Wi-Fi Softwares

2 Responses to “Using Netstumbler To Measure Wi-fi Signal Strength?”

1. 

   Nothingf
   

   22. Aug, 2009

   Absolute power of a signal is measured in wattage. The bel or decibel
   system can only describe relative power- a gain of 3 dB means your
   signal is 2 times as strong as it was before, but the dB scale doesn’t
   define where you’re starting from or what your ‘zero’ is. So, we
   specify dBm, indicating that our scale is relative to 1 milliWatt of
   power. 0 dBm = 1 mW.
   The reason you see negative values is that you’re representing small
   but positive numbers, on a logarithmic scale. In logarithms, the value
   indicated represents an exponent… for example, under a log 10 scale,
   a value of -2 represents 10 to the -2 power, which equals 0.01.
   Likewise, a negative dBm means that you’re applying a negative
   exponent in your power calculations; 0 dBm equals 1 mW of power, so
   -10 dBm equates to 0.1 mW, -20 dBm equates to 0.01 mW, and so forth.
   It’s a lot easier, and more useful in some calculations, to describe a
   weak signal as -100 dBm as opposed to 0.0000000001 mW.
   So -65 dBm is twice as strong as -68 dBm.

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2. 

   Funky G
   

   22. Aug, 2009

   Id suggest looking for some netstumbler forums.
   They are probably the DB signal ratios.

   Reply