Increasing wireless range

I did not even test the WLAN range yet, but just to be sure I investigated what I could do to improve reception, both distance, reliability, and bandwidth wise. So: there are implementations of drafts of the wireless "n" standard around. Since this is in the draft stage marketing chose the label "MIMO" instead to avoid trouble. Netgear advertises their stuff as "RangeMax".

Does it work? It looks like as the technology does help, possibly quite a bit. Depending on the outcome of outdoor trials I will wait until proper "n" implementations are out, or I might jump on board of some proprietary implementation. One problem is "how to power a hub in the field". Since Netgear hubs take 12V AV for input I figure it should be possible to open up a device and hook the right spot up to a lead battery (actually, input might even be 12V DC which would make things easier - what does the equal sign with the lower line dashed mean again?).