Personal computing discussed
Moderators: renee, Steel, notfred
Redocbew wrote:If you're able to run a cable from one router to the other, then you could setup the secondary router in access point mode. If not, then you might want to look at power line networking as an alternative.
Informai wrote:Hey,
there are some weird adapters that you plug in the electric box (sorry don't know the word in English) where you plug your toaster. You plug one close to the router and one to the room with the device (pc, tablet...) you want to give access. I can't find a picture of this things, but may be one of you can find it online.
They really exist.
notfred wrote:Yes, this is the "powerline networking" that Redocbew referred to. Also see the front page article from almost a year ago http://techreport.com/blog/29108/mixing ... toxicating
SuperSpy wrote:You can get away with using a wireless repeater, but in the long run you will be much happier if you can get a physical connection up to a secondary access point, either via cat5/6 or something like powerline networking.
Buub wrote:I've been extremely happy with my Ubiquiti wireless gear. I have a couple of AC Pro access points, and clients roam between them seamlessly.
You will want to install the network controller software on something low maintenance and reliable. A Raspberry Pi or Odroid works great.
ozzuneoj wrote:Bulk cat5e ethernet cable, keystone wall plates and a punch-down tool are quite inexpensive compared to other methods of getting your network to cover a whole house.
You can get 500 feet for around $30 on eBay and it usually comes with a crimp tool too if you want to make your own patch cables.
If you only need a couple wall plates, the cable and the tool, it should cost less than $50. If you are totally unfamiliar with running cable through walls and don't know anyone who is (or you just don't have the time), then it gets less appealing of course. When we had some of the electric wiring and outlets updated in our house I had the electricians run ethernet from the only central (second floor) room with a cable connection, with a wall plate leading to the attic apartment and one going down to the first floor. I'm far from a networking expert but everything I connect to this network, even through switches and wall plates reliably autonegotiates to 1Gbps speed (using the bulk eBay Cat5e cable I bought), which is a lot better than what I get from wifi, and we are using a pretty beefy router (Netgear R7500v2). Its nice to have at least one connection on each floor that will be hard wired to our router.
Having played with routers in "repeater" mode, I would highly advise against using repeaters. It was only "just" reliable enough to tolerate, and it killed our throughput. We didn't do that for very long.
Buub wrote:I've been extremely happy with my Ubiquiti wireless gear. I have a couple of AC Pro access points, and clients roam between them seamlessly.
You will want to install the network controller software on something low maintenance and reliable. A Raspberry Pi or Odroid works great.
Usacomp2k3 wrote:Buub wrote:I've been extremely happy with my Ubiquiti wireless gear. I have a couple of AC Pro access points, and clients roam between them seamlessly.
You will want to install the network controller software on something low maintenance and reliable. A Raspberry Pi or Odroid works great.
I was going to recommend ubiquiti also. You can run them controllerless also. We replaced our router with one and my in-laws and it has beedn rock-solid.
Usacomp2k3 wrote:Buub wrote:I've been extremely happy with my Ubiquiti wireless gear. I have a couple of AC Pro access points, and clients roam between them seamlessly.
You will want to install the network controller software on something low maintenance and reliable. A Raspberry Pi or Odroid works great.
I was going to recommend ubiquiti also. You can run them controllerless also. We replaced our router with one and my in-laws and it has beedn rock-solid.
bthylafh wrote:An alternative to powerline Ethernet is using MoCA adapters, which operate over unused TV cabling instead.
notfred wrote:If you can run Cat5 or better then use that and go with a direct wired setup. The powerline setup is for those scenarios where for some reason it is impossible to run Cat5 from one floor to another so it uses the power wires to transport the signal.
Fogg wrote:I needed to extend my range to the back deck of the house, and I picked up one of these
http://www.netgear.com/home/products/ne ... ar_organic
https://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-Wi-Fi-Ex ... RS44D&th=1
It was easy to setup and solved the issue I had. I just do some light surfing on a tablet and stream music. Not sure what your needs are.
bthylafh wrote:An alternative to powerline Ethernet is using MoCA adapters, which operate over unused TV cabling instead.
seankay wrote:bthylafh wrote:An alternative to powerline Ethernet is using MoCA adapters, which operate over unused TV cabling instead.
Is it similar to power-line networking?
Firestarter wrote:
it is similar in the sense that you use existing cables to do your networking instead of pulling new cables. If you have TV plugs in both rooms where you need them, it's as simple as buying 2 MoCA adapters (you can often buy a pair as a kit), plugging them in on both sides, plugging the power and networking cables in and you're done. If you also use any of the TV plugs in your home to watch TV it can get more complex because the TV signal might get too weak. If you use satellite TV, MoCA won't work. If you buy a MoCA adapter with built-in wireless, you'll have to configure the wireless settings of course.
My wireless for example is just an old wireless router that I put in access point mode (so it's no longer a router, just a wireless access point) and I plugged the MoCA adapter and my PC into it. The actual ISP router in my utility closet is also connected to a MoCA adapter, as are the 2 other PCs. My HDTV is connected to the filtered output of the MoCA adapter that connects my HTPC to the network, that output filters out everything in the satellite/MoCA frequencies and only lets the regular cable TV frequencies through. It took a bit of fiddling to set the cable amplifier just right so that the cable TV signal came through strong enough. All in all though, using the coax for my home networking means that I have a rock stable 450 Mbit/s connection between all my devices and my internet router. The newest MoCA 2.0 adapters are even faster, roughly 800 Mbit/s. The 2 downsides to MoCA are the cost of the adapters (more expensive than powerline adapters) and the latency, which is about 3ms or similar from what you get with a wireless connection.
Powerline networking is similar in that you also need to buy an adapter for each spot where you want your network wired. The big problem with them is that their effectiveness really depends on how the power in your home is wired, the powerline adapters need to be on the same circuit to reach their advertized speeds. For example, in my home the rooms on the upper floor are all on the same circuit so plugging in an adapter in one room and another makes for an excellent connection, fast and stable (more than 100 Mbit/s at least, less than 1ms latency). But the sockets in my utility closet are on another circuit, so if I plugged in a powerline adapter in there to connect my internet router, the connection from that adapter to the others was terrible, only about 3 Mbit/s. How good or bad it is for you depends highly on the layout and how well everything is wired, and probably also on what kind of breaker panel/breakers you have. If you have a home with very old wiring it will probably be slow and/or unstable.