WiFi Signal

[george99]

Sorry if this is posted in the wrong area, I wasn't quite sure where to put it. If it helps, all my home theater equipment is connected to my router
I have a big house, 4500 sq ft. Concrete exterior walls, and 2 floors.

One router is just not good enough to provide a strong wifi signal to the whole house, and my yard.
Wifi repeaters are a joke, because they drastically degrade the speed. I want everything to work fast. My main router is an Asus RT-AC66U, and I use a couple of older routers (fast too) as access points. However, It is still not good enoguh.
In order to keep the same SSID so that my devices will always connect to the same network, I have to make each of the 3 routers use a different channel.
Basically, what I would like to have is some sort of router or antenna that I can run through my whole house. If my router is downstairs, maybe run coax to the upstairs to connect an antenna. I am really not sure what to do. I want a good solution.
Any suggestions?

 

[dfergie]

Moved to Computer / Gadgets for better visibility... sounds like you might be on the right track.

 

[mike123abc]

I ran ethernet cable to a couple wifi boxes around the house to get full coverage. Essentially the "repeaters" have the same SSID/password and have the ethernet connected to the LAN side with DHCP turned off so that only the "master" router hands out IP addresses. WAN side of the "repeaters" are not connected to anything, they simply copy the data to/from the ethernet to the WiFi.

 

[StevenD]

Like mike123abc, I have a gigabit "backbone" and Apple AirPort Extremes hooked up on each floor. I get a great signal throughout the house, and most of the backyard and garage.

 

[. Raine]

Quite a while ago I used DD-WRT in some old routers so I could set them up as wireless repeater bridges and that worked pretty well. May be a cheap solution if you have some old routers that DD-WRT could be flashed onto.

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Repeater_Bridge

It gives you a lot of control over everything like signal strength and such and is pretty much invisible to the network, allowing you to stay in the same subnet and use the same SSID, etc. Much better than the repeaters that are for sale out there.

 

[george99]

Thanks for the replies.
Mike and Steven,
This is essentially what I have been doing, however, I read that each of the routers must use a different channel. So instead of leaving them all on auto, I gave them a unique channel. Is this what you did? Or did you leave them all set to auto?

 

[StevenD]

Thanks for the replies.
Mike and Steven,
This is essentially what I have been doing, however, I read that each of the routers must use a different channel. So instead of leaving them all on auto, I gave them a unique channel. Is this what you did? Or did you leave them all set to auto?

Mine are on Auto, and I have not had any issues.

 

[mike123abc]

I manually set mine to different channels, but they should do that automatically when in auto mode.

 

[george99]

Thanks, couple other questions.
Any preference on 2.4 vs 5ghz. I don't live in a very busy area, so 2.4 shouldn't be very busy. I have noticed 2.4 has better range. Just curious to hear what you guys think.

Also, what advantages do Apple routers offer? Their website's description is awful and it's hard to even know that it is a router. But obviously there is something good about them. Also, what is the difference between the Extreme and Express (for my purposes)?

 

[StevenD]

Thanks, couple other questions.
Any preference on 2.4 vs 5ghz. I don't live in a very busy area, so 2.4 shouldn't be very busy. I have noticed 2.4 has better range. Just curious to hear what you guys think.

Also, what advantages do Apple routers offer? Their website's description is awful and it's hard to even know that it is a router. But obviously there is something good about them. Also, what is the difference between the Extreme and Express (for my purposes)?

I have 2.4 and 5GHz enabled. Devices that can connect at 5GHz, do.

You would want Airport Extremes. I bought all 4 of mine on as refurbs from BestBuy for $120 each. I do not have any experience with the new round Extreme. I did quite a bit of testing when I bought my first one. I had a D-Link that had similar specs to the Extreme, but I was never really happy with the performance. My transfer speeds with the Extreme are very close to the "max specs" of 802.11n. Easily several times faster that with the D-Link.

 

[klang]

I do the same with a pair of Extremes but I use the same channels on both. Seems to work fine.

 

[george99]

I know Apple likes to make things very easy, but often this comes at the expense of the "advanced user". Does Airport Extreme allow port forwarding, and other standard type stuff you would expect to see in most routers?

 

[StevenD]

I know Apple likes to make things very easy, but often this comes at the expense of the "advanced user". Does Airport Extreme allow port forwarding, and other standard type stuff you would expect to see in most routers?

I'm sure it does, but I cannot answer that. I'm a firm believer of keeping your router and your WiFi separate. I only use my Extremes as Access Points.

 

[george99]

I'm sure it does, but I cannot answer that. I'm a firm believer of keeping your router and your WiFi separate. I only use my Extremes as Access Points.

Interesting. I am curious, why do you do that? What do you use for a router?

 

[StevenD]

Interesting. I am curious, why do you do that? What do you use for a router?

1) I don't want WiFi to ever interfere with my router. I maintain business servers at my house and I want my router to be rock solid and never have to be rebooted or anything. Every "consumer-grade" WiFi router I have ever used requires a kick every now and then. I have my Extremes on appliance timers so they reboot sometime in the middle of the night. There was some bad firmware about a year ago that constantly caused them to drop. I haven't removed the timers since I upgraded the firmware.

2) I can upgrade either independently. If I want to upgrade to the new 802.3ac standard, I can do so without messing with my firewall/router and having to re-configure everything.

I'm currently using a pair of TP-Link TL-ER6120's for my firewalls/routers. I have Business FiOS with 5 IPs, so they are configured identically and I can switch between them as needed, and I have a semi-redundant link back in if something happens to the "primary". That being said, they have about 200 days of uptime right now.

 

[klang]

I know Apple likes to make things very easy, but often this comes at the expense of the "advanced user". Does Airport Extreme allow port forwarding, and other standard type stuff you would expect to see in most routers?

Port forwarding yes. I'm using for accessing security cameras.

 

[king3pj]

I know Apple likes to make things very easy, but often this comes at the expense of the "advanced user". Does Airport Extreme allow port forwarding, and other standard type stuff you would expect to see in most routers?

It does support port forwarding and something like a DMZ but I think they call it something else. I had to mess with those settings when I got my Verizon Network Extender to get it to work properly. Everything else has worked out of the box.

One thing to note. I have the 5th generation wireless N AirPort Extreme. This is the last flat one they made before switching to this new tower design with wireless ac. For some reason Apple only includes a WAN port and 3 gigabit LAN ports while most routers include at least 4 LAN ports. I didn't notice this until I started plugging stuff in.

I like to keep as many of my devices wired as possible but this is an easy fix. I have a single ethernet cable run to my bedroom, my mancave, and my living room. Each of these rooms has an 8 port gigabit ethernet switch next to the TV. This gives me more than enough ports for my current and future devices. It wasn't a big deal for me because I needed ethernet switches either way but if you are used to a more standard 4 port router it can be a surprise.

 

[navychop]

I set up an Apple AirPort Extreme as an access point with different PW and SSID. I bought Apple because I wanted simultaneous 2.4 & 5 and the only other router that did that at the time was even more expensive. Freqs at auto. No problems. See no need for identical SSID & PW.

Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

 

[king3pj]

I set up an Apple AirPort Extreme as an access point with different PW and SSID. I bought Apple because I wanted simultaneous 2.4 & 5 and the only other router that did that at the time was even more expensive. Freqs at auto. No problems. See no need for identical SSID & PW.

Sent from my iPhone using SatelliteGuys

I only need one AirPort Extreme to cover my whole house. I put it on the middle floor of my tri-level house and put it as close to the center of the house as possible and I get a solid signal everywhere. I am considering an Airport express to use as an extender because my signal is basically unusable on the back porch. It would be nice to have streaming music available out there.

Because I only have one Airport I don't need to worry about this but I can see why you would want the same SSID and PW on every device. If you set it up that way your devices can easily roam to the nearest access point without manually telling them to switch. If you use separate SSIDs your iPad might still cling to the weaker downstairs signal when your bring it upstairs.

 

[aaronwt6]

I use two of these to share my neighbors wireless across the street and through two brick walls. One installed at his house and one at mine. Both inside with the stock antennas with only about a 25% loss in speed which I'd consider quite good given the fact that I'm using the 2nd one as a DHCP server so I'm on a different subnet than him. Then I use a third one as an access point only to cover our house with wifi. Anyway, coverage on them is amazing. Covers our entire 1/4 acre lot with perfect signal. I can walk 100 yards down the street with my iphone and still use it.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005CSOE1G/?tag=satell01-20

And the price is certainly right for the performance it offers.