Boosting WiFi Signals

Guy

Piper/Leonaedas
Hi folks,

So, wifi router in one room, PC in another room. Reception on the PC is shitty: what can I do about it?

  1. Run a cable - don't want that as a solution
  2. Buy one of those network-via-your-electrical-plug-things
  3. Buy a receiver box, place it outside the PC's room and cable it to the PC...

Any other ideas or feedback about the above?
 

Zeus

Full Member
Electrical socket thingy is pretty good, but I sometimes find it drops for no good reason - might bethe bt home hub dying though, rather than the connection.
 

Rochdale

l33t g1bb0n
Staff member
Yeah powerline networks are good, I have one running between my router and the shed. You can get wifi boosters as well, you'd position that between your PC and the router somewhere. Or maybe relocate the router, or get a bigger aerial for it if you can.
 

Bunty

Full Member
I've got a ZyXEL WRE2205 N300 Wireless Range Extender/Repeater for the machine I can't wire to the router. Works ok. Bridges wifi to a lan port. Plugged it in, just worked. Lan port looks just like it's plugged into the router.

I usually use powerline. Can't fault Zyxel. Currently using ZyXEL PLA5205 600 Mbps. Had ZyXEL ones before for ages but when one conked out I upgraded to the faster ones. Get a pair, plug one by the router, the other by the PC. Win.
 

Zeus

Full Member
they say they dont
and i wonder if thats why mine has a problem occasionally...
but it DOES work.
 

Guy

Piper/Leonaedas
I'm reading that they interfere with radio bands. That's not a big deal for me though. What brand are you folks using?
 

Cadfiel

Not grumpy
What are the walls made off, what pipes or other large metal objects are in between?

Wifi is radio, that means line of site so draw a straight line between the 2 and see what could be in the way.

Secondly of you are in a stone farmhouse for example you wifi will pretty much only cover the room and not much else due to the thickness of the walls.

Ensure you wifi antennas if you can see them are aligned the same way, ie I and I or _ and _ thats on the router and the pc, if you have 2 on the router they can be any alignment but just looks silly.

Lastly, you can try the Pringles can trick just to see if its a signal strength issue, 1 Pringles can, cut lengthways so you have a curved 180 section and use it right behind the antenna to bounce the signal in the pcs direction, if that improves things you know there may be milage in a stronger router, if not, power-line is the way to go.

Oh and i forgot get a wifi scanner, for android Wifiscanner is the actuall name of the app, run it and see what other wifi signals are out there, as a preferabnce you want to be as far from other wifi signals as possible so 1 6 and 11 are the best spacing but you have no controls over other peoples wifi but each wifi channel overlaps with the channels around it and will interfere.
 

Aaelon

Max Rincewind(eq)Caramon(wow)
I believe these work wonders! :)

300px-Tinhat.JPG
 

Cadfiel

Not grumpy
Do these work ok through extension leads and surge protectors?

Be aware that differing ring mains can cause issues also. Had a nightmare customer once that had a huge house with 4 ring mains, 1 for each floor, 1 for the extension and another for the workshop and the powerlines didnt work at all.

I have since seen powerlines that claim to work on different ring mains but cant vouch...someone else may know the answer to that one.
 

Swither

Full Member
I did use these before and the connections were possibly on different ring mains, but they worked.
 

Tempy

Mutley !!
I'm no electrician, but I think if you have a "common rail" fuse box, you can use the powerline adapters on different ring's (as they share a common feed).
 

Chick

Cartwheel RIGHT
+1 for powerline adapters. they don't work with extension leads, but simply plug it into the source and have your extension/4gang on top and knock up a longer cat5 cable.

I've used them for 2 1/2 years now and have only had 2 dropouts \o/
 

Dareos

The Bastard Thats Grinding You Down
get powerline with passthrough and they can go right into the wall socket, anything else plugs into them. I use TP link, they have been solid.

It will depend on your wiring though, last 20-30 years and you should be ok, prior to that and it could be problematic.

Also security, theres nothing stopping the data flow, so unless its encrypted (most come with a wps type of button on them now) it can be picked up anywhere on the power grid until it dissipates, had a few cases now where customers were connected to neighbours routers instead of their own, and in one case both he and the neighbour had wireless powerline adapters, so that caused even more confusion.

Wifi itself is a minefield, i dislike boosters immensely as they cause masses of lag in games, but if its not a gaming pc, they can be used. Setting up a separate wireless access point connected via cable is a far better solution, as can be powerline wireless as it just replicates the signal from your router.
 
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