how can you test wireless signal strength?

[ontangent]

Hi

I have just set up a new wireless network at home with a linksys wag54g and a Asus wl-330g ethernet bridge into my G4 graphite. ( i would recomend the wl-330g to others without an airport card as it just connects to the ethernet port)

What i want to do is see how strong/or quick the signal is between the two, or if their are any other networks near by. Is their a Mac OS X tool for this as i am not using an AirPort card?

thanks

tristan

 

[Zammy-Sam]

Hi tristan and welcome to the forum.
iStumbler should be what you are looking for.

 

[Viro]

Doesn't Internet Connect provide the functionality to test the signal strength? I know it provides a gauge that displays signal strength.

 

[Gig']

How about Network utility in OSx Utilities Folder ?

 

[Zammy-Sam]

Doesn't Internet Connect provide the functionality to test the signal strength? I know it provides a gauge that displays signal strength.

The Internet Connect only shows devices such as internal modem, bluetooth, apple airport and vpn. Third party devices are not listed in here. In the case of my dlink pc card DWL-G650 I can only use the orangeware drivers, which have a signal strength indicator or iStumbler.

 

[Zammy-Sam]

How about Network utility in OSx Utilities Folder ?

The third party device will be listed in here, but there is no indicator for the signal strength..

 

[ontangent]

thanks, i'll give those a try when i get home. I asked as the only ones i found were ones that used the airport card and i do not have one.

site support gave me these links
MacStumbler;
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/14746

iStumbler;
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/17572

KisMAC;
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/17199

 

[fergus_n]

I think the best way to test out connection speeds is using the “airport management tools” available from apples site. The package consists of two applications:

Airport Management Utility (allows you to configure multiple AX, monitor signal strength, look at logs, see what MACs are connected etc..).

I can’t remember what the other one is called but I think it monitors strength and speed.

Visit:
http://www.apple.com/support/airport/

There you will find “airport management tools” beneath “additional resources” on the right hand side of the page.

Alternately here is a, for now, working link to the dmg:

http://download.info.apple.com/Mac_OS_X/061-1087.20040419.AptmG/2Z/AirPortManagementTools.dmg

 

[Gig']

Zammy-Sam thanks for the input

fergus_n : that's a tip Brilliant ::love::

how come these are not part of the standard OSX utilities ?

whats the difference between airport management utility and AirPort Admin Utility ?

 

[TangentIdea]

I would recommend AP Grapher for testing signal strength. It graphs the wireless signal strength over a period of time.

http://macupdate.com/ap+grapher