I have a wireless router downstairs, and I have a long Ethernet cable going from the router to the upstairs part of the house. I have the Ethernet cable going into a crappy router (provided by my ISP which has very limited functionality) to produce a different wireless network upstairs. Is there anything I can buy that will make the upstairs the same network as the downstairs so that any devices (laptops etc) upstairs can see all devices downstairs as if it were just one network?
I have tried wifi extenders but they don’t really work that well. I have also tried powerline wifi gizmos which kind of work but results in a different network anyway.
Is there a device that I can just plug my Ethernet cable into that will just spit out the same network, ideally with minimal configuration/fiddling by myself?
If you are comfortable with fabricating your own stuff, you can make wi-fi Yagi antennae, basically antennae designed to focus their transmission/reception in a given direction. You might need to set one up on your router and then set one up for each of your devices upstairs. It looks like there are companies that sell directional wi-fi antennae if you’d rather buy one pre-made.
Alternately, if you don’t mind replacing your consumer wi-fi setup with a commercial one, you can get something designed from the ground up to do what you’re trying to do, with multiple access points all running on the same network.
No, anything you buy just creates a second network. While there may be things that do actually just grab the signal and send it back out, untouched just stronger, everything I’ve seen that calls itself a repeater, extender or booster does the same thing. Creates a second network. You put it near the edge of your wifi range (but still in a good area), and it gives you another 100ish feet or so. As you walk around your house, your device will hop from one network to the other.
Have you tried moving your wireless router (the good one) around to different areas of the house to see if you can find a spot where all your devices can see it? That’s probably going to be your best option.
You don’t need commercial equipment or to fabricate anything. All you need is two wireless routers and turn off the DHCP and routing services on one of them. I’ve got my house set up that way. If you give both of them the same SSID and password your wireless devices will work pretty much seamlessly.
Doug, this sounds promising. Question: if you have 1 laptop on 1 end of your house, and another on the other end of your house, can they see each other as if they were on the same network?
This is what I have. The router connected to the cable modem is configured for DHCP and using an IP address range of x.x.x.2 to x.x.x.200. The x’s will often be 192.168.1.
The second router (the access point) is configured to be fixed IP address x.x.x.201. That way, the first router can never give that IP address to another device, thereby causing a conflict. Both routers have wireless configured with the same SSIDs and passwords.
Google setting up router as access point and you will find articles telling you how to do it.
Yes. Or more accurately they see each other because they are on the same network. That’s how I’ve had my home network set up for years. I have two WiFi routers, but one has had all services turned off
I do this as well. For some routers there’s a specific “wireless access point” or some such setting.
Note, certain ways of doing this might require that you don’t use the WAN port of the secondary router. The cable to the main router would go into a regular LAN side port.
Check if the router has a specific setting for this and see what port it recommends.
You can get good info Googling “wireless access point” and the router model number.
A directional antenna can spectacularly increase the range of Wi-Fi in free space, like outdoors between two towers. Inside a house, where multipath and diffraction around obstacles are more important effects, the benefit will be marginal at best. Homebuilt antennas also tend to be hit or miss, unless you build a known good design with very close mechanical tolerances, or you have test equipment to confirm the antenna’s tuning.
Like the other posters said, multiple access points with the same SSID is the way to go indoors.
Somewhat of a side note, but I recently replaced my old router with one that also works on the 5 GHz band as well as the traditional 2.4 GHz. Most of my devices are 5 GHz capable.
I’m amazed at how much better the range is on the 5 GHz band. I did a test where I put the laptop at the other end of the house and the signal had to go through several walls. I still got 250 Mb/s transfer speeds.
There are lots of products out there for seamless roaming. Search for that, multiple point, wifi extenders, network repeaters.
These vary in complexity and ease of use, so read as many reviews as you can find. A new product called ‘eero’ is getting a lot of buzz for its simplicity - but is expensive.
If I understand your problem correctly, you want to be able to communicate with a device that is connected to one router in your network from a device that is connected to a different router.
You are confusing a wifi network with an ethernet network.
This is NOT a wifi problem or a signal strength problem or anything like that. You do not need to improve your wifi reception, you do not need create a single wifi network, or even use the same SSID on the two routers.
It’s a routing problem, not a wifi problem. All of the devices in your house should be able to see each other, no matter how many routers you are using or how many different wifi networks you have, as long as all the routers are connected together.
You just have a set up problem.
First make sure the ethernet cable that runs between the two routers is plugged into a LAN port on both routers, not a WAN port. (A LAN port is where you would plug in a computer, for example.)
Then go into the settings on the downstairs router (the one that is not provided by the cable company) and turn off the DHCP server. You may have to reboot. But every device connected to either router should be able access every other device.
If you need help doing this, please post the brand and the model number of the router you are using.
You don’t need to use the same SSID, but you probably should. That will cause e.g. your laptop’s Wi-Fi adapter to treat the two access points interchangeably, and automatically switch to whichever gives it better signal. I’m pretty sure the usual Wi-Fi roaming behavior is “stickier” between different SSIDs, so that once you connect to SSID_A, you might stay there until you lose coverage entirely, even if SSID_B is stronger. It’s also more convenient, since you’d otherwise have to set up both access points separately on each device.
Not sure if this will help you but how about a Powerline Network?
Basically this uses the electric power wires to carry the signal to any room in the house.
The system consists of an adaptor connected to the computer that’s plugged into a wall socket and several Extenders plugged into wall sockets in various parts of the house where you want to receive LAN or WiFi signal.
I think you mean better performance, not range. 5GHz has a shorter range, but higher throughput when in range.
That’s true if performance is limited by the ratio of signal to the receiver’s own noise at the receiver, like in a house in the middle of nowhere. If performance is limited by interference, like in a high-density apartment, where many people around you are using the 2.4 GHz band (but maybe not so much the 5 GHz band), then range could be as zwede observes.
I just ordered 2 of the Ubiquiti AC Lite access points for my house to replace two crappy consumer grade devices. These are selling for under $85 each and I hope they will resolve my connectivity issues.
I’ll update the thread once I have them installed later this week.
I have the exact same setup on my Apple network. It was very simple, so I assume you don’t have Apple. I ran the ethernet from my first router to the new router, when I powered up the new router I got a message on my laptop asking me if I want to extend my existing network or create a new one. Click extend = done.
I first tried to boost mine with a wall plug-in wi-fi extender and I got a strong signal but it was very slow. When I was next to my main router I was getting 20mbs, when I was in the other end of the house next to the extender I was getting less than 10mbs. The one thing I learned which I believe is true for PC’s as well, is that you drop your speed in half every time you wirelessly boost it, regardless if that boost is by a wall extender, new router etc.
Fortunately I was easily able to run ethernet to the new location, I invested in a new router and boom - no speed loss still the same network.
If your routers/Wifi are the typical home units - they have a WAN port (internet), wifi, and 4 or 5 LAN ports (local network). Typically the Wifi is “bridged” to the LAN (occasionally this is an option). Thus, anything on Wifi can see anything on the wired lan because they share the same IP address range.
If one of the wired devices is another router (B) - as mentioned, just turn off the DHCP and give the router a non-conflicting IP address. Router B’s DHCP would have told anyone who got addresses off of it to use router B’s WAN to get to the internet. Whith DHCP off, nobody knows about B’s WAN port - which is good, becase it’s specifically NOT connected to teh internet.
Set up both Wifi with the same SSID and yor device will connect to the best one.
Here’s the issue - typically it will stay on that one access point. The higher end Wifi control systems can manage this by forcing the clients to change - they monitor signal strength, and when they hear it much “louder” at another wifi access point, they “bump” the client of the first access point by stopping communication. But, cheap home routers don’t have this smarts. Barring this sort of managed intervention, which Access Point to connect to (and whether to drop it and reconnect elsewhere) is strictly the decision of the client’s Wifi driver software - so wandering the house may cause problems. Unless it loses one signal completely, it will not switch. But if you one time power up your laptop in the rec room to work there, and next day in the bedroom, each time you will get the better signal.
Actually, 5 GHz is much shorter range than 2.4 GHz. Higher frequencies attenuate faster and are hindered by obstacles more than lower frequencies are.
That said in many place the 2.4 GHz spectrum is positively flooded with other people on the same frequency. I live in a condo and this is the case there. You can download a scanner app for your smartphone that will show other signals in the area. If you are lucky you can find an empty channel and switch to that one for your wireless network.
These have a habit of interfering with each other which effectively slows down your network speed. The 5GHz band is substantially less populated so as a result you may well get better speed out of it.
However, if there is no one in your area to compete for that frequency then you are better off in the 2.4 GHz range.