Router(s) for broadband being extended to shed

- bo -

Hi folks

We have a new shed arriving hopefully soon that's going down the end of the garden as a home bar. We're in a small mid-terrace house.

We will need a good internet connection in it to stream TV, music and whatnot. That's where I'm hoping you can help as I'm a bit of a novice.

We have an electrician coming out in the next week or two to run power out to it, through the attic and out and under the caps of a wall down the side of the garden. You can see as the green dotted line this in my very badly drawn diagram below!

We currently have Vodafone Gigabit broadband that comes into the house through a SHG3000 Gigabox router in the living room (red box). The range of this has been woeful to be honest and once you go in/past the kitchen the wifi drops. But my whole pile of issues with Vodafone is separate to this anyway..

The electrician said he can run a cable while doing the electrics (CAT6 I think?) that would go from the sitting room to the shed. My questions:

• Should I buy two new routers? One to replace the Gigabox one and a new one for the shed?
• If yes, are there particular reasonably-priced models or router that would suit?
• When this is wired up, is it simply a case of connecting each end of the CAT6 cable into each router in the living room & shed?

Appreciate any help, thanks a million.



Red: existing modem
Purple: proposed new modem
Green dots: power going from house out to garden

advertsfox

I'd recommend a mesh WiFi system firstly; this will help fix your wireless range issues (I personally use Google WiFi but the TP Link Deco M4/M5 are great on par alternative for half the money).

The beauty of this is you can keep 2 hubs in your house - 1 connected to the existing router (which will need to be put into bridge mode) 1 in the kitchen and the 3rd in your shed.

These have ethernet backhaul capability meaning the shed hub will be fed the 1Gbps speeds via CAT6, then re-emitted over WiFi. You also get one seamless wireless network where you automatically hop between to the hub with the best strength.

I'd recommend if at all possible, running a 2nd CAT6 cable to the kitchen area as well, closest to the garden so that can also be used for the backhaul. While this is not required, I'm a big fan of all mesh hubs being connected via LAN instead of wireless so you get maximum throughput.

https://www.did.ie/tp-link-deco-m5-wi-fi-system-pack-of-3-white-decom5-3-pack-decom5-3-pack-prd

ED E

advertsfox wrote: »

I'm a big fan of all mesh hubs being connected via LAN instead of wireless so you get maximum throughput.

If you're running wired backbone then its by definition not a mesh.





If you have VF TV or Phone its easier to not replace the Gigabox, especially as any issues and VF support will ignore you.

Shopping list:
- Get the sparks to run two CAT5e/6 cables to the shed (should cost almost nothing extra and will leave you with a spare leg in case one were to fail longer term)
- Small 5port switch in shed
- Ubi AP for shed
- Ubi AP for house (place it on a ceiling somewhere, they're discreet enough)

This will give you a really solid setup. They're aimed at stability for many vs high speed for single clients but thats really fine, your laptop has no use for >200Mb in any real use cases. TV etc can be hard wired to shed switch to keep it off the air (free for other clients).

advertsfox

ED E wrote: »

If you're running wired backbone then its by definition not a mesh.

Yes I'm aware but I was referencing the bandwidth benefits - gigabit backhaul will mean he has no worries about any mesh range / dilution, esp since he's running fresh CAT6.

- bo -

Thanks to both of you for taking the time to reply. Plenty to look up and I have looked into the Deco M5 product before alright.

Much appreciated!

betarayjay

personally not a fan of mesh systems, hardwired 100%, what u can do is pick up an ac router off adverts triple radio depending on ur budget, have same ssid/password on both routers, ur basically extending network both wired/wireless.

ipodrocker

ED E wrote: »

If you're running wired backbone then its by definition not a mesh.





If you have VF TV or Phone its easier to not replace the Gigabox, especially as any issues and VF support will ignore you.

Shopping list:
- Get the sparks to run two CAT5e/6 cables to the shed (should cost almost nothing extra and will leave you with a spare leg in case one were to fail longer term)
- Small 5port switch in shed
- Ubi AP for shed
- Ubi AP for house (place it on a ceiling somewhere, they're discreet enough)

This will give you a really solid setup. They're aimed at stability for many vs high speed for single clients but thats really fine, your laptop has no use for >200Mb in any real use cases. TV etc can be hard wired to shed switch to keep it off the air (free for other clients).

This the best option for your setup, a bonus for your shed you can have TV hardwired with cat6 and adding a switch will give you more expansion and adding an AP to service your garden and other devices.

seamus

I've a similar setup to you, new office/shed in the garden. Been using a mesh and a raving about it for a week and a half now, I'm getting 90Mbps in the office. But if I had the option of hooking up ethernet cabling, I would do that instead.

Herself isn't too crazy about chasing walls for cabling though (neither am I tbh), so the mesh will do for now!

betarayjay

seamus wrote: »

I've a similar setup to you, new office/shed in the garden. Been using a mesh and a raving about it for a week and a half now, I'm getting 90Mbps in the office. But if I had the option of hooking up ethernet cabling, I would do that instead.

Herself isn't too crazy about chasing walls for cabling though (neither am I tbh), so the mesh will do for now!

pop it behind the skirting boards, put a lil 5 port gig switch never have any issues ever

seamus

That would involve taking off the skirts and drilling through two brick walls to get it out the back. The next time we're getting decorating done, I'll stick the cabling in, but the mesh has exceeded my expectations 500%.

olestoepoke

I'm also looking to provide my shed (home office) with a strong internet connection so thought this thread would be handy but after reading through it this episode of Always Sunny came to mind.

- bo -

I totally forgot about starting this thread til I noticed an alert today.

In the end, I got the sparks to run the CAT5 cabling out to the shed with the extended power cabling from the attic. Popped a UniFi Ap device on the wall. All very simple to set up and the home bar is just about complete with all the entertainment streaming without any bother 😎