Increase Wi-Fi signal

[jeepnut]

My daughter goes to a college where all wi-fi is free to their students, however she doesn't live in the dorms this year, she actually lives in some apartments next to the university. She has a little laptop that doesn't quite reach out to the school from her apartments ( she has to go outside and get closer). Now that winter is approaching she would like to stay indoors to access the wi-fi signal. Is there anyway she could get the signal from her school so she could do homework from her apartment?

[LochLomonder]

It may be possible, depending upon policies from the university's IT department, that they will allow a repeater to be set up which will hook in through their network. Even if that's possible, I'd surmise your daughter would have to pay for the repeater.

[jeepnut]

Unfortunately she won't be able to afford to pay for any additional cost even if the University did allow it, and I'm sure the apartment complex wouldn't allow any type of transmitter on there building. :(

[mjc]

Don't get much cheaper than this...

http://www.turnpoint.net/wireless/has.html

[jeepnut]

hmm, I have no way to connect her 802.11 card to anything because it's built inside of the laptop - to bad because that was by far the cheapest route.

[Paul Komski]

Cantennas can be helpful if the emitting signal is reaching the reception point in the first place but you generally need an aerial socket that can accept a pigtail in order to build one. On a laptop this could be done with an approriate PCMCIA WiFi Card - but it is a very geeky approach. Some USB WiFi Dongles (http://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-Link-TL-WN722NC-150Mbps-Wireless-Adapter/dp/B003158RHE/ref=sr_1_sc_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1323999980&sr=8-3-spell) do have such an aerial socket but might not emit a good enough signal.

If a strong enough signal can be received then one of these DLink WiFi Bridges (http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=663) could be used as long as it can log-on to the Uni WiFi Signal. One would then connect the laptop to the bridge by cable. They are not cheap and only trial and error would tell you whether it would work or not. I can use a pair of these to extend my own internet 400 metres (clear line of sight) to outlying farm houses

Similar outdoor devices would be even more likely to be successful.

I would contact the uni IT to see what they think might work.