Wifi Extenders

Big Kahuna

Administrator
Location
Tuscaloosa, AL
We have some dead spots where we have trouble getting wifi. Looking at Extenders. Any of you got experience with any? Recommendations?

Edit. This is mainly for cellphones, tablets, laptops. Our bedroom is a dead zone. Sometimes we can get wifi, half time it real slow.
 
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E350

Site Supporter
Location
Sacramento Delta
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smokeysevin

one man with a couch
Location
Houston
Powerline adapters work really well, the extenders did not in our house.

We have the tp link version of both.

Sean

Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk
 

Big Kahuna

Administrator
Location
Tuscaloosa, AL
Am i understanding that you run data cables from router to the plugs where TV' are plugged in? This does not help with lack of signal for our phones or laptops.
 

E350

Site Supporter
Location
Sacramento Delta
Thank you Smokey for sharing your experience!

My new friend, Smokey, will explain it better than me.

1. You run Romex house 120v AC wiring to an outlet (or use existing outlet if you are lucky, see below) to the transmitter powerline adapter and plug it in.
2. You plug the receiver powerline adapter into the 120v AC outlet next to your router.
3. You run an Ethernet cable from the receiver powerline adapter to your router.
4. Your laptop or camera connects to your transmitter powerline adapter via wifi.
5. The wifi signal is sent via the hard wire 120v AC house wiring to the receiver powerline adapter.
6. The receiver powerline adapter sends the signal to your router via the Ethernet cable.

So, the wifi portion is very short.
The 120v AC wired portion can be very long.
There should not be a subpanel or a circuit breaker between the 120v AC wiring from the transmitter powerline adapter to the 120v AC wiring to the receiver powerline adapter and both the transmitter and receiver should be on the same side bus bar in your main panel. All of these concerns are alleviated if you run a dedicated circuit/wiring from your panel to your router and then branch out to your receiver powerline adapters from there. That is what I planned to do.

Hence I was going to run a dedicate circuit for the router and powerline(s) -- yes you can have more than one receiver powerline adapter on the circuit.

In these hard times we would all do well to watch the 39 min. documentary called The Lady in 6.
Best movie of all time.

Oops! I forgot it was Sunday:
 
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smokeysevin

one man with a couch
Location
Houston
I have mine setup :

Fiber from outside box-> house wall-> modem-> router-> ethernet cable -> powerline adapter -> wall outlet. Then you plug the other adapter into another wall outlet. Then it goes wall outlet -> powerline adapter -> ethernet cable -> device.

Sean


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smoofers

Rockin' the SQUARE!!!!
Site Supporter
Location
Granbury, TX
You need to look into a MESH router system. Multiple access points that communicate with each other and spread your network out as far as you need it. You can start with a basic 2 or 3 satellite system and add as many as you need. I using the Linksys VELOP system and it is amazing and super simple to set up. It also lets you prioritize up to 3 devices to get the fastest speeds to them.

https://www.linksys.com/us/velop/??cb=
 

Big Kahuna

Administrator
Location
Tuscaloosa, AL
I have mine setup :

Fiber from outside box-> house wall-> modem-> router-> ethernet cable -> powerline adapter -> wall outlet. Then you plug the other adapter into another wall outlet. Then it goes wall outlet -> powerline adapter -> ethernet cable -> device.

Sean


ff93818044011eed1649ddda86619efe.jpg
4ed452aa8c8b53ba824981ad52412929.jpg
This not what we are looking for. Cell phones, tablets, kindles dont hook up to ethernet cables. This system does not seem to be what we need.
 
I just have the one (good) router. if you only want one or two single range extenders for a couple spots its not that big of a deal just to pickup a couple 20-40$ extenders. they are pretty easy setup these days
 

smokeysevin

one man with a couch
Location
Houston
This not what we are looking for. Cell phones, tablets, kindles dont hook up to ethernet cables. This system does not seem to be what we need.
I am aware of that, I mentioned in my first post that I had not had good luck with the range extenders. If you were to use a mesh network, you still need to run ethernet cables to each of the "pucks" the powerline adapters can simplify the setup.

Typically what would happen with the repeaters is that the phone/device would either not switch to the better signal strength device, or if I did switch, the repeater did not have internet access.

It could have been a ssid issue or something similar. I am not a networking guy but I did follow the setup instructions.

Ultimately, I just bought a higher powered router and placed it up higher on my desk which fixed our coverage issues.

Sean

Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk
 

E350

Site Supporter
Location
Sacramento Delta
This not what we are looking for. Cell phones, tablets, kindles dont hook up to ethernet cables. This system does not seem to be what we need.

Edit: BK I linked to the wrong Powerline adapter. I should have linked this one:

https://www.tp-link.com/us/home-networking/powerline/tl-wpa8630-kit/

The TP-Link Powerline transmitter adapter is a "wifi" extender. Cell phones, tablets, kindles hook up to wifi, so they will hook up via wifi to the TP-Link Powerline transmitter adapter or to mesh extenders such as the Linksys mesh.

Smokey, what "higher powered router" did you buy?
 
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smoofers

Rockin' the SQUARE!!!!
Site Supporter
Location
Granbury, TX
I am aware of that, I mentioned in my first post that I had not had good luck with the range extenders. If you were to use a mesh network, you still need to run ethernet cables to each of the "pucks" the powerline adapters can simplify the setup.

Typically what would happen with the repeaters is that the phone/device would either not switch to the better signal strength device, or if I did switch, the repeater did not have internet access.

It could have been a ssid issue or something similar. I am not a networking guy but I did follow the setup instructions.

Ultimately, I just bought a higher powered router and placed it up higher on my desk which fixed our coverage issues.

Sean

Sent from my LM-G710 using Tapatalk

Only the first puck is connected to the line. Everything else is wireless.
 

smokeysevin

one man with a couch
Location
Houston
Edit: BK I linked to the wrong Powerline adapter. I should have linked this one:

https://www.tp-link.com/us/home-networking/powerline/tl-wpa8630-kit/

The TP-Link Powerline transmitter adapter is a "wifi" extender. Cell phones, tablets, kindles hook up to wifi, so they will hook up via wifi to the TP-Link Powerline transmitter adapter or to mesh extenders such as the Linksys mesh.

Smokey, what "higher powered router" did you buy?

I was using an asus rt66au and switched to an asus ac3100 dual.

Strictly speaking, its not more powerful, it has an extra band and supposedly better antennas.

Sean
 
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OCD Solutions

Original, Clean and Dependable Solutions
Site Supporter
Vendor Account
Location
Rentz, GA
We tried a three point Eeros mesh system in our current home when we first moved in and never could get it to work right.
We have quite a bit of square footage, a second story so we thought it would be perfect.
Tech support said we had them too close together and our floorplan was just too open and so we got too much feedback between access points.

We bought another single point Linksys EA9300 and have had zero complaints.
My wife gets great signal strength in her upstairs office as do I out in the garage.

Layout and construction will play a huge roll in coverage but so will placement of the router.

The higher frequency carries further but the Low frequency penetrates walls better. So if you have a dead zone, choose 2.4Ghz over 5 for a better result.
 
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I have the ubiquity unify and am not impressed. I’m in the living room that’s connected to the garage and the unify in the garage is just average strength.
 

Big Kahuna

Administrator
Location
Tuscaloosa, AL
any updates? Never did anything, but I bought my mom a Toshiba Fire TV this time last year and it was just a bit confusion to her, so got her a new Samsung and took the Toshiba to my house and put in bedroom. It will not even connect to our wifi. Guessing not enough signal even though our Phones are connecting and Laptop. She had Geek squad protection, so they are coming Wed. to check it out. But need to go ahead and get a extender with a router at the endpoint so I can reach my shop.
 

OCD Solutions

Original, Clean and Dependable Solutions
Site Supporter
Vendor Account
Location
Rentz, GA
I ended up pulling Ethernet to both the Firesticks for my in-laws.

They say WiFi is more convenient but keep tabs on how much time you spend messing with connections and settings. Pull a cable once and move on with your life.

Reolink sent me another beta WiFI camera to test out and I spend 2hrs getting a signal to the damn thing. Finally had to install a second router on my patio to get it to work. Meanwhile, I strung a whole new cable out to that same spot in under 30 minutes.

And, that two hours of messing around only got me a 1080p image with 30 second clips where the 30 minutes of cable pulling let me plug in a 12MP IP camera that records 24/7.
 
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