Wifi signal in house

mel123

Hi
The wifi signal isnt carrying throughout the house, you can only get it in certain parts of the house and cant get it upstairs at all. The walls are concrete (not sure if this makes a difference). Have bought wifi extenders and these are no good.

Can anyone suggest anything (other than probably trying to change provider which probably wont do any good)? Is there anything else i can buy?

00sully

mel123 wrote: »

Hi
The wifi signal isnt carrying throughout the house, you can only get it in certain parts of the house and cant get it upstairs at all. The walls are concrete (not sure if this makes a difference). Have bought wifi extenders and these are no good.

Can anyone suggest anything (other than probably trying to change provider which probably wont do any good)? Is there anything else i can buy?

Make sure your router is transmitting at 2.4ghz and not 5. 2.4 has a longer range and is better going through walls.

Make sure you have no legacy devices using 802.11b or even g. Try only N if possible.

Check your channel for interference. Neighbours might be on same channel causing interference.

Thargor

Powerline adapters like these:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-LINK-TL-PA511KIT-Gigabit-Powerline-Adapter/dp/B005FVOKM8

Work in 99% of houses, just run a cable from your current router to the plug socket with one of those in it and plug the other one in the weak part of the house, then hook up to a cheap router on that side of the house.

Thargor

Powerline adapters like these:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-LINK-TL-PA511KIT-Gigabit-Powerline-Adapter/dp/B005FVOKM8

Work in 99% of houses, just run a cable from your current router to the plug socket with one of those in it and plug the other one in the weak part of the house, then hook up to a cheap router on that side of the house.

mel123

00sully wrote: »

Make sure your router is transmitting at 2.4ghz and not 5. 2.4 has a longer range and is better going through walls.

Make sure you have no legacy devices using 802.11b or even g. Try only N if possible.

Check your channel for interference. Neighbours might be on same channel causing interference.

how do i check for interference?

ongarite

mel123 wrote: »

how do i check for interference?

Do you have an Android smartphone?
Download wifi analyzer to check for wireless channel with least interference.

dub45

It would also help if you told us what equipment you are using and where it is located?

Also netstumbler should help you find other wifi networks around you and what channel they are using.


http://netstumbler.en.softonic.com/

nagel

do you have video senders in the house, seen these killing wifi, the problem with these is that they wont show up on a wifi scan, dect phones can do the same

techdiver

Unfortunately the very nature of Wifi will mean that people will run into these issues.

I have a top of the line Asus router and have a standard 4 bed semi detached house with a downstairs study (where I keep the router). My signal degrades significantly upstairs to the point of being redundant in some rooms.

It's not just old houses that suffer this. In fact some old houses might be better for wifi than newer houses as the foil backed insulation kills wifi signal.

I work in the tech industry and have tried everything to improve the wifi signal. The only option was to go the powerline adapter router and add a second router. You can do this i a way that the wifi from both rouoters appears as the same network, so you don't have any sharing issues etc.

The simple instructions are somethig like this:

http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ConfiguringTwoWirelessRoutersWithOneSSIDNetworkNameAtHomeForFreeRoaming.aspx

Thargor

nagel wrote: »

do you have video senders in the house, seen these killing wifi, the problem with these is that they wont show up on a wifi scan, dect phones can do the same

Yeah these are surprisingly powerful alright, can shut down the wifi for a building like some kind of spy gadget, don't think many people use them anymore though.

mel123

Sorry i'm in work so i don't know the exact router, but its just the standard one that came with Vodafone.
I think the first thing i will try is as suggested above and getting a second router.
Thanks for all the posts they are very helpful.

mel123

Sorry i'm in work so i don't know the exact router, but its just the standard one that came with Vodafone.
I think the first thing i will try is as suggested above and getting a second router.
Thanks for all the posts they are very helpful.

techdiver

mel123 wrote: »

Sorry i'm in work so i don't know the exact router, but its just the standard one that came with Vodafone.
I think the first thing i will try is as suggested above and getting a second router.
Thanks for all the posts they are very helpful.

You will also need 2 powerline adapters.

One linked to your main router and the other lugged into onr of the LAN ports (not WAN) or the second router, with the second routers DHCP disabled and using the same SSID as the main router. The details are in the link I proivuided above. If you have any questions when setting it up let us know.

Thargor

If the Vodafone router is a cheap piece of sh1t like the UPC standard one it could be worth kicking up a stink on their Talk To: page here on Boards until they send a courier round with a different one, worked for us with UPC. Worth measuring the signal in various rooms with a wi-fi app and making sure youre on 2.4 ghz not 5 first though.

http://www.linksys.com/us/support-article?articleNum=134478

Thargor

If the Vodafone router is a cheap piece of sh1t like the UPC standard one it could be worth kicking up a stink on their Talk To: page here on Boards until they send a courier round with a different one, worked for us with UPC. Worth measuring the signal in various rooms with a wi-fi app and making sure youre on 2.4 ghz not 5 first though.

http://www.linksys.com/us/support-article?articleNum=134478

Thargor

This double posting bug makes me want to scream...

mass_debater

Thargor wrote: »

This double posting bug makes me want to scream...

Only happens when you use quick reply, quoting is fine

danko82

I have the same issue, with powerline I can resolve for the pc, not for the phone...

Thargor

danko82 wrote: »

I have the same issue, with powerline I can resolve for the pc, not for the phone...

Plug the powerline into a second router and connect everything to that.