Re: wi0 oddity

["STeve Andre'" <andres@msu.edu>]

On Thursday 05 June 2003 12:19 pm, Paladdin wrote:
> On Thu, 5 Jun 2003 09:12:12 -0700 Chris wrote:
> > Ted Unangst [tedu@stanford.edu] wrote:
> > > signal strength has no meaning for an access point.  the numbers
> > > don't matter.
> >
> > Is there any way to figure out the signal strength for each client
> > from wi in hostAP ?  Is this possible?
>
> No, but you may get a coarse signal estimate by looking at the link
> speed. Speed/signal tables are available from manufacturers docs. i.e.
> an Agere PCMCIA would work like:
>
> 11Mbps, signal >= -84dBm (typ.)
> 5.5Mbps, signal < -84, > -87
> 2Mbps, signal < -87, > -91
> 1Mpbs, signal < -91, > -94
>
> Not too fine, but it's more than nothing :)
>
> 	Daniel

-84dBm is even close to an 11Mbps signal?  That is a fantasy.
The three next figures are possibly right in relative terms, but
even then I'd expect more than 3dB would be needed for a
reliable jump in data speed.  Offtopic, sorry; the ham in me just
squealed.  Someone didn't proof-read their technical docs.

--STeve Andre'