Maximizing Wireless Range Indoors and Outdoors

Last updated January 11, 2022

Indoors

When on stage or in the studio, transmitters are often in close proximity to receivers. In these situations, it is good practice to reduce the transmitter output power and to use omnidirectional ¼ wave whip or ½ wave dipole antennas. These can be mounted directly to the receiver, or to a slot receiver chassis like an A10-RACK that provides good coverage. The advanced digital diversity technology in the A10-RX receivers take advantage of multipath, or reflected RF signals.

A10-RACK with A10-RX mounted

Outdoors

When using wireless systems outdoors, multi-element Yagi or a LPDA receive antennas increase range. With active, wideband LPDA-type antennas, it is paramount that the gain on the amplifier is applied only to overcome the loss due to the cable run from the antennas to the system. The cable length on each side of a diversity receiver should be equal. Unequal lengths could favor one side of a diversity, making the system perform like a non-diversity system with more frequent dropouts.