Need Wifi Extender (1 Viewer)

[Johnny Angell]

I have this router:

See on Amazon

Back in our master the single is quite weak and sometimes I have to select the slower speed to get reception back there. I’d appreciate recommendations for a good extender. Perhaps this one:

See on Amazon

 

[Dave Upton]

I have this router: See on Amazon

Back in our master the single is quite weak and sometimes I have to select the slower speed to get reception back there. I’d appreciate recommendations for a good extender. Perhaps this one:
See on Amazon

Johnny,

My recommendation is to actually skip the extender and go straight for a better solution overall with wireless mesh. You can disable the wifi in your modem, and just add an external wireless system like Eero or Google Nest WiFi. You'll have a way better experience.

 

[Johnny Angell]

Johnny,

My recommendation is to actually skip the extender and go straight for a better solution overall with wireless mesh. You can disable the wifi in your modem, and just add an external wireless system like Eero or Google Nest WiFi. You'll have a way better experience.

Well both those options cost a lot more. The Eero 6 has a package with an extender, implying it needs an extender. And since I’ve got a TiVo Edge, I needed a Moca adaptor. I wonder how that would fit in with the Eero and Nest?

 

[Dave Upton]

If you already have Coax in place, the TiVo should be creating/maintaining a MoCa network on its own, independent of your home network.

The "extenders" in Eero or Nest wifi are really just a better/more complete version of the extenders you can buy affordably. This is a bit of an investment, but you'll have far better home wifi for years to come.

Who is your ISP? Some will offer a package with this sort of mesh offering as part of your service at a discounted cost. Here's an example from Comcast/XFinity: https://www.xfinity.com/learn/internet-service/wifi/xfi-pod

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

Is there a large mirror in your master suite? The metal layer in the mirror messes up Wi-Fi signals.

 

[DaveF]

This is a topic where I'd just buy what the Wirecutter recommends, particularly if you can't jump up to a new mesh system. And note their caveat on older devices, because a simple extender can have a 50% speed hit and even slow down your entire network.

One final warning: Don’t even consider extenders that don’t use 802.11ac. Old, 802.11n extenders are even cheaper, but when such extenders are running, they significantly decrease the speed of all devices on your Wi-Fi; in addition, for devices connected by Wi-Fi to the extender, such models provide less than half of the base router’s speed.

The Best Wi-Fi Extender and Signal Booster

If you have rooms where 4K streams don’t work or browsing is too slow, you might solve the problem with a Wi-Fi extender—without replacing your whole network.

www.nytimes.com

 

[John Dirk]

I'd like to know more about your environment so that we can determine why the signal is weak before recommending a solution. For starters...

• How far is the wifi router from the area with the weak signal? Same physical floor?
• How are you determining the signal is weak? As @DaveF alluded, it could be an issue with interference.

 

[David Norman]

This is a topic where I'd just buy what the Wirecutter recommends, particularly if you can't jump up to a new mesh system. And note their caveat on older devices, because a simple extender can have a 50% speed hit and even slow down your entire network.

The Best Wi-Fi Extender and Signal Booster

If you have rooms where 4K streams don’t work or browsing is too slow, you might solve the problem with a Wi-Fi extender—without replacing your whole network.

www.nytimes.com

I bought the TP-Link RE300 mentioned in that article for use at my inlaws house. The modem there is on one end of the house and there are 2 bathrooms, Gas Water Heater. and Laundry close directly between that and the rest of the house. I tried repositioning the modem in several locations in their computer room/Office (converted old bedroom) without any help, The Den/Sunroom/Dining Room/Kitchen on the other side of all that metal and plumbing just couldn't keep a good wi-fi signal and I wanted something cheap.

The TPLink works pretty well keeping the signal on the far side of the house by placing it in an outlet at an outlet in a room which has more a direct line with the Office, but outside the BR/Laundy. Pretty easy to set up, cheap, but this is a 25mbps DSL line so it's OK for normal web browsing and functionality, but isn't going to be good enough for much HD Video Streaming. I could run a ROKU with some intermittent buffering and dropping to SD quality, but I'm sure it wouldn't hold up to any serious streaming esp if multi-tasking.

 

[Johnny Angell]

Is there a large mirror in your master suite? The metal layer in the mirror messes up Wi-Fi signals.

Yes there is.

I'd like to know more about your environment so that we can determine why the signal is weak before recommending a solution. For starters...

• How far is the wifi router from the area with the weak signal? Same physical floor?
• How are you determining the signal is weak? As @DaveF alluded, it could be an issue with interference.

Single story house. The weak area is over a 100’ away with a couple of walls. In the way. I can’t move the router because that’s were the broadband enters the house. I determine the signal is week by using my iphone 11. Usually one little dot of wifi and sometimes I have to switch to the lower band.

 

[John Dirk]

Yes there is.

Single story house. The weak area is over a 100’ away with a couple of walls. In the way. I can’t move the router because that’s were the broadband enters the house. I determine the signal is week by using my iphone 11. Usually one little dot of wifi and sometimes I have to switch to the lower band.

Thanks for the additional info. I would bet the mirror is in fact impeding the signal, although 100 ft is a long distance for a consumer level product to effectively cover. I think your best bet would be to run an Ethernet cable from the router to the remote location. I don't know the exact layout you're working with but, in a single story home, this should be doable.

If, for whatever reason, this is not practical then your next best option is likely a mesh solution with a node placed equidistant between both points.

 

[Johnny Angell]

If, for whatever reason, this is not practical then your next best option is likely a mesh solution with a node placed equidistant between both points.

I’m basically happy with my wifi strength in the rest of the house. I can get better reception back there just by choosing the slower channel. I had made an assumption (usually not a good idea) that an extender would do just that but without slowing up my existing wifi.

Would this mesh system work? Would it work with a modem/router that already has a Moca adaptor attached to it. My TiVo needs the Moca.
See on Amazon

 

[John Dirk]

I’m basically happy with my wifi strength in the rest of the house. I can get better reception back there just by choosing the slower channel

I should have caught this before. If you mean choosing the 2.4Ghz band as opposed to 5Ghz then that makes sense as 5Ghz signals cannot travel nearly as far as 2.4Ghz. Still, 2.4 Ghz is capable of [theoretical] speeds up to 600 Mbps. While real-world speeds will be slower, it is generally suitable for most applications including HD streaming. Are you experiencing any performance degradation using 2.4Ghz or do you just prefer to use 5Ghz?

 

[Dave Upton]

I’m basically happy with my wifi strength in the rest of the house. I can get better reception back there just by choosing the slower channel. I had made an assumption (usually not a good idea) that an extender would do just that but without slowing up my existing wifi.

Would this mesh system work? Would it work with a modem/router that already has a Moca adaptor attached to it. My TiVo needs the Moca.
See on Amazon

Johnny,

You can definitely still use your Moca adapter with this. It would simply be connected into a different port from the Eero box.

Your current modem would have one ethernet cable going to the moca adapter, and another to the Eero device in that room.

You would then work with your ISP support (or us) to disable the built in wifi in your modem and would be off and running.

 

[Johnny Angell]

I should have caught this before. If you mean choosing the 2.4Ghz band as opposed to 5Ghz then that makes sense as 5Ghz signals cannot travel nearly as far as 2.4Ghz. Still, 2.4 Ghz is capable of [theoretical] speeds up to 600 Mbps. While real-world speeds will be slower, it is generally suitable for most applications including HD streaming. Are you experiencing any performance degradation using 2.4Ghz or do you just prefer to use 5Ghz?

All we use in the bedroom is our phones. I was irritated by the loss of signal and I thought just get an extender. Now that it’s not so simple or cheap, I’m rethinking this.

 

[John Dirk]

All we use in the bedroom is our phones. I was irritated by the loss of signal and I thought just get an extender. Now that it’s not so simple or cheap, I’m rethinking this.

Yea, unless you're actually experiencing performance degradation I would just use the 2.4 Ghz band in the bedroom and save your money. There's nothing wrong with 2.4Ghz and it has a much longer range than 5Ghz.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

My less than expert opinion as someone who had a lot of bedroom WiFi issues a couple years ago:

-If you’re going to try an extended, I second Dave’s suggestion to just go with whatever Wirecutter recommends right now. Buy from Amazon or someplace with a good return policy so that if it doesn’t solve your issue, you can return it.

-If you need to do something more complex, a vote of confidence in favor of chatting with John Dirk. I gave him my problem and my budget and he selected gear which solved my problem.

 

[Dave Upton]

Yea, unless you're actually experiencing performance degradation I would just use the 2.4 Ghz band in the bedroom and save your money. There's nothing wrong with 2.4Ghz and it has a much longer range than 5Ghz.

Not to get too into the weeds here, but I'll do it since we're both network guys .This sounds a little like it could be a classic case of receive/send power mismatch. Lots of mobile devices will download/receive acceptably at a poor signal strength, but the upload/send antenna is power limited in software, causing significant packet loss on any packets sent from the device back to the AP. This is usually unidirectional and hard to track down.

For the above reason, that's why I'm steering @Johnny Angell towards a mesh solution. Not because I want him to spend unnecessary money, but because I think it will end up with a more consistent result.

If Johnny was willing to spend an hour or two in the attic running a network cable to the far end of the house, a cheap access point like this would be the optimal solution: See on Amazon

Failing that, the modern mesh solutions like Eero are pretty trouble free and "just work", which is what most people really want.

 

[Johnny Angell]

If Johnny was willing to spend an hour or two in the attic running a network cable to the far end of the house

When a T-Rex comes walking down the street I will climb up into the attic.

 

[Todd Erwin]

If you do not need WiFi-6, there's still the previous model eero available for much less, which has two ethernet ports on the back on each unit. In rooms where I had devices that only had a wired option, I simply added an inexpensive gigabit ethernet switch.

See on Amazon

 

[John Dirk]

Not to get too into the weeds here, but I'll do it since we're both network guys .This sounds a little like it could be a classic case of receive/send power mismatch. Lots of mobile devices will download/receive acceptably at a poor signal strength, but the upload/send antenna is power limited in software, causing significant packet loss on any packets sent from the device back to the AP. This is usually unidirectional and hard to track down.

For the above reason, that's why I'm steering @Johnny Angell towards a mesh solution. Not because I want him to spend unnecessary money, but because I think it will end up with a more consistent result.

If Johnny was willing to spend an hour or two in the attic running a network cable to the far end of the house, a cheap access point like this would be the optimal solution: See on Amazon

Failing that, the modern mesh solutions like Eero are pretty trouble free and "just work", which is what most people really want.

Well, this sounds like the beginnings of a "Let's Talk About Networks" thread.

Based on what I've read thus far, I'm still not sure whether there is any actual performance issue. Having to use 2.4Ghz because you're out of range for 5Ghz doesn't constitute poor performance.

@Johnny Angell - Could you indulge us and plainly state whether you're experiencing poor wireless performance in the bedroom area.