Wireless Router / Kiosk / Wireless Signal booster

[Classic Race Services]

Let me begin this post by saying I really know very little about networking and wireless routers, so I may very quickly be showing my ignorance!

I am still working to at getting the kiosk working via a wireless router at my races.  I can get it working in my driveway, but when I get to a race location perhaps nerves gets the better part of me and I just can't seem to get it to work.  I have been using the old fashioned "sneaker net" and walking a thumb drive back and forth between my timing computer and kiosk computer.  That works beautifully and my FitBit is happy with all those steps!!!   

My question today is...  once the router is plugged into power it is sending out a wireless signal to all devices within reach of the signal.  Am I correct in believing there is really no need to plug the router into my kiosk computer via an ethernet cable?  I use a little HP netbook for my kiosk computer and it has an HDMI port for my very inexpensive HDMI TV from Best Buy that I use at the Kiosk.  But, this computer does not have an ethernet port.  I don't believe I need the ethernet connection, correct?

2nd question... I think my problem at races has been distance between wireless router at the kiosk and timing computer at the finish line.  Has anyone used any type of signal booster of directional antenna with their router?

Thanks!  Hope this post doesn't make it to the top 10 list of stupid questions!

Carole

[Ted Finch]

You may wish to consider cabling all connection and using fixed IP addreses.
You can use USB to Ethernet adaptors then cable to router.

The network connections must be on the same subnet. You may have a mix of fixed and router allocated addresses. When you have your test setup check the IP addresses via the properties of the network adaptors. Then try pinging from each computer e.g. ping 192.168.1.4 Do the two computers 'see' each other?
Repeat with your RFID reader connected up. Does it still work.?

Try with wifi links and cable links. You may find that with wifi you end up with different IP addresses and so the connection does not work.

I hope this helps

Ted

[Edward Schrank]

Carole,
Find someone who does know networking. They can get your IP addresses all set in your router so they stay the same every time you connect. Your second issue is the distance to your kiosk. If you think about the size of your house and where your weak signal is at home, that is about the distance you will get with a normal router. If your kiosk is farther you will need different gear.

[Brian Agee]

Carole, I am sympathetic because I too struggle with knowing how best to setup a wireless network. If you click on the following link and watch until the 8:52 mark you can see how I set mine up: https://youtu.be/VnDYjHELndE?t=287

Besides what I covered in the video I also turned off Password protected sharing: http://www.isunshare.com/windows-10/turn-off-or-on-password-protected-sharing-in-windows-10.html

Finally, you can see the distance I'm getting out of my router in the first video. I hate to say that I'm not sure what the maximum distance is but as you can see I'm getting pretty good range out of a Belkin N300.

[Brian Agee]

Oh, and as Ted said you'll need to make sure both computers are on the same network. Using static IP's may be the best way to go, but if you're like me, I want to touch as little as possible and hope the equipment can figure it out for me (sometimes the more I touch, the more I mess it up). So I just ensure that your main timing computer and your kiosk are on the same domain/workgroup. You can do this by right clicking on "My Computer" (or just "Computer" in newer versions of Windows) and selecting "Properties". At the bottom of the System window you will which workgroup or domain they are on and you have the option to change it if needed.

More than likely both computers are on a WorkGroup named "WorkGroup". So once both computers connect to the wireless network you setup they should be able to see each other. If they cannot, you might try creating a brand new "WorkGroup" (named anything you want) on each computer. I've had to do this before to get the computers to see each other.

Hopefully something here helps, and if not, I hope this thread attracts the attention of all of the network pros that are using the software.

[Ted Finch]

Also. If you have suitable power points and are using Wifi then you can place the router midway between timing and kiosk. if using cable connection run a 50m Ethernet between each computer and the midpoint router.
You may be able to set up a battery powered router to save finding a mains power point.
Ted