WiFi Signal amplifiers

[weelis]

Does anyone out there have/use one?  Do they work?  What  brand/'model do u use?  Thanks.

[shaneymack]

You mean like a signal booster? I need some info on that also. I only get WiFi in half of my house.

Sent from my SM-N910W8 using Tapatalk

[Brendon_t]

I'm not sure of the model but I rent one from time Warner cable for I think $2/month. I used to have poor signal everywhere but my office.  Now I get it 3 houses away. 

[Woodenskye]

I have a Netgear Wifi range extender and it works well.  My router is in the attic/office and I get full signal strength throughout the house.  If I take iPad upstairs it automatically switches to stronger signal.

[Klappco]

I installed this TP Link one recently to extend our AirPort Extreme. So far works great and setup was a breeze.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00NR2VMNC/ref=yo_ii_img?ie=UTF8&psc=1

[Llama]

10 hours ago, Klappco said:

 

I installed this TP Link one recently to extend our AirPort Extreme. So far works great and setup was a breeze.

 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00NR2VMNC/ref=yo_ii_img?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Will something like this give me a stronger signal (more speed) in an area I get a good signal in? I am asking because, since cutting the cord, I've been considering running a physical line to my tv box for a better signal. 

[BobInAustin]

27 minutes ago, Llama said:

Will something like this give me a stronger signal (more speed) in an area I get a good signal in? I am asking because, since cutting the cord, I've been considering running a physical line to my tv box for a better signal. 

I think those work on half duplex mode so it might actually be slower than whatever the wireless signal currently is.  Wired > wireless.

[Tom Crawford]

I have 2 Apple routers.  One at my house and one in the Guest cabin about 300 feet away. The one at the cabin works as an extender so I have a strong signal in the shop about 75 feet from the cabin.  There is a app on my Mac that allows me to set up the one in the cabin to extend the one at the house. Don't know if it is available for Windows. I should say that there is a direct line of sight between the cabin and house but there are several trees in that line.

[Klappco]

 

I installed this TP Link one recently to extend our AirPort Extreme. So far works great and setup was a breeze.

 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00NR2VMNC/ref=yo_ii_img?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Will something like this give me a stronger signal (more speed) in an area I get a good signal in? I am asking because, since cutting the cord, I've been considering running a physical line to my tv box for a better signal. 

I don't know about that aspect of signal but it does do dual band. I wanted to keep the AC format as all of our devices have that. Our router is in the center of our house and the garage and patio areas had just one bar before this unit. Now full bars with this in the bedroom on that side of the house. Really seems to make a difference. I can watch Marc's videos at my workbench in the garage while I work.

[socoj2]

Stop using crappy wifi gear just get one of these.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Ubiquiti-Networks-Enterprise-AP-Unifi/dp/B00HXT8R2O

[Tpt life]

Can you elaborate on what makes it more or less crappy?

[Cliff]

If you got an old router sitting around you can turn it into a wireless bridge. https://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Wireless_Bridge

I've done it a couple of times for other people. though I noticed most wifi problems are due to obstructions and interference, so its often unnecessary.

[Guest]

I have found that a reboot of my router and modem seems to solve most wifi problems.  I assume that all the devices coming and going on our connection cause some sort of log jam.   Rebooting significantly speeds things up.  

I was running an airport extreme and it was awesome and I rarely needed to reboot.    My cable company has switched to a router/modem combo unit and it sucks.    There is a way to set up their unit to be a modem only (so I can go back to my airport) but I haven't figured it out yet.  

[socoj2]

19 hours ago, C Shaffer said:

Can you elaborate on what makes it more or less crappy?

I could but this does a better job.

 

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/10/review-ubiquiti-unifi-made-me-realize-how-terrible-consumer-wi-fi-gear-is/

 

forgot to mention i have a 4000 square foot house with 2 story with a basement. on .8 acre. Both my neighbors get usable signal and one is a good 300 feet from my access point. I placed it in the center of my house on the celing pointing down.

[Chestnut]

To extend a signal I'd just install another access point and have the SSID and passkey be the same.

I use a Microtik Router and a separate wireless access point. To note the Higher you place the AP the better the signal will be. Mounting it on the ceiling is a good way to go. I just threw mine in the attic because running CAT6 up there was easy. My house is small but i can hit full signal everywhere. My aluminum siding messes with the signal outside tough.

[Tpt life]

2 hours ago, socoj2 said:

I could but this does a better job.

Thanks. I am terribly inexperienced at the networking end of things. 

[Immortan D]

On 17/4/2016 at 1:11 PM, Tom Crawford said:

I have 2 Apple routers.  One at my house and one in the Guest cabin about 300 feet away. The one at the cabin works as an extender so I have a strong signal in the shop about 75 feet from the cabin.  There is a app on my Mac that allows me to set up the one in the cabin to extend the one at the house. Don't know if it is available for Windows. I should say that there is a direct line of sight between the cabin and house but there are several trees in that line.

I also have 2 Apple routers (1 extreme + 1 express), hooked together via ethernet cables and a switch. Works like a charm.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Immortan D said:

I also have 2 Apple routers (1 extreme + 1 express), hooked together via ethernet cables and a switch. Works like a charm.

What is a switch and what does it do?. Seriously I know almost nothing about this stuff

[Immortan D]

10 minutes ago, Acer Cletus said:

What is a switch and what does it do?. Seriously I know almost nothing about this stuff

An external switch is a box with multiple ethernet ports. Allows you to connect many devices to it so they will be able to talk to each other (to network). Many internet routers already have a built in switch, with 2 to 5 ethernet ports, so most people do not need external switches.

To connect two routers together via ethernet (for wireless extension) you don't necessarily need an external switch. Unless you also want to extend the wired (ethernet) network to another area of your home, which was my case.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Immortan D said:

An external switch is a box with multiple ethernet ports. Allows you to connect many devices to it so they will be able to talk to each other (to network). Many internet routers already have a built in switch, with 2 to 5 ethernet ports, so most people do not need external switches.

To connect two routers together via ethernet (for wireless extension) you don't necessarily need an external switch. Unless you also want to extend the wired (ethernet) network to another area of your home, which was my case.

Got it.  I always called those things a hub but maybe that is something else.  In any case my two routers have enough ports that I don't think I would need a switch. 

[Immortan D]

Just now, Acer Cletus said:

Got it.  I always called those things a hub but maybe that is something else.  In any case my two routers have enough ports that I don't think I would need a hub. 

Ethernet hubs look like switches and have the same purpose but they are different animals. Hubs are slow. People only used them when switches were too expensive.

 

[Cliff]

1 hour ago, Acer Cletus said:

Got it.  I always called those things a hub but maybe that is something else.  In any case my two routers have enough ports that I don't think I would need a switch. 

Hubs can't control traffic very well, it sends all packets to all ports and everything collides and makes a mess. Switches, if I remember correctly, have a mac table so it can associate your network cards mac address with the packets and only send things where they need to go. It's been 15 years since I've thought of that, so please forgive mistakes.

Y'all need some of this:

 

I have 11 gigabit ethernet ports to my office. They all connect to a 48 port patch panel in the basement and that is connected to a 24 port gigabit switch. Both of which are rack mounted.

Thats what I did on my first day in the new house. 

Second day - fixed that damn plaster where I mangled it

None of that solves the issue of no wifi in garage. But I think just moving my wireless router to the other side of the basement would do it. Or I'll be lazy and just extend it. 

[socoj2]

1 hour ago, Cliff said:

Hubs can't control traffic very well, it sends all packets to all ports and everything collides and makes a mess. Switches, if I remember correctly, have a mac table so it can associate your network cards mac address with the packets and only send things where they need to go. It's been 15 years since I've thought of that, so please forgive mistakes.

Y'all need some of this:

 

I have 11 gigabit ethernet ports to my office. They all connect to a 48 port patch panel in the basement and that is connected to a 24 port gigabit switch. Both of which are rack mounted.

Thats what I did on my first day in the new house. 

Second day - fixed that damn plaster where I mangled it

None of that solves the issue of no wifi in garage. But I think just moving my wireless router to the other side of the basement would do it. Or I'll be lazy and just extend it. 

Thats pretty good job of explaining it. for the layments terms.

A hub is stupid, Its basically a Network version of your TV splitter any traffic comes it its sent out all ports. If you have a lot of heavy talkers this can cause issue ( you generally run into a problem with about 30-40 devices depending on what they are doing)

A switch learns the physical address that is on each port. So if it gets a frame that is destined for another port it only forwards that specific packet to that port. You wont run into a device count with a problem until like 300-400 devices.

*its worth a mention that you would actually have to work hard to find someone selling a HUB

[Guest]

I guess I am dating myself a bit.  Back in 2001/02 I worked for a strategy consulting firm. We mostly worked out of client conference rooms.  This was before secured connections and firewalls.  You could plug a lap top into a client network connection and get full internet access and in some case access to their network.  Nowadays these things are all locked down.  

In any case, most conference rooms had a single network connection.  As the junior guy, I was charged with carrying our ink jet printer, overhead projector, and "hub",  The hub allowed five of us to share a single connection.  This was well before wifi of course.  When we were at hotels we worked via a 56k dial up connection.  

[Mark J]

On 4/17/2016 at 10:06 PM, weelis said:

Does anyone out there have/use one?  Do they work?  What  brand/'model do u use?  Thanks.

 

On 4/17/2016 at 10:17 PM, shaneymack said:

You mean like a signal booster? I need some info on that also. I only get WiFi in half of my house.

Sent from my SM-N910W8 using Tapatalk

I admit I got lost in this technical conversation about a third of the way down,but...  

This is what I have:

https://www.asus.com/us/Networking/EAN66/

It works great.  It's about 5 inches in size and unobtrusive. Old two story with my office and the main router in the walk up attic. The Asus sits next to my land line phone in the kitchen (yes I have a land line phone and proud of it) and provides signal for the first and second floors, the basement and patio.  Before the Asus you could get signal on the second floor and maybe bits of the first.  

It requires a laptop to set up, but the process was easy; I certainly am not network savvy.   It has worked great for years.