Sunday, May 21, 2017

Professional tips for WLAN - More reach, faster Internet

How you can create faster Internet and more reach, show our professional tips. Every wireless network offers potential for improvement. The good news: In most cases, only small interventions are necessary, which can cost up little, but can help the WLAN to more functions and higher performance.


Tip 1: Find lost wireless passwords


The WLAN access is protected by WPA or WPA password, but the matching key no longer reminds you? No problem, because Windows remembers all the WLAN keys you enter and makes them visible on command.


Tip 2: Filter MAC addresses


To do this, call the Windows system control and go to the network and sharing center via the Network and Internet menu. Then, in the left column of the window, click Manage wireless networks. Windows now shows you a list of all WLAN networks your computer has connected to. Now call up its properties via the context menu of the desired WLAN and switch to the Security tab. By clicking on Display characters the password appears in the plain text


Tip 3: Solve temp brakes with WLAN 802.11n


Note: You must have administrator privileges to view the wireless keys.


Also interesting is


Each network device has a MAC address - an individual unique identifier, which can only be identified in the network. You can use this to allow access to your network only to specific devices.


For example, make sure that only your own devices or those of relatives and friends can log on to the WLAN, while unknown network participants remain blocked. The MAC address can be found by entering the command "ipconfig / all" in the Windows command line (call with "cmd" from the start menu input field). MAC addresses consist of six bytes and are usually written in hexadecimal, with each byte separated by hyphens or colons. A MAC address looks like this: "11-22-33-AA-BB-CC".


Windows displays the MAC address in the command line window under the Physical Address entry. If you use a Fritzbox as a router, call up its main menu in the browser by entering "fritz.box". Then click on Wireless network and select the option Restrict WLAN access to the known WLAN devices. Use the button Add WLAN Device to tell the Fritzbox the permitted MAC addresses.


In a Speedport router of the Telekom works the thing similarly: Call the main menu in the browser by entering "192.168.2.1" or "speedport.ip". Then, click Start Configuration, and then click Security. Select MAC filtering. Set the operating state to On and accept this change with Save. In the Security menu, MAC filtering, you can now share the MAC addresses with the PC entry & share.


For your wireless network, you are using the high-speed WLAN standard 802.11n, but you do not want to set a fast data transfer rate anyway? If the TKIP (Temporal Key IntegrityProtocol) router is an encryption protocol, the 802.11n can not fully exploit its performance.


Instead of the currently possible maximum 300 Mbit / s the data throughput is throttled to 54 Mbit / s, so it runs as slowly as with the WLAN standard 802.11g. To release this brake pad, you must change the encryption method stored in the router. Ideally, your device supports the WPA2 security standard, which uses AES as the encryption standard and uses the CCMP protocol.


On the other hand, the older WPA security standard is based on RC4 encryption, which, however, is implemented as a protocol with TKIP. In the Fritzbox, click on Security in the main menu point WLAN and select the mode suitable for 802.11n under WPA encryption: If WPA (TKIP) is activated as a security standard, change it to WPA2 (CCMP)


If the WLAN range of your router is not satisfactory, the replacement of the WLAN antenna can help. This works however only with devices, whose antennas can be unscrewed. In the Fritz box, the manufacturer has not provided an exchange equipment and it can be done with only a little craftwork.


In this case, be careful, as changes to the router hardware will void the warranty. Routers from other manufacturers are often significantly more adaptable, either because they have a detachable antenna like the devices from D-Link or are equipped with an SMA socket like the Speedport II LTE from the Telekom to which you can connect an external WLAN antenna.


Tip 4: Replacing the antenna


Three antenna options are available: The omni-directional antennas (also known as omnidirectional) used in most routers communicate in all directions and are ideal for large rooms that require a WLAN signal. The other extreme is the directional beam antennas, which only send and receive in a certain direction. These antennas can reach a wide range and are particularly suitable for point-to-point connections.


The third antenna type is the sector antenna whose opening angle lies between the omnidirectional and the directional beam antenna. The sector antenna can be used to cover a relatively large area with a high range, making it ideal for camping or cafe hotspots, for example.


Tip 5: Increase WLAN range with PowerLAN adapters


Cheap WLAN antennas are already available from about 10 euros, but with these models the power gain indicated in dBi is rather small. Professional models cost a lot more, but scores with higher dBi values.


Thick walls and reinforced concrete barriers are the fright of any WLAN technology, because they block radio signals very effectively. If your router does not allow you to connect from one room to the next, simply send the radio signals through the socket.


To do this, you need two PowerLAN adapters, each of which is attached to a free power outlet. The first adapter is set up in the same room as your wireless router. Connect both devices to a network cable. The second PowerLANAdapter is placed in the room that you want to provide with a WLAN signal.


Tip 6: Enable jumbo frames


Tip 7: Connect USB storage media to the router


You will not have to compromise on speed with the PowerLAN method. With common adapter sets such as the Devolo dLAN 200 AV Wireless N Starter Kit, WLAN signals can be transmitted through the socket at up to 300 Mbit / s, ie at full 802.11n tempo.



Data transferred in the network are divided into individual data packages, the so-called frames. The maximum user data volume per frame, the MTU (Maximum Transmission Unit), is 1500 bytes for the Ethernet protocol. However, it can make sense to increase this value if, for example, it involves the transfer of many data.


An oversized frame, also known as a jumbo frame, transmits less protocol information and thus more useful data than a standard frame, which can result in a speed advantage. In order to benefit from the oversized packet lengths, however, all network participants must be compatible, ie, in addition to the PC, the router and WLAN-operated end devices. The Fritzbox can not be persuaded, because the manufacturer does not currently plan to support Jumbo Frames.


For other routers, you can usually set the jumbo frames using menu items such as LAN configuration or network. If there are no hints on whether your router supports jumbo frames, use the command line tool mturoute. After entering the command "mturoute [IP address of the router]", the software sends small, then ever larger data packets to the router and thus determines the maximum possible packet size.


Many routers have a USB to host port and can be turned into a NAS drive by providing the contents of connected USB storage media over the network. The exact procedure differs from router to router, but basically runs according to the same scheme. First of all, the USB stick or the USB hard drive must be formatted according to the router, for example in the FAT / FAT32 or NTFS format


After you have plugged the USB storage device into the USB to host port, you can configure it further via the web interface of the router and set up one or more network drives. The example of the Fritzbox works as follows


Click the Home and Storage (NAS) menu items in the user interface and activate the option Storage (NAS) for the desired USB storage medium. Then, save the memory as a network drive. To do this, call the Windows Start menu (Windows 8: Windows key + Q) and enter the command "\\ fritz.box" in the input field. In the file manager, Windowsnun lists all partitions of the storage media connected to the Fritzbox.


To select a partition or subfolder, right-click the corresponding entry, and then click the Connect Network Drive context menu item. After you assign a drive letter to the folder, it appears in the file manager as a traditional local disk. With the dynamic name service (Dynamic DNS, also DynDNS) of the Fritzbox you can also call the network folder over the Internet. To set the Dynamic DNS service, under Internet, click the Dynamic DNS tab.

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