What can I do to see the strength of wireless networks?

Question

I need to do a sweep of the office to see where the wireless dead-zones are located so I can get new wireless access points as needed. You see those cool devices in movies that sweep all the air for everything, I won't need something like that. Are there any utilities that would do this? I know of a few but they are very watered down. The utility can be for either Windows or Linux.

Answer 1

inSSIDer might be what you're looking for. From the website:

YOU CAN
– Inspect your Wi-Fi and surrounding networks
– Scan and filter hundreds of nearby access points
– Troubleshoot competing access points and clogged Wi-Fi channels
– Highlight access points for areas with high Wi-Fi concentration
– Track the strength of received signals in dBm over time
– Sort results by MAC Address, SSID, Channel, RSSI, Time Last Seen
– Export Wi-Fi and GPS data to a KML file in Google Earth


FEATURES
– Uses your current wireless card and connection software
– Works with Windows XP, Vista, and 7 (32 and 64 bit)
– Compatible with most GPS devices (NMEA v2.3 +)

And it's free. I've used it loads in the past and it's a great little tool (no, I don't work for them). Get it here

Answer 2

I've used this smart phone app with great success:

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.farproc.wifi.analyzer&hl=en

I had an old version for iPod (before it was pulled from the app store for using undocumented apis) and really liked it.

Answer 3

I've used Ekahau in the past and was happy with it, it makes a nice heatmap, and can even be used to locate hot spots.

http://www.ekahau.com/products/heatmapper/overview.html