Extending Wifi Range to back of property

[mhutaff]

Hi,

I have my Residential Gateway set up at the absolute front of my house. It's connected to my television/receiver in my living room, and the existing (DirecTV) cabling running through my house connects the television/receiver in the back of the house. I have no problem with the connection with either television, and the wifi in the front of the house is strong enough to support my laptop and desktop with great access.

In the back of the house, however, wifi is spotty, especially for mobile devices. I was wondering if there was a solution I could install off my television receiver in the back of the house that would boost the wifi signal enough to give good reception there and also in our garage, which is about 10 feet away. Would like to put a wireless UVerse box out there if possible.

Am perfectly willing to purchase a router or other similar hardware if I can install it with relative ease at the back of the house. Any help or suggestions on this hardware would be most appreciated.

Thanks!

[BeeBeeSA ACE - Wizard]

You could always use something like this.

[gregzoll_1]

How large of a structure is this? Can you post a floor plan showing location of the RG, and any Ethernet connection points that you have? It is not so much covering the other parts of the home, it is also do you want just G, or G/N wifi, also what do you plan on doing with the network (browsing Internet, streaming Netflix or other movie Ondemand programming, etc.)?

[mhutaff]

We're talking about an 1100 sq ft single story home where the RG is at the front of the building and the bedroom is as the back. So 30-40 feet away.

Would like to extend the range another 20 feet or so to encompass, the garage if possible. It's a free-standing structure adjacent to the house. The purpose for that would be to add a wireless UVerse box to the garage to watch TV. No gaming or streaming Netflix that far out.

Thanks!

[gregzoll_1]

Well, for the UVerse box, it uses its own AP that would need a Cat-5e/6 run back to the RG. As for adding a A/P to cover the rear or overlap from the front, you just need to figure out what you are wanting to spend, and also how many other A/P's are there in your area.

Run inSSIDer to see how many other Access Points are running on the 2.4ghz freq. around your house. I have the Netgear WN802Tv2 Wireless G/N AP and get decent range. There are some others out there, depending on what price you are willing to pay, and if you want external or internal antennas.

As for my RG range, we can go at least 75-90 feet from it, before it drops out, with it down in our basement at the rear of the house..

[mhutaff]

I'd spend an extra $100 if it would give the ability to have the wireless uVerse box in my garage (and give me the wifi I need at the back of the house).

The uVerse box in the back of the house is connected to the system with coax cable, but I run a CAT 5 cable out of it into the back of the AppleTV that connects to that television.

[gregzoll_1]

Again, the Wireless UVerse Set top box comes with its own Access Point, that needs to be hardwired LAN back to the RG. And as for slaving off of a STB connected via Coax, not the best practice.

[mhutaff]

I don't really have an option of rewiring the house, so I have to stick with the coax that runs through the house, but are you saying the STB in our bedroom is a repeater/extender itself? If not, can I hook into the CAT5 line with what was recommended up thread to experience a boost in signal strength?

Thanks for you help!

[gregzoll_1]

Well, you do not have an option of using the coax to extend the network, if you wish to use the wireless STB. You are going to have to pull some Cat-5e/6 through the house, if you want this to work. That means getting into the attic or crawl space, if you do not have a unfinished basement, or basement at all.

[mhutaff]

So if I'm reading you right, I don't have any means of using third-party hardware to extend range unless I run CAT5 cable from the RG to the back of the property? (Which is not possible.)

[BeeBeeSA ACE - Wizard]

Use one, two, three or more of these.  If you have a ton of money put one in each room!!  You will have coverage for sure then although it wouldn't be necessary.  This would be to extend your wireless for regular devices such as computers, smart phones, or anything else on your wireless network.  If you want a wireless STB in your garage the access point that comes with it will be plenty strong enough to run the wireless STB in your garage with an 1100 sq ft home.  Don't try to judge your current wireless strength to determine if you can get a wireless STB to work.  That box uses totally different wireless signaling to transmit and receive wirelessly.

[BeeBeeSA ACE - Wizard]

Just thought of something else and my edit time ran out, but my neighbor has a wireless STB and his access point is about 75 ft. from my RG inside his house of course.  Using inSSIDer I can see his signal good and strong inside my house.  That of course is going thru all of the walls in his house and all of the walls in my house.  You should be fine with what you are trying to do. 

[gregzoll_1]

Remember, the lower the -dbm is, the better the signal. The higher in -dbm, the worst the signal.

[mhutaff]

Will try the Netgear box - thanks!

[SomeJoe7777 ACE - Geek]

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gregzoll_1 wrote:
Remember, the lower the -dbm is, the better the signal. The higher in -dbm, the worst the signal.

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Just to clarify, the signal strengths of wireless devices are measured in dBm, which is the signal strength referenced to 1 mW.  Thus, a 1 mW signal is 0 dBm.  A 10x lower signal of 0.1 mW would show as -10 dBm.  A signal 10x lower than that would be 0.01 mW, or -20 dBm.

Greg is correct that the magnitude (number only) portion of the reading goes down as the strength gets higher.  e.g. a -20 dBm signal is stronger than a -30 dBm signal.  However, since these numbers are negative, the actual value follows standard mathematics, e.g.

-30 < -20, so the -30 signal is less than (and lower strength than) the -20 signal.

[mhutaff]

How do I apply this knowledge to the situation? Is there a setup on the Netgear box that lets me choose dbm?

[SomeJoe7777 ACE - Geek]

No, you don't set a signal strength, but you can measure it to get a good idea of how well your computers can receive the signal.

There is a program for PCs called inSSIDer that will graph the signal strength over time for you. You can install it on a laptop, and walk with that laptop into your backyard and see your signal strength. You can then compare what the signal strength is with the various solutions presented in this thread and determine which might work the best.

A "good/excellent" wireless signal will have a signal strength of -50 dBm or higher (remember, that means that the number is lower than 50, e.g. -45 or -40, etc.)

The lower limit for usable wireless communication on most computers is about -80 or -85.

[mhutaff]

Ah, very cool. I'll install on my wife's laptop tonight and give it a try!

[mhutaff · Accepted solution]

In case anyone's following this thread, here's the end solution:

I purchased a Netgear N600 wireless router and slaved it to the STB at the back of the property. Turned it on without connecting it to anything and connected to its WAP from a laptop. From there, turned off DHCP and renamed the WiFi to match my UVerse SSID (and renamed the 5G connection to something similar).

Then I plugged it into the CAT5 outlet on the STB. Everything's gravy now.

[SomeJoe7777 ACE - Geek]

Be aware that this will work as long as that STB is turned off. If you turn that STB on and tune to a channel, the multicast traffic will likely overwhelm the router and you won't get any connectivity.

The only way around this would be to run another Ethernet cable from the N600 back to the RG.

[jaykstr]

The eithernet port on the back of the STB is only to be used when feeding the STB on eithernet. If you plug anything it to that port and you have the STB on, it will affect your your video service and may also affect the video service to your other tv's. You could have the RG moved to a more central part of your home, but you would need a phone & cable jack at that location. You could also run cat5 from the RG to a room that is close to the garage and place the WAP there.