Long Range Outdoor AP options.

[Malt_Vinegar]

I am planning to take down my now defunct starlink dish, which is mounted above my house roof on a pole and use the pole to mount an access point in it's place.
Due to the height and the surrounding land it has fairly decent line of sight all around.
I want to see how far I can get wifi to be available around my local village.
I want to spend around £150 for the equipment and it must be:

1- PoE enabled - If it comes with an injector that is good, but not a hard requirement.
2- Very reliable - Once installed, access is not easy, I have to get an aerial chap in due to the height of the pole. (My own 2 section ladder does not even come close to reaching!)
3 - Long range 360 degree coverage - I want to be able to max out the wifi range on my mobile phone.
4 - Outdoor Rated - To be pole mounted, and if it can have some form or lightning protection that would be great.

I am seeing some reviews of certain access points claiming ranges of over 1km on 2.4ghz but YouTube videos suggesting ranges of 50-100 meters before signal drops off. However, they often seem to be using very poor mounting locations, rarely give accurate details about 360 degree performance, and do not follow any common testing methods making comparison very difficult.

I would love to know what OcUK's userbase can recommend based on personal experience. Also what my real world expectations should be for range at this price point before I am maxing out my device's own transmit range (S25 Ultra).

 

[Firegod]

I maybe totally wrong but doesn't WiFi radiate from Omni antennas as a doughnut shape. So mounting high up isn't the best as you want access to the strongest horizontal gain not up and down nulls. I asked AI for optimal outdoor AP height and it suggested no more than 3m (9ft).

 

[the-evaluator]

You need to consider that even if you had an AP with an infinite transmission range you'll be limited by the transmission range of a mobile phone. So the phone may hear what the AP is saying, but the AP won't hear what the phone is saying. Range is also very dependent on environmental factors such as other Wi-Fi AP's which you can't influence.

If you're wanting good Wi-Fi coverage in a large area then you need to look at scaling out with multiple AP's with wired backhaul rather than a single AP.

Personally I think this idea is best shelved.

 

[Malt_Vinegar]

I already have a multiple AP with backhaul in the house and have great coverage on the property.
I understand the devices will be the limit, I just wanted to max out the range of the devices with the best suited AP.
I care not about reception directly under the AP, but I want devices to be able to see the SSID and connect to the network ASAP.
Throughput is not the main concern.

 

[Malt_Vinegar]

I maybe totally wrong but doesn't WiFi radiate from Omni antennas as a doughnut shape. So mounting high up isn't the best as you want access to the strongest horizontal gain not up and down nulls. I asked AI for optimal outdoor AP height and it suggested no more than 3m (9ft).

As I understand it, the doughnut is flattened by the increase in dbi from the aerials, so an 8dbi on a longer range AP will be much wider and flatter than say a standard 2dbi that will be more round and taller

 

[Caged]

Get a spare Wi-Fi router or AP if you have one, put it on 2.4GHz-only, hang it out a window that you can still have line of sight to for a decent distance, and see how far away you can get. Wi-Fi power is limited by regulation, and higher gain antennas mean the AP runs at a lower power so the outcome is the same.

What you might experience with this test of an AP out the window is you can still see a signal but you can't load anything over it, in that situation an AP with a higher gain AP will be able to hear your phone for longer. I would be doubtful that you're going to be able to pick up a Wi-Fi signal from your house in a pub 200m away, for example.

The best result will be deciding what directions you want to provide coverage in and putting outdoor directional APs up to cover those sectors. Or if you're determined to have coverage in the village look at getting an Ofcom shared access license and building your own LTE network.

 

[the-evaluator]

I already have a multiple AP with backhaul in the house and have great coverage on the property.
I understand the devices will be the limit, I just wanted to max out the range of the devices with the best suited AP.
I care not about reception directly under the AP, but I want devices to be able to see the SSID and connect to the network ASAP.
Throughput is not the main concern.

I wasn't considering throughput at all. What I said was based on it actually being usable. Not slow, but usable.