Increasing the Receving Ability of my WiFi Card

I believe this would be the right forum for this question, but if it isn't, please forgive me. I'm on a wireless network at college. The problem is that I'm upstairs and the Access Point & Antenna are downstairs so once in a while I have trouble receiving the signal. It works fine 95% of the time, but sometimes the signal strength drops way low and for a minute or two I'm offline. What I was wondering was if there is a way for me to somehow make the antenna on my Wi-Fi card bigger without buying any expensive parts. Like, can I run wire around the antenna and then around me room or something? I'm new to wireless so I have virtually no knowledge here so I apologize if this is a newbieish question. Thank you for your time.

Regards,
Xierox

Does the Wlan card have an aerial socket?

if yes you have a lot of options.. if.. don't dispair..there is a ugly solution

here is a recent mag artical on the cheep DIY (oops it is only an intro..you need to subscribe -pay ouch)
http://www.siliconchip.com.au/cms/A_102507/article.html

nah try these.. from my bookmarks


http://www.saunalahti.fi/~elepal/antenna1.html
http://helix.remco.tk/
http://www.weijand.nl/wifi/
http://www.wlan.org.uk/simple_double_quad.gif
http://www.wlan.org.uk/tincan.gif
http://www.seattlewireless.net/index.cgi/MicroTVAerial
http://www.oreillynet.com/cs/weblog/view/wlg/448
http://trevormarshall.com/biquad.htm
http://fermi.la.asu.edu/w9cf/yagipub/index.html


Give that lot a play..

Xierox
Making an antenna bigger is not conducive to better reception/transmition. This is because antenna size is dictated by the frequency used, ie. Each frequency used requires a different antenna length...............Frequency used devided by the speed of light= Antenna length.

Positioning of the antenna is the important factor. You maybe able to improve reception by moving your location, even small position changes can make a big difference.

Undertaker no's his stuff, so the links he gave should be pretty good.

Hmmm, placing a reflector behind the antenna in the opposite direction of the emitter (transmitter) may work. Then again, your problem could be the opposite. Your signal dropping out before reaching the base station. Heck moving the pc 4 or 5 feet might help too.

Increase "gain" is the goal not a longer antenna that only induces more noise and in reality moves the antenna a little closer in some respects.

How to make a reflector you just pop on the existing equipment?

Some of those links Und3ertak3r posted tell you but your getting good reception most of the time already and those things are some high quality home made stuff. Stack some beer cans or a frying pan behind it. :D

Ok really, you've heard of the pringles can antenna, but there are some other really cheap parabolic projects out there with some more gain. Not only can you make them increase your "ears" but from a security point you can use them to reduce and eliminate broadcasts to specific areas, such as the starbucks across the street full of college skiddies :p :

Cheap as hell:

http://www.freeantennas.com/projects/template/

Thanks for the links Und3ertak3r