Does it really matter where a router regarding speeds and reliability wise?

Question

So my parents and I have argued lately about where to place the wireless router. I have an airport extreme and it is plugged in and placed in my room along with the cable modem. We have wireless extenders downstairs that extends the network. When we had issues we had an at&t guy who came here and told us that we had over 40 devices or something wirelessly connected and said that it was causing issues. I only have a total of like 10 devices in my house so it doesn't make any sense. He then told my parents to move the wireless router and modem downstairs saying that it is in my room which is on the opposite side of the house and says that it is causing the other side of the house to be weak. He wanted to move the router to the living room which is the center of the house. My sister claims that she can't do her homework because it is too slow and he got her and my parents to side with him. I refused to do that and I got called selfish. After he left I called spectrum and switched and just got service from spectrum yesterday. My sister still complains about it being slow and unreliable. Does it really matter where the router sits ? Wouldn't network extenders help and not make the network become slow and provide a stronger signal ??

Answer 1

First, WIFI is not a line of site technology as the AOL dialup expert before me mentioned. If it was, then it could be sitting around a corner and not work, it is not GPS. Your network is going to be only as fast as the slowest Layer 2 or 3 device, that is router or switch or both. I am not including the NIC. The TCPIP stack tacks on more packets to ensure ECC error correction the worse the signal over wireless as it is session based. Ever wonder why smartphone battery drops faster in poor cell areas?it is trying to send, send, receive constant session ECC info at poor quality and chews up battery life. Albeit a small amount, but the further away and depending on the home construction, wall density, mirroring and refraction of signals in the home you could be adding more ECC error controls to the TCP session.



Now, for the modem, as high speed ISP send out config files for the modems your modem may not be able to handle the dedicated bandwidth. Ensure the modem model can handle the speed offered. Second, try speed test sites from various locations in the home and determine where the issue maybe more pronounced. Third, the ISP may not be aware of issues in copper lines in area, since your ISP is using copper not cable, you should have pure dedicated speed verse cable with no variable speeds. Ask neighbors if they have issues also, this may reveal an ISP coverage area issue and not isolated to your home.

Answer 2

What you need to do is get ethernet extenders these are devices that you plug the ethernet wire into and then plug it into the wall socket of your house and in every room that you wish to have internet you plug the ethernet cable into one of the extenders Wireless extenders are good but unless you rename them so that they don't conflict he'll make a big mess why don't you call a networking expert and have him set you up a good Network in your house



Big motels have wireless networks that don't have problems the problem that you're having is that someone doesn't really know what they're doing and you need to call a professional that knows how to position a router and set up a proper Network in the meantime learn to use the hotspot that's on your phone for internet Verizon is absolutely wonderful it's faster than any internet service you're going to get with your router

Answer 3

You sound like a candidate for one of the Mesh routers. Many devices, decently large area to cover. Also, you get what you are paying for so if you don't spend a decent amount of money, you get horrible experiences. Peruse the mesh routers at best buy.

Answer 4

Wireless extenders are actually a pretty bad option. Typically you put a wireless range extender at or near the furthest point where it can still get a signal from the main router. It then takes this weak loss-prone signal and boosts it up. The signal-to-noise ratio at these locations are low, so the extender has to spend its time error-correcting and retrying to send/receive lost packets.With all of this overhead, you'd be lucky to get only half the speed through these parts of the network going through the range extender.



A better option than wireless range extenders would have been a Powerline Ethernet connection, with added WiFi. An example is this TP-Link device which is both Powerline Ethernet and WiFi range extender at the same time:



https://www.bestbuy.ca/en-ca/product/tp-link-powerline-av1200-gigabit-wi-fit-adapter-kit-tl-wpa8630/10630410.aspx?



What a Powerline Ethernet does is it uses the house's electrical lines as an ad hoc Ethernet signal carrier. These are generally much more reliable and faster than WiFi by themselves. It then rebroadcasts the data through its own separate WiFi transceiver. WiFi repeaters take a degraded signal and boost it as best as they can, but a Powerline adapter has a much stronger signal to work with and there's hardly ever any losses. It can go from one end of your house to the other with something like 80% efficiency, whereas WiFi by itself would be at 20% or less.



With a Powerline adapter, you can afford to put the router in the center of the house, and you can put a Powerline adapter in your room, and have nearly 100% speeds, for all of your online gaming needs or whatever that you may need all of that performance for.

Answer 5

Tracy L is spot on.



The other and often more important things is if you are using 2.4GHz, EVERY other WiFi system within a couple of hundred metres is sharing the same frequency range and every transmission from every device or access point blocks or interferes with every other transmission.

(Plus many other wireless gadgets using the same 2.4GHz band that interfere but do not show up as WiFi - from video senders through microwave ovens to baby alarms).



As distance from a WiFi AP increases, speeds rapidly drop and the device is more and more susceptible to being "jammed" by weaker signals from other WiFi gear in the area.





Although there are 11 or 13 numbered channels, any "11n" WiFi signal uses a block of eight channels - it's impossible for two to coexist in range of each other without overlap and interference.

11g (54Mbit) used four channel slots and could work with separate systems on channels 1, 6 & 11 or even 1, 5, 9, 13 - but newer, faster gear actually makes problems far worse.





WiFi should always be an absolute last resort.

It was designed when the only use was web pages and checking email, with things like streaming nonexistent - but the basic system is virtually unchanged in principle from then and should never be sold as a primary internet access method.



Salesmen do not care and all performance claims for WiFi device speeds are based on tests done "in isolation" with no other equipment within range...





Use wired ethernet for all fixed devices and if you must have extra WiFi, use wired-in APs rather than repeaters.

(Your repeaters can probably work in AP mode).



If you have clusters of devices in different areas, add an ethernet switch for local connections and you only need a single cable back to the router.



If ethernet cables are impossible in an area, use gigabit Homeplug modules - they pass ethernet via the house wiring and do not cause WiFi congestion. You can even get one with a WiFi AP, or plug one of your extenders in to one - or a switch then a WiFi AP into that..





[Radio & Electronics designer & programmer for 40+ years].

Answer 6

You still don't get it do you. WIFI is line of sight. Thus the closer to the router the better all WiFi devices work! Each extender used slows the system by 1/2 because it has to "repeat" every thing it hears and send it to the router. Thus extenders are useful but SLOW the entire system. They should only be used if nothing else works! Putting the router in the CENTER of the home puts it closer to everyone on BOTH ends of the house!!! Some people refuse to look and understand WiFi.. it appears from your quesitons you are one of those who simply do not want to look at logic.