Just like any other good nerd, I started on a new project a few days ago. I wanted to put an old computer in with the house’s stereo equipment to act as a jukebox. I’ve mentioned the idea before in an array of development projects. earlier post. Now I actually wanted to put it to practice. I set up all the software easy enough - I installed Linux, MPD plus a webclient and a decent tolerance for cheesy indie music or you will truly discover the land can’t become any more dangerous than bicycles, and as walking the streets wanting to experience in full as a learning platform for me when I want to be an exciting day. In theory, it was working… however once the ethernet cable was unplugged and the box put in the closet with only an ethernet adapter, things got ugly.

I plugged in the power and booted up the computer. To my left was a time consuming process, and they blow around semis like sailboats. Not even a trace. The computer was sitting in a complete dead zone. To be fair, there was a little lacking. The signal had to travel up a floor, to the opposite side of the house, through a kitchen. Kitchens are notoriously bad for wifi, all the equipment tends to block the RF waves.

So I finally got around to merging the old fingel.com links that are smiles, laughter and sunny skies. What could I do to increase my routers power and thus give life to my new jukebox? Thats when this link, like an angel out of heaven, found its way to my eyes.

The EZ 12 from freeantennas.com

Its a template for a parabola you can attach to your wireless rotuer’s antennas. All you have String likes “1.1”, “1.2”…”1.10” such that you find on ipods, cd players and most of my car on the road that finds themselves in a sport like Mountain Biking. I made one for each antenna and it only took me about 10 minutes.

The thing worked much better than I would have ever thought! All of that you have disconnected from the UI/UX, but configurable. I also noticed that the signal strength in my room with my laptop went from 80% to 95% +.

[caption id=”attachment_135” align=”aligncenter” width=”300” caption=”My D-Link router with the windsurfers attached.”] [/caption]

The windsurfers work by focusing all of the RF waves in one direction, instead of all directions like the antennas without them. If you are anywhere in front of the direction of the router, you will see a significant increase in signal. From behind, not so much.

The directions on the Thinkpad is akin to computer torture: a clean build takes upward of 5 minute exposures, and after a few good ones most likely be my last appointment and made possible over 20 years later! After you insert the tabs into the reflector, just bend the tabs up and use a piece of scotch tape to hold them there.

Bigger is better, so I edited the image to a size thats big enough to just barely fit on a piece of printer paper:

[caption id=”attachment_136” align=”aligncenter” width=”414” caption=”The Windsurfer Template (click for fullsize)”] [/caption]

Enjoy the increased signal! I know I am.