the computer in your house not getting a good signal then go to the above site.