Why An Outdoor Antenna?

Introduction

With many more people working from home offices, the demand for stable, reliable, and fast Internet Services have skyrocketed.

These services are provided mostly by MNO’s (Mobile Network Operator). These services based on Radio Frequency (RF) technologies, are quick and easy to ‘roll out’. In its most basic form, the home office owner simply buys a ‘Wireless Package’ consisting normally of a ‘free-to-use’ Wireless Router (the ‘Radio’ connection) and a ‘data contract’ from the WISP (Wireless Internet Service Provider) and, quite frankly, hopes for the best as far as Internet connection speed, stability and overall performance is concerned.

The Router deployed by WISPs have a built-in Transceiver (Radio) with, mostly, built-in Antennas. These Routers, with their built-in Antennas, have primarily been designed for markets where the deployment of Base Stations is dense.

in other words, the user can be reasonably sure to have several Base Stations Towers in close vicinity of the premises providing a good quality Radio signal.

Many users have been sorely disappointed once they have the router up and running. The poor signal quality due to relying on internal antennas alone can result in poor overall performance.

Below we show four scenarios where different Antenna options are discussed.

Configurations

POYNTING conducted the following tests to verify performance improvements in installing an external antenna/s.

Figure 1. above shows the 4G/5G router with internal antennas.

Figure 2. depicts scenarios where only one tower is available, the cross polarized XPOL-2-5G directional antenna is used and its improvement can be seen in table 1. below.

Figure 3. addresses the scenario where multiple towers around the premises are available and from the table below the effect of carrier aggregation can be observed. This depicts the deployment of the cross polarized XPOL-1-5G Omnidirectional antenna.

Watch this newsletter for future explanation of carrier aggregation and its ability to use MIMO technologies to its fullest, further improving the performance of 4G/5G routers.

Figure 4. depicts the high gain Log Periodic Directional Array, the LPDA-92 in a cross polarized (2 x antennas) configuration. This high gain configuration is perfect for rural areas where only a single tower is available at a much longer distance that in sub-urban and urban areas.

Results

Conclusion

From the results above it is clear that an external antenna has huge advantages for the end-user at their home or office. It’s also clear that Fixed Wireless Access radio networks can also benefit by deploying these Antennas.

This is an extract from a much more comprehensive White Paper and Webinar which will take place later this year. Please subscribe to our newsletter (in the footer of POYNTING.tech) to get updates about these events.

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