Hi, I am a fourth year university of Waterloo student, and I am currently
working on a project. I was wondering if there is a way to measure the signal
strength of each wireless access point? When we connect to a wireless
connection, we are shown the signal strength, and it is shown in terms of
bars, 5 bars means excellent, 4 means good etc. I am sure there is something
going on in the back end that is converting the actual measurement (above 90%
signal strength implies 5 bars etc) into bars. I was wondering if it is
possible to access that somehow?

I appreciate any help.
Thanks.

On 28-Sep-2006, =?Utf-8?B?U3VtYW4=?= <Su***@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

If you want an accurate signal strength, you need expensive
test equipment, regularly calibrated to traceable national
standards.
But some wireless adapters, when using the mfrs drivers, and
not Zero Config, give you relative signal strength, as a percentage,
as well as signal quality as a percentage..
To compare access points, put it on a laptop, move to the same
free space distance from each access point, and take readings.
There are also utilities like NetStumbler that produce a moving
plot against time of signal strength and signal noise ratio.
That said I'm a bit doubtful about NetStumblers results since they
don't always correlate with link performance and throughput.
Signal quality, rather than strength, seems an important determiner
of throughput. Multipath propagation may give a good signal
strength, but poor signal quality, presumably signal quality
correlates with error rate, and a high error rate link devotes a
lot of resources on error correction protocols.
If you have multipath problems you can boost the signal,
and reduce the angle of acceptance, with a homemade reflector.
Adds about 10% to signal quality and some 25% to signal
quality, which boosts throughput.

This parameter is called RSSI. It can be obtained from the
driver of the wireless network adapter.
Windows Wireless config and other wireless utilities have some
function that maps RSSI values in dBm to 0-100% scale, and then to
"human readable" form, such as bars.
Hope you can proceed with your research from here.

--PA

Hi
May be this can Help, http://www.ezlan.net/wbars.html
Jack (MVP-Networking).

Show quoteHide quote

Netstumbler will display the signal strength in db for you.


MD



Show quoteHide quote

Add new HP laptop to current wireless network
WiFi Constant Connectivity
Help
DHCP Problems
Upgrading to SP2
WPA Download KB893357
DHCP of ICS does not work
Connecting Laptops
Wireless Connection stopped working
setting up wireless home network