Hello,

I'm looking for a recommendation for good, affordable WiFi hardware for a long distance link.
The WiFi hardware will be run on solar power, so every watt power consume counts a lot.
It is a BIG (in money) difference in running a 1 Watt device vs. a 6 Watt device 24/7/365 on solar power.
What I would wish for is a Raspberry Zero like router hardware with a Zioncom WL0162 USB dongle on a parabolic dish antenna.
The Zioncom WL0162 has a receiver sensitivity of -101dBm @ 1M (802.11b) and up to 20 dBm max. transmit power.
The RaspZero can be tuned to 300 mW power use.
That is what I would call good WiFi hardware.
Unfortunately is the Zioncom WL0162 not longer in production and nobody sell a used one...
I could not find any Wifi USB dongle in production that comes close to the -101dbm/20dBm of the Zioncom WL0162.
And yes, I tried 3 times (!) to buy an *original* ALFA Network AWUS036H. No success. The market is flooded with cheap shitty Chinese clones. So I looked for a WiFi SoC solution. And the best I could find is:
http://www.gl-inet.com/ar150/  -94dbm/18dBm @ 950 mW.
But the receiver sensitivity of this device is just half as good the Zioncom WL0162 :-(

Any real WiFi hacker left in this forum who can point me to good, affordable WiFi hardware ?

Thanks,
Andy

20 dBm as tx power is little comparing with some high tx power router like some of ubiquiti (30 dBm).

-101 dBm of rx is a good choice.

I agree. But, how much power does it consume to transmit such power? Remember, OP is concerned with power consumption as his/her device is driven by a solar power.

The difference in power consumption between a tx 20dBm and a tx 30dBm will be less than 1 Watt.
AFAIK only ubiquiti has routers of that tx power, if someone know more or any usb dongle with that tx power pls share in this thread, I'm interesting in it.

can you share your solar panel you are using? and how to setup

can you share your solar panel you are using? and how to setup

two sxt2 lite microtiks

In general, their are 3 chipset brands of USB wifi dongle in market, atheros, ralink and realtek. Atheros is almost alway better than ralink(mediatek), realtek in term of stability but may be sacrifice by txpower cap because atheros driver obey to regulation(good?).

Cheap dongles that use ralink/realtek chipsets have driver/hardware design problems. However, some good ralink/realtek dongles could perform well because well internal design and specific driver modification, in additional, have no txpower capped.

If you could find cheap atheros dongle you almost guarantee you get a work dongle. Avoid cheap ralink/realtek. Ralink / realtek are good choices only for good/expensive dongle.

How is your distance access ponit setup?
AWUS036H is  a good old realtek but too old for crowd noise wifi signals today.

(Last edited by tomrev on 30 Jun 2016, 03:29)

AR9331 maybe is a good choice for you, it's a 1x1 11n SoC and also was supported by Raspberry .

@stas2z
Thank you very much for pointing me to this nice router. http://routerboard.com/RBSXT2nDr2
But according to the specs, this device uses 12 times more power than the gl-inet ar150.
And this makes really a huge difference if you need to run it 24/7/365 on solar.
@tomrev
I agree that most ralink/realtek hardware is crap. Not long term stable. I would have to drive 150 km to reset the counterpoint router...
The distance between my points is about 1 km. Both points about 50 m above sea level. Mostly water in between.

I have now already 2 x GL.iNet AR-150 WiFi Router on Chaos Calmer 15.05 to evaluate them.
These little router are very nice. Not just very power efficient, they have also 2 x Ethernet, 1 x USB 2.0, 1 x RS232 (3.3V) and a handful of unused GPIO pins for connecting lots of other stuff.
The max. power of 18 dBm (64mW) is not that much. But real world experience has shown that a good high gain, high directional antenna leads to better overall results than a high power transmitter.

This is the hardware that I have chosen (so far) for my project:

- GL.iNet AR-150 WiFi Router on Chaos Calmer 15.05
   from www.gl-inet.com or China http://www.aliexpress.com/item/GL-iNet- … 052719.htm (fast world wide delivery)
- Satellite dish 80-100 cm with a good quality WiFi feed. 23-25 dBm gain. Dish locally, WiFi feed from here:
  http://www.brennpunkt-srl.de/eshop/prod … cts_id=203 (world wide delivery)
- 20 watt solar panels. Very lightweight. High low light power delivery. From here:
   http://www.aliexpress.com/store/product … 92263.html
- Super Capacitor power storage (1 mio. charge/discharge cycles!) for max. 3 Router.
    Seizing SCs for your application: Capacity calculation:     I  x  td  /  (Vmax - Vmin)  =  C
    I is the current (in ampere) your application is using. Every mA count. The voltage is not important.
    The DC-DC converter care about that.  td (in seconds) is the time that your application need power.
    Vmax - Vmin (Vtotal) is the voltage difference between the max. charge voltage of your SCs array and the
    min. voltage your DC-DC discharge circuit can convert to the working voltage of your application.
    So for my application: 91 mA for 16 hours (short winter day) with a usable voltage range of 1.747 volt (of 2.65V).
    0.091 * 57600 / 1.747 = 3000 Farad per router. Best build as an array of 2 x 2 3000 Farad SCs
    The source is not decided. Be very careful with stuff from China if you not able to verify the specs of the SCs
    (C, self-discharge and R).
    You *need* also a fitting balancing/protecting board.
    And most important, two good DC-DC buck-up-down boards for charging and discharging the SCs.
    I have not enough boards evaluated so far. So no recommendation from me.
    But to give you an idea what you have to look for: 
    http://www.aliexpress.com/item/XL2577-L … 84748.html   

The important settings:
Router link Channel: 14.................Unused in my country. Noise free.
Sole routers for the long distance link. 2nd router at a different channel and mode for picking up/deliver the signal from the gateway/client. 3rd router if my link get extended to a mesh. All router use Ethernet as backbone.

Some power measurements some of you may find useful when designing off-the-power-grid WiFi applications.
All @ 4.83 Volt measured with a good multimeter.

GL.iNet AR-150 WiFi Router Tx-Power: 18 dBm  94.6 mA = 0.456 W idle / 179 mA peak = 0.864 W
Vodafone / ZTE K4607-Z G3/GSM Data Modem 40 mA idle / 80 mA in UMTS search mode / 65 mA in GSM search mode / 115 mA peak with an active micro SD card
Huawei E1550 G3/GSM Data Modem 124 mA in search mode / 150 mA peak with mSD card
Ralink RT3070 WiFi Dongle (148f:3070) 70 mA idle / 82 mA peak active
Alfa Network AWUS 036H (0bda:8187) (bad Chinese clone) @ Tx-Power=20 dBm 335 mA idle / 393 mA peak active
Kingston Flash Drive 8GB (13fe:3e00) 45 mA idle / 75 mA peak active
Kingston Flash Drive 2GB (13fe:1d23) 51 mA idle / 60 mA peak active
Alcor Micro Flash Drive 16GB (058f:6387) 61 mA idle / 99 mA peak active
Micro SD reader with 2GB card 18 mA idle / 35 mA peak active
Chinese NoName Stainless Steel Flash Drive 8GB (0011:7788) 65 mA idle / 110 mA peak active
TrekStore (Chipsbank CBM2080) Flash drive 64MB (0204:6025) 56 mA idle / 60 mA  peak active
Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000 (046d:0990) 76 mA idle / 144 mA video capturing
Active USB extension cable 5m (05e3:0608) 1.6 mA idle / 69 mA with an active flash drive

Simple answer. How to get massive range. I saw some people in a big house complain about their wifi. Slowed it down and they said the internet was faster, due to increased range / signal dBm.

802.11b, use a range calculator on the web. It goes kilometers with a big antenna compared to 100s of metres with 802.g, compared to 100 metre with 802.11.n  vs a single house if you are lucky room with 802.11ac
I like using RTS (request to send) and make sure you stake out a frequency with the least interference after listening a day or so if you are using the 2.4ghz spectrum.

If i could work out how to fragment packets using some kind of VPN and using the larger MTU.

Also get a signal amp, and a whopping great antenna, and POE connector, and a waterproof box. You don't want a newer router that does 802.11ac because they have INTERNAL antennas only for abgn and the external ones are for AC.

Don't get the TP-Link 841N-HP (high power) it's a ralink that isn't supported.

Hi Openwrt.not,

I have built a 703n based solar powered WIFI mobile data relay.

Details here (pdf) https://app.box.com/s/ad68mfftpc982ll0y0go

Lot's of WIFI calculation information in the article.

I have backed off the AR9331 WIFI Tx to +10dBm for my 600m link to prevent overload of the Rx.

The AR-150 with the very power economical AR9331 chipset has oodles of power (with the right antennas).

As long as the links Fresnel zone is clear and you have suitable gain antennas, 1Km won't be a problem for the AR-150's.

If you have any questions please ask.

Regarding the mythological powers of the Zioncom WL0162

see http://www.zioncom.net/

Nothing better than -90 for the current range of Zioncom USB WIFI adapters.

-----

You are on the right track with the AR9331.

@Wahroonga Farm
Thank you very much for your project documentation. Very nice. Do you have a PDF direct download link too ?
Good to know that you had success with AR9331 based hardware.
I have done my solar calculation homework.
I measured a power delivery of 17.69% of the nominal sun panel capacity at a cloudy, rainy, short NZ Far North winter day. Panel perfect aligned at true noon. But this is a exceptional good poly solar panel. I expect not more than 16% (day average) from a different one. And I get 1350 watt/m2 instead of the world average of 1000 watt/m2 here.
BTW. I discovered how to get solar power for $0.50 NZD/AUD per watt.
The Chinese solar cell producer sell solar cells (i.e. 4.3 watt / 0.5 volt) direct from the factory at AliEx.
If you are able to build your own solar panel from the cells, you are total flexible regarding to size, current and voltage. And you save a lot of money. I'm evaluating some cells at the moment.

Used batteries are cheap, but I'm really sick of all the fast degrading chemical power storage systems.
Super Capacitors have a lifetime of 1 mio. charge/discharge cycles. That's 2739 years of daily charge and discharge.
If you are interested, I will post the details of my Super Capacitors power storage system once its finished and tested.

The parabolic grid antennas you use are many times more expensive than the sat-dish/wifi feedhorn combination that I use. This German engineer has sat-dish feedhorns for 2.4 GHz (WiFi) and 2.1 GHz (3G/UMTS). The feedhorns can be used with any cheap sat dish. Offset or front feed. 40 cm or 2m. Have you seen his "Stickblock" sat-dish feedhorns for all kind of WiFi/Mobile USB sticks ? Ingenious!

same device (GL-AR150) tested here, it had the weakest link of all devices tested, even with strong signal the rates were falling down to 12 Mbps, mostly around 24Mbps. and this was short distance (2-3km).

what did you mean with 10dBm, you did txpower increase?

You can download the file from that link.

Excellent

For a 1Km link Chinese cheap and cheerful will work just fine.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/171150785489 … EBIDX%3AIT

My basic testing of this very cheap antenna. I reckon it runs in at around 16dBi or so; which will be ample over 1Km.

https://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-r … p;p=8#r159

https://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-r … p;p=9#r162

Batteries are relatively cheap and reliable. The key is to maintain battery charge, by providing sufficient panel.
capacity. Panels are cheap.

Ruff costs. https://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-r … 2391444#r4

and to end up this glinet torture here are test results:

GL-AR150 running CC R49033:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
pSib = 0x80d71310(60)
AID 0, e4-95-6e-40-6d-24 STA, idx: 60, pVportBss: 0x80d8fb20
flag: USED VALID, time: 81, State: None, transState: 0x00000000
Current Ant: 2, Rx Ant: 2
Ant 1: 23862, Ant 2: 23877, Switch: 1977, Delta: -15
Start: 346604, Last active: 347204
TX Rate: 2, lfRate: 2
Authentication Type:     Open System
Encryption: ON Keyflags =  framekey=0 pPriv =0x80d32f20 AES 128bit key: 5367b85aa7df42866473d78782a1807b hwIndex 6
128bit AES key: 5367b85aa7df42866473d78782a1807b
RX MIC key: 0000000000000000
TX MIC key: 0000000000000000
Ciphers: NONE(unicast), NONE(multicast),  NONE
WLAN Mode: 2.4GHz 54Mbps (802.11g),  nonERP present: NO, nonERP protected: NO
Capabilities -> Element not present or invalid
Authentications:         1  Deauthentications:     2
Associations:            2  Reassociations:        0  Disassociations:       1  Reason Code: 8
Power Save Mode: OFF
RX Rate:                 24
AckSignalStrength:             14     RcvSignalStrength:             14
Tx MSDUs:              47739     Rx MSDUs:              47379
TxBroadcasts:                  0     BroadcastReceives:              0
TxMulticasts:                  0     MulticastReceives:              3
TxDataFrames:              47820     RxDataFrames:              47428
TxMgmtFrames:                  3     RxMgmtFrames:                  2
TxErrors:                 84     RxErrors:                174
TxFramesDropped:             84     RxDiscardFrames:              0
TxPending:                  0
psRequestFrames:             10     psSavedFrames:                 10

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

AWUS036NHA running on trunk R48626:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
pSib = 0x80d72034(61)
AID 6, 00-c0-ca-84-56-ac STA, idx: 61, pVportBss: 0x80d8fb20
flag: USED VALID, time: 0, State: AUTH ASSOC, transState: 0x00000000
Current Ant: 1, Rx Ant: 2
Ant 1: 2059262, Ant 2: 2081585, Switch: 146050, Delta: -22323
Start: 104795, Last active: 347285
TX Rate: 54, lfRate: 54
Authentication Type:     Open System
Encryption: ON Keyflags =  framekey=0 pPriv =0x80d32d30 AES 128bit key: 997ef70417c3f601827c8bfe8fba358d hwIndex 5
128bit AES key: 997ef70417c3f601827c8bfe8fba358d
RX MIC key: 0000000000000000
TX MIC key: 0000000000000000
Ciphers: NONE(unicast), NONE(multicast),  NONE
WLAN Mode: 2.4GHz 54Mbps (802.11g),  nonERP present: NO, nonERP protected: NO
Capabilities -> Element not present or invalid
Authentications:         6  Deauthentications:     8  Reason Code: 3
Associations:           12  Reassociations:        0  Disassociations:       4  Reason Code: 8
Power Save Mode: OFF
RX Rate:                 54
AckSignalStrength:             26     RcvSignalStrength:             22
Tx MSDUs:            4140847     Rx MSDUs:            2931703
TxBroadcasts:                  0     BroadcastReceives:              0
TxMulticasts:                  0     MulticastReceives:             15
TxDataFrames:            4141087     RxDataFrames:            2933373
TxMgmtFrames:                 13     RxMgmtFrames:                 13
TxErrors:                222     RxErrors:              13391
TxFiltered:                  0     RxDuplicateFrames:              4
TxFramesDropped:            222     RxDiscardFrames:              4
TxPending:                  0
psRequestFrames:           1487     psSavedFrames:               1487

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

as you can see alfa which is limited to 20dBm (probably 14dBm or less at 54Mbps) outperforms ar150 for 8-12dB.

so if you think of hooking up outdoor antenna to ar150 and getting quality wireless link at long distance better save your time for something else.
i've put this device in a building at a friend's place and it could not provide stable repeater operation. 5m away from it no more than 1-2 Mbps.

not to mention that both units i got have failed, on first one wifi and on second one usb port. complete disaster...

you need high power device for long links not the crap that barely transmits.

Helllo anarchy99,

thanks a lot for the detailed information.
But, may I point you to the problem that I have with the Alfa / Realtek Wifi adapter ?

This shows the problem I have with my Alfa / Realtek Wifi adapter too.
My Alfa / Realtek Wifi adapter is also *reporting* very high reception numbers.
But also a very high error rate.

iw dev wlan1 station dump   (after 10 minutes)

Station e0:a3:ac:xx:xx:xx (on wlan1)
    inactive time:    0 ms
    rx bytes:    97075531
    rx packets:    81809
    tx bytes:    10304549
    tx packets:    40202
    tx retries:    8367
    tx failed:    64
    signal:      -62 dBm
    signal avg:    -62 dBm
    tx bitrate:    11.0 MBit/s
    rx bitrate:    5.5 MBit/s
    expected throughput:    8.331Mbps
    authorized:    yes
    authenticated:    yes
    preamble:    long
    WMM/WME:    no
    MFP:        no
    TDLS peer:    no

The REAL amount of transferred data is low. The firmware of the Realtek chipset is not telling the truth.
My Alfa AWUS036H (a cheap Chinese clone) hangs after max. 1-2 hours of constant hight data traffic.
Often even after 5 minutes. (low transmit power and bit rate set)
I have to reload the driver to get it working again (checked with kernel 4.4 to 4.8 rtl8187 driver)

So yes, I would like to use a good USB WiFi adapter.
But it need to be run really stable with constant traffic 24/7/365.
anarchy99 is your ALFA Networks AWUS036NHA USB WiFi Adapter (Atheros AR9271 chipset) running stable ?

Can someone point me to a source for a high sensitive & stable running USB WiFi adapter please ?
     (need to have an ext. antenna connector and sent to NZ)

(Last edited by openwrt.n0t on 1 Nov 2016, 03:09)

My expereince with Atheros AR9331 based 150n routers has been superb. No real experience with Realtek ... but I have my reservations.

The solar relay (referenced above) uses a TP-Link 703n at the relay end and a TP-Link WR741ND (same AR9331 chipset), but with four LAN ports and external antenna at the home end. The 703n required modification to connect an external antenna. Bit fiddly, but doable.

This WIFI link (600m) has run for 2 years without interruption. The Tx power of both ends is reduced by 10dB to prevent Rx signal overload ... so no problems with power. The throughput of the link is greater than 50MB/s in either direction.

Details here (pdf) https://app.box.com/s/ad68mfftpc982ll0y0go

IMO there is no reason that the GL-Inet AR-150 (with external antenna port), won't do the exact same job as the 703n (AR9331 chipset).

I would have no qualms in replacing my 703n with a GL-Inet AR-150.

look at your signal level (-62dBm) vs tx/rx rates 11/5.5 - this is very bad unless you connect to 802.11b AP, connecting to 802.11bg AP at this signal level should give 54Mbps. whoever told you to get awus036h is lost in the past because there are better performing newer alfa models.

and by "better performing" i don't mean faster because of 150N wifi but with better reception sensitivity, better driver support etc.

as for my AWUS036NHA i did not take a long stability test due to constantly changing configuration requiring reboots but i remember recently looking at statistics in luci it had uptime about 5 days (before reboot or reconnect) and worked all the time without problems.

running latest trunk without any issues with this adapter, it can get 20/20 of throughput to another 802.11g AP 2.5km away.

so it's definitely a recommendation, but even more sensitive is AWUS036NH with RT3070L chipset. one more interesting adapter i had not chance to try is PL-H5DN-3070. any of these should run stable.

19dBi grids on both ends are overkill for such a short distance as 600m. that's why you had to lower txpower. recently, i've picked up a network from about 110km away with AWUS036NH. i haven't tried connecting and i doubt it would work since this adapter lacks some txpower, but with txpower patch who knows.. there is no way gl-ar150 would ever picked it up.

Helllo anarchy99,

thank you (and Wahroonga Farm) again for the very helpful information.
I have "only" a 1 MB/s Internet link to share, so the 11 MBit 802.11b is on purpose to stable the link (it improves the quality, tested).
Are you able to make a precise power usage measurement of your USB WiFi adapters ?
Can you recommend a source (online shop with international mailing) for the AWUS036NH and the AWUS036NHA ?
(were I get 100% original hardware)

Interest in a little WiFi_regulatory_hack howto to remove artificial limits ?

(Last edited by openwrt.n0t on 1 Nov 2016, 06:30)

Yes of course, but the point is that the link path loss paper estimate and what the routers 'see' are identical.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with the Rx sensitivity or Tx power output of an Atheros AR9331.

From 'that' report that I keep quoting ...

And the link is always locked on 150MB sync

I manged a good link over 43km on 2.4G.
Thirst I need to tell you yagi antennas are not useful für Wifi links! Anyway they have not enough gain and not enough bandwidth.
The best are grid antennas 20-30dBi. The wind blows through the grid in contrast of dish antennas.
For the link about 43km we use 24dBi Grid antennas and ubiquiti b2hp. Theoretical with this equipment the max range can be up to 100km. But in practice the noice, fresnel zone and earth bend reduce this. For this range you need big hills and nothing between.

At 5G there are 7dB extra loss, I dont know why. The antennas are smaller.

(Last edited by dnkru on 30 Jan 2017, 14:29)

Are you using the TP-Link 24dB parabolic grid?  I bought one, looks like a decent build quality for the price, but never tried it on the air yet.