sporadic connectivity

[Michael Butash]

If you're dropping often, it's probably more an RF issue, ie. coverage
isn't sufficient.

In linux, it's easy to see your levels, use iwconfig when connected to
wifi, and look at your Signal Level.  It'll be represented as a negative
integer, say -50 dBm.  The higher the number (remember, this is negative),
the better the connection.  For instance, Cisco recommends voice coverage
isn't lower than -65dBm for voice quality on wifi clients, so I tend to use
that as a watermark for good/bad, but usually -40 to -65 is acceptable,
anything over -75 means you're too far away, or there is interference to
keep the connection.

If your levels are good, and you're still dropping, I'd say look at the
drivers and/or other causes.  Watching your syslog file at networkmanager
output when connecting/disconnecting can be telling.

Also, if you're using 2.4ghz wifi (802.11b/g/n), then you're very
susceptible to interference - microwaves, fluorescent ballasts, all sorts
of things can cause EMI.  Better to use 5ghz, but also less range than
2.4ghz with the higher frequency.

There is a big difference in wifi dongles, usb ones in particular tend to
be variably craptastic.  This was a good look at testing between different
usb dongles as they use them for testing wifi in enterprises I found
recently.  Long story short, try an Asus usb wifi nic, they seem to test
best.

https://netbeez.net/2016/06/01/iperf-wifi-comparison-on-raspberry-pi-raspberry-pi-3-vs-asus-vs-hawking-vs-linksys-vs-tp-link/

HTH!

-mb

On Sun, Aug 6, 2017 at 5:29 PM, Michael <bmike1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> I moved into a new place which offers free wifi (I'm renting a room). I
> have my wifi dongle plugged in and sometimes wifi works and sometimes it
> doesn't. Could it be something with Linux because the woman who owns the
> house says wifi works fine for her.  I am on a guest account.
>
> --
> :-)~MIKE~(-:
>
> ---------------------------------------------------
> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss at lists.phxlinux.org
> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings:
> http://lists.phxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.phxlinux.org/pipermail/plug-discuss/attachments/20170811/22b4e350/attachment.html>