Home-Brew WiFi Booster for about 3 bucks

[NerdLifeAMD]

Hey guys, Last night I was forced to reach even farther to leech the webernet.
I built many adapter, cantennas and some things I wouldn't even be able to think of a good name for.
This particular build is an improvement on a proven design and its super cheap.
Ive use a USB adapter with and extension cable in the past and it works well this build i used a coax style antenna I got with and old dell.
Most of the time you can simply hang one of these on a nail or thumbtack.
Being that I had to grab from sooo far away I needed to get out away from the house and around my Neighbors house.
I elected to use the old direct tv dish pole out front.
I also decided to keep the assembly used to direct the dish since I knew I would have to tune it in.
You can just use the dish but only if you have some serious time on your hands and allot of patients.
If you want to use the dish keep in mind they are Very focused and placing your antenna in the right spot can be very very tricky.

In this build I used

1 - Cardboard box complements of USPS
2 - Aluminum foil
3 - Clear Packing Tape
4 - Empty toilet paper roll
5 - Plastic Wrap
6 - Hot Glue
7 - Wireless Adapter or Antenna
8 - Camouflage

I first folded the edges of the box in to get some angles on the interior of the box this seems to help a lot.
Next I taped them down securely making sure to crease the tape to keep the angles sharp where the flaps folded down.
I folded the top and bottom first the folded angles on the flaps on the sides so they would reach the back of the box.
the next step is several layers of foil first vertical then horizontal. Its best to put some glue in the middle first let it cool and press out from there.
you can lift up the foil and make it nice and neat as you go.
You can then use packing tape on the overlaps when your done laying it out.
Its also a good Idea to trim the foil flush with the box and tape it after you're all laid out.
In my case i used a toilet paper roll cut in just under half to hold the adapter off the back of the fixture you definitely want a gap behind your adapter.
If you use a usb adapter you should make yourself a post from the bottom so you have something to attach your cable to then plug in your adapter.You want it to be vertical.
I scratched away some of the foil to attach my toilet paper post to the box.
I cut a small hole to fish my cables thru and then sealed the the hole with glue.
Since my box had to go outside I used packing tape to completely seal the outside of the box.
Then I used plastic wrap to dry in the front of the box also attached with clear packing tape.
next I attached the directional fixture to the back of the box with hot glue and tape.
Yes the fixture is heavy but the box isn't holding it its holding the box and the box is light so it works fine.
Ok almost done. I had to camouflage this puppy because of the time of year i wrapped it in halloween paper.
I'm thinking Ill throw a christmas bag over it after halloween.
You may not want to advertise your picking up free WiFi to all your Neighbors.
If you use a USB adapter it might be a good idea to remove the led or put some black tape over it.
Another thing to consider is USB cables can only be about 10 - 15 feet long without a powered Hub
The last thing to do is tune it in. It helps to have a computer savvy friend to click refresh over and over to look for APs Strength and speed, don't just trust windows run a bandwidth check to see what your speed really is you should also use a site with a ping display.
In my case windows clams 1 bar. Keep in mind my AP is 2 blocks away over a hill 15 houses down I got this info from Wardrive 4 on my phone.
Its also a good idea to run a baseline with no reflector before you build your rig and run your bandwidth tests from the same location this way you know that you're adjusting is changing your signal not where your testing from.
As you can see from the snip-it Im getting 6mb down 3mb up and thats with the kids on facebook, youtube 4 phones and 2 tablets active on the net and its Raining. More Important is Im getting a pretty decent ping of 35ms and thats whats going to matter the most if you play online games.
you can get 50mb down but if you ping is 1800ms you would be better of with 500k down and a ping under 100 as far as online games go.
by the way my baseline was 2 APs now i see over 30 hope its been entertaining and helpful

[Dirk Broer]

Very ingenious!

But:
What happens when the poor sod from whom you're leeching decides to put some effort into having a secure WiFi?
Can he/she see that he/she is using far more bandwith than can be accounted for on his/her own regular use?

[NerdLifeAMD]

they have a standard 25mb cable connection i doubt they notice. And i have Qos turned on to limit youtube quality also i cap my tor traffic.

Besides if they were savvy enough to check their usage there AP would be locked

[NerdLifeAMD]

the FCC says once it hits the air its fair game. and the supreme court says that an ip address is not a person and no person can be held responsible for what happens on there open wifi. also i'm separated behind the computer that catches the net. there are also 3 more APs in the same direction with similar strength I may rotate. I just Like the ssid of this one the best Do you have a moral issue with this dirk?

[NerdLifeAMD]

people streem so much hd media these days at 1 or 2 mb a sec. I on the other hand will download a 200 meg version of the same show to watch its a drop in the bucket compared to what they are already using

[Dirk Broer]

people streem so much hd media these days at 1 or 2 mb a sec. I on the other hand will download a 200 meg version of the same show to watch its a drop in the bucket compared to what they are already using

Call me old-fashioned: I'll buy the DVD

[Dirk Broer]

Do you have a moral issue with this dirk?

Nope, I was worrying whether you were doing something illegal, but you explained it is not (in your country).

[NerdLifeAMD]

don't get me wrong dirk i do support quality entertainment.
I do go to see every new star trek movie as well as the terminator series and a few others.
99% of what i download are network programs that are available on regular cable
( i can't commit to being in front of the tv at a certain time every week my lifes not that organized )or available on the network site streaming.
That being said they have gotten all gung ho on data caps here in the US.
so if i were to go to South Park Studios to see new south park it auto detects my connection and does not give an option for manual bandwidth selection.
they run at 1.5mbs . thats 873.813333 bytes a second thats roughly 1572 Megabytes over 30 min
I (In theory ) Can get the same quality version of the show in a MP4 and its only 79.5 megabytes.
thats only 1/19th the size and in a world that is limiting data to 250 gig a month that makes a hole lot More sense.
I also get A LOT of things from BBC CH4 CH5 that are educational. Id say educational shows make up a good 3rd of my 6TB library and its information I would not be exposed to going threw conventional Channels.
Admittedly someone in my position may give out a copy of office to a student here or there so they can do there homework but would explain that when they are done with school and made something of themselves they need to buy a copy to replace the 30 day trial that they got screwed with when they started doing all their homework on there new laptop and it expired on them and locked all there homework in read only.
Open office is great but its only 80% compatible
I don't mean to sound defensive I just don't want you guys to get the wrong Idea.
I am a DG but i don't sell any shows or movies or anything like that.
I do give young people some things to open there minds and broaden their horizons.
I once gave a 8th Grade teacher the entire Bill Nye The Science Guy Series for his Class and wouldn't be afraid to go before a jury of my peers to defend such a action.

[NerdLifeAMD]

Is it against the law to hop on an open AP where you are ?

[Dirk Broer]

There has recently been a court verdict that stated that is is not against the law in the Netherlands to hop on an access point, whether locked or not!