NextG USB-Yagi Plug & Play 11N Long Range WiFi Antenna 2200mW

This is an instant re-buy for me. I bought this item on amazon on a friday, got next day shipping and received it promptly Saturday afternoon. I got this item because I recently shut off our internet, in an attempt to save more money. This item has already paid for itself in one and a half weeks. I can get a great connection, with high download speeds. Right out of packaging, all I had to do was insert a disc and install a driver and boom. Ready to go. One goal I had was to hook up my PS4, and my wife's Kindle and a lot of people are saying you cannot do this. I tried and tried until I found a way. If you download the program: Connectify Hotspot Pro you can creat a hotspot on your laptop as if it were a router and pick up the signal from your other devices. This USB plug and play magic device is one of my most prized possessions! I hope the hotspot info helped and here's a link to the software: http://www.connectify.me/hotspot/ Update 1: I ordered this item on February 19, 2015. It is now November 29, 2015. This item has seen rain, sleet, and snow. still running like a CHAMP. This item has survived flood weather. I've pushed it to it's limits. Still have great signal, and do not notice and damage on the unit. I thought the rain/water would destroy the unit around the USB port but NOPE. I ordered a 30" usb cable and I can move all around my house comfortably.

Let me start by saying that you will simply not find a better higher-gain WiFi antenna at this price. This antenna has so much gain that it is mind-boggling. Like all Yagis, it is highly directional and will 'listen' where you point it. Where I live, my old laptop can pick up 1-3 networks, while my new laptop can pick up 5-6. With this antenna, I can get close to 30 (all at once). If I rotate the antenna around, I will get 30 more in a different direction. Your reception will be roughly line-of-sight. I happen to live where I am surrounded by trees, so it is difficult to 'see out' to neighboring buildings. But, signals bounce off of buildings and objects, so even if you can't see your target, you might find the signal in some random 'hot-spot' reflection point. Of course, this takes a lot of trial & error. And although I have the antenna mounted on my roof, I could still get over 20 networks through the wall while the antenna was hooked up inside. The antenna itself has a bit of a home-brew feel to it. As one previous reviewer put it, one could probably make one themselves; however, you will never be able to build and tune a system like this for the price that they are asking. It looks somewhat weatherproof, but the USB connection is exposed, so I would not leave it out in the rain. The tripod that comes with it is a little too small; however, I think some of the reviewers are failing to realize that the legs of the tripod extend out an additional segment. This makes it work much better! I am happy that a standard camera tripod mount was used - this lets the user mount it to any standard tripod or camera mount. The software/driver for this antenna (from Ralink) is not the strongest. The problems will differ depending on your operating system. One irritating thing about the built-in 'site survey' function is that it does not identify the sites with no security. However, if you are using Windows 7, that feature is built in. With XP you are out of luck. Another irritating thing is that the 'site survey' window keeps refreshing as you are searching for a particular site. Every time it refreshes, you lose your place and have to start over. A minor annoyance, but when you are searching for a particular site's signal, it can get frustrating. **update** - get the latest driver from the website - it has a much improved user interface! I tried this antenna with several different computers: (1) Old Dell Laptop running XP with USB 1.1: Would never recognize the antenna no matter what I did. This device probably doesn't work with USB 1.1. (2) Dual-Core Dell Laptop running XP with USB 2.0: Worked perfect. Just hard find the nonsecure sites. (3) Brand new Sandy Bridge desktop running Windows 7: USB 3.0 ports won't work with this (even though they are supposed to be backward compatible) but USB 2.0 ports will. Windows 7 makes it easy to find the nonsecure sites. I am currently running this antenna on my roof, using two 30-foot powered USB cables connected in series. By my math, this should not work. If the antenna truly transmits 2.2 watts, it should draw approximately 5 watts total (even the best amplifiers are only ~50% efficient). Each powered USB cable uses a couple of watts as well, so I should be drawing close to 10-12 watts with this setup. But a USB port can only supply 0.5 amps, which at 5 volts translates to about 2.5 watts total. Because of this, I bought a powered USB hub to power the antenna and cables and take the stress off of my desktop's USB port. However, when I run the antenna off of the powered USB hub, it cycles back and forth between connecting and disconnecting, making it totally useless. I bought a particularly expensive USB hub in hopes that I would not have weird problems like this, but it could be that a different hub would produce a different result. All I know is that I am currently powering the antenna and two active cables on my desktop's USB port, and I am afraid that my USB port will soon kick the bucket under this load. Having said that, it is certainly working fine as-is. In a related point, the USB extension cable that came with it was causing all kinds of problems. If you bought one and are having connectivity issues, I would advise to first change the USB cable, because the one they shipped with mine wasn't working correctly. In short, this antenna is just great and the problems that I am having with it are very very minor. ** UPDATE ** So, after a few days of use, I have been having a lot of connectivity issues: active connections will suddenly be disconnected, it will have a hard time connecting to signals that are strong, and I often get the message that the "wifi card needs to be re-inserted." The reason? It is getting too hot. The 100 degree weather isn't helping any, but there is a design issue here that causes the antenna to overheat. In short, this antenna is a USB wifi card that is wired to the yagi. Well, the USB portion, which contains all of the circuitry, is wrapped in heat-shrink tape - which covers the ventilation holes. Consequently, the circuitry gets hot and causes all of the connectivity problems that I just described. So here are some solutions, all of which probably void the warranty: #1. Basic: remove the heat-shrink tape. Take a knife and cut it off. After doing so, you will uncover some of the ventilation holes that were originally designed into the USB component. This by itself may solve the problem. #2. For the adventurous: Using a small blade screwdriver or knife, CAREFULLY pry apart the plastic covering on the USB component. This will expose the circuit inside. You might loosely reassemble the plastic pieces in a way that leave a gap, or drill holes in them to increase airflow. #3. For the real DIY nerd: Upon removing the plastic cover of the USB component, find the largest surface-mount component on the board (has an 'Ralink" logo on it). This is what is generating all of the heat. Using heat sink ADHESIVE, glue a small heat sink on top of the chip. I had a tiny one from a motherboard, but it might be hard to find anything that small. One solution is to use the heatsinks used for south bridge chipsets....search Amazon for 'XBOX heat sink' and you will find some self-adhesive miniature heat sinks that will fit right on this. Might seem a little extreme, but after altering the USB component, the device became rock-solid stable.

Ordered this on Fri. chose 2 day shipping for slightly higher shipping price, was delivered on Monday !! via usps priority mail. And this is from Az. to NY (have never seen priority mail usps move this fast) Very easy to setup as driver was already installed in my laptop (rt2870 option from ralink) : 2nd download after link above opens usb rt2870 [...] About 3 min. tops to assemble, placed unit on wooden table facing street. Angled up (slightly) toward ceiling as described in pamphlet that comes w this product. I can see about 20+ access pts of which two give me very high speed: 21Mbps(download on speakeasy.net is min 21,000 Kbps to 24 Mbps on one ssid, other is minimum of 18Mbps download/ surfing speed tests done on speakeasy.net). Other access pts vary, but still acceptable surfing speeds (2Mbps to 10Mbps avg) Yes at 100.00 it is expensive but well worth the expense as there is nothing on market that comes even close to this turbotenna unit: READ THIS CAREFULLY!!! You can most likely get Close To performance with homemade cantenna approx 12 " long + 500mw/1000mw wifi adapter from ebay that uses rt2870 or rt3070n driver from ralink, this wifi adapter avail. from ebay direct or Amazon less than 14.00. With my homemade cantenna placed on table and moved toward wall and away from wall I recd good performance Close to Turbotenna) Strongest access pt 24,000Kbps download speed or approx 24Mbps. Anyway at 99.00+ shipping it is a great value????! and I can tell you Amazon guarantees your satisfaction 100% will even compensate you for shipping cost back to vendor Unlike Ebay! if item is returned. Amazon Great Customer Service Thanks very much for a great product!! As stated before you can pretty much get close to this performance for a fraction of the cost is using a homemade cantenna 12" long, 3.4 " outside diameter of can X 12" length when used with item from Ebay or Amazon (save yourself some money this way ) Orienting the positioning of the cantenna or turbotenna is Tedious and may take some time but is critical to good performance for the cantenna w a cheap tripod or the turbotenna w tripod legs fully extended. (signal strength of the ssid should be Excellent from windows zero buit in config tool (do not use ralik's utilty, use windows devices to connect and config.) Buy a quality tripod (Sunpak) not the crappy one that comes with turbotenna! Do not try the new alfa 2000mw wifi adapter AWUS036NHR, it is overpriced and nearly as good as turbotenna or homemade cantenna as described. 8/10/12 I have replaced the flimsy tripod that came with unit with a Sunpak Quality Tripod (sold on Amazon as well as Ebay, now tripod and whole yagi of turbotenna are very sturdy,it is now very easy to position tripod in any position (even angled uptoward ceiling without it toppling over!) Still to this day I have not yet come across a wifi unit that pulls in distant signals better than the turbotenna/ and also gives extremely fast download speeds IF Positioned Correctly (takes Time and is Tedious, but well worth the effort) Considerably better than Etekcity High Power 802.11 B/N/G 300M USB Wireless 1000mw Wifi Network Adapter with Dual Antenna also sold on Amazon. One last note, the turbotenna unit is compatible w linux plug and play. However in Terminal mode (command in windows) if I type in iwconfig, it says 27dbi wlan0 connected to ssid xxxx signal strength xxxx so what does that tell you about inflated statistics eg: 27dbi= 500mw NOT 2000mw! 10/1/12: I see Amazon has raised the price for this item about+ $25.00!! Get this item here from amazon: BestDealUSA Wifi Wireless LAN Card 150M 5dBi IEEE 802.11 n/g/b Adapter , use that with a cantenna about 12" long (read thru my Whole Review on how to do this), if you can hold of an old super-cantenna that will do fine, just uses a n connector/rpsa adapter to screw the end of the ralink (NOT REALTEK!) wifi adapter into the cantenna instead of a pigtail cable) I guarantee your performance will be just as good as this Overpriced yagi known as the turbotenna (124.00!!) Amazon pulls this crap all the time, always check Ebay as well : if the product (eg the ralink wifi adapter I mentioned for about 12.00) is made in China, order if from Ebay, and just wait a few more days: if you follow my instructions on here, you will get the same performance as the turbotenna and save yourself a TON ON MONEY! Feel free to post a comment here. Make sure the wifi adapter you buy is a b/g/n one w a Ralink rt3070 chipset that looks like the one that is`sold on amazon for less than 12.00.

After several months of light use the base wifi adapter (model#: DNX10NH-HP) stopped functioning for no apparent reason. Even following the initial delivery we noticed the Yagi acted somewhat strangely where the network interface would go down and then come back up like it was power cycling (happened in Windows, Ubuntu, & Debian) even though the cable was connected to an external USB hub that was surge/level protected by an APC 1500 VA UPS. The antenna sat in the same position inside a temperature and humidity controlled office and was barely moved. The Yagi's sole purpose was to bridge a gap to get to a base station over my family's property. After the unit failed we tried 3 different USB 2.0 Mini-B 5 pin cables and two separate laptops to make sure it wasn't a configuration problem, but none of the machines detect the Yagi now. Not even the LED light illuminates at this point. I have a lot of wifi gear (name a Panda, Edimax, Alfa, Rosewill, Marvell, or Netgear adapter and I probably have one). This is the first wireless antenna I have experimented with that failed after such light use over such a short period of time.

I would have given 5 stars as this antenna works great with my PC Laptop. But, it will not work at all on a Macbook Pro. It seems the drivers do not exist or at least I could not find any that did work.

I was looking at the reviews before I got this to see if I even should, and there weren’t many photos, so I’ll fix that. It is kali Linux compatible (monitor and injection), but it can take a second for it to turn on but not long. (Under 20 seconds for me.) The range I’m honestly not sure for exact distance, HOWEVER, sooo many new WI-Fi signals now. IT IS DIRECTIONAL! Please remember that. The mini Tripod is weird at first but if you tinker with it, you’ll actually understand how to get the most out of it, which it is quite a decent tripod for it’s job. There is a piece that spins that moves it up and down and what this does changes how far out the tripod legs can go. Again, play with it and see how it works best for your style. It is a pretty decent amount smaller than what I’d expect but undoubtedly it works great! Overall: Windows and Linux compatible (plug and play) didn’t need to install the driver disk at all. Great compact size (fits in my backpack in the smaller part). Tripod is actually really great I think. After reading the reviews I wasn’t expecting much but it actually is a good tripod for the antenna! Range and connections are great. In a crowded area my normal WiFi dongle TL-722n (I think), it can pick up a normal amount maybe slightly better or slightly worse than my laptops wifi card. This antenna is like on steroids compared to that. But it is directional and if you are in a smaller area with less houses around you, don’t expect too much. In 1 direction I could see 50 alone, while when scanning and rotating it, I got over 80. Feels great to hold and looks cool like really really cool. The cord that came with it seems durable even though my friends cat chewed on mine, it’s still pretty thick. If something comes up and it stops working down the road or if anything negative or needs added, I’ll update. But I love it!!! Personal note, it seems over priced slightly maybe worth 80 at most but without a doubt it’s paid for itself already.

Absolutely the best Long Range Wifi Antenna I've ever used.

This Yagi works as described, I can pick up wifi from next door which is what I need since it cost too much to get an isp (make sure you have permission to use the network) could be good for penetration testers, however it is very small and the rang is about a block at best so if you are going to obfuscate you physical location a Bigger Yagi would be better. for the casual user who just cant afford an ISP this is your Yagi, as a Linux user I had no problems with drivers at all (Linux is on a meteoric rise). Absolutely smoking connection speed and download speed is mind blowing! Mint Life! Linux Master Race!