Advice for improving WiFi signal round the house

S

straightatthewall

Well-known member
Anybody had genuine success in boosting the signal all round the house? Typically have those situations where provider insists the speeds are up to scratch but performance varies from room to room.

I bought a devolo booster a few years back. Not sure it ever really made much difference and the worst room still uses a cable that is run up the stairs.

Any tips?
 
Get a Mesh system, its not like a Wi Fi extender plug, works 100000% better, costs a bit mind, I Have a TP link M5 sysytem with 3 discs, & I get 73mbs over wi fi everywhere in the house & well into the garden.. Expect to pay about £150
 
BT Whole Home WiFi repeaters. You can get them in a twin or 3 pack are are great. I work for the telco on the IoM and have trialled more expensive repeaters which don't perform any better. They themselves ain't cheap mind but they will paint your walls with WiFi. One plugs into the router then the other one or two have to sit within wireless range of the first one. We live in an old thick walled stone house and have one upstairs which does all of that floor. The third one is about 30m away in a log cabin at the bottom of the garden and allows us to stream to the TV down there seamlessly. In fact we'll be down there in an hour for the match today 🙂. I'd recommend the Whole Home definitely.
 
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In the first instance if you are checking your speeds all around the house make sure you do the check in each room with the same device and with only that device operating when you do the check.
I'm not an expert so I won't be offended if someone tells me different.
PS.
Just run fast.com on 2 different tablets sat in the same chair
Old tablet shows 60mbps
New tablet shows 140mbps.
I've BT Fibre 250 superfast broadband with Halo 2.
 
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been using develo connectors for 6 or seven years. i have a house on three levels where some of the walls ar over 4 foot thick. we have good connectivity in every room. sometimes through cable and sometimes through wifi, i can be watching I follow in my office downstairs and the other half can watch movies in the lounge or watching stuff in her office on the top floor. i very rearely get i follow lag.

i used to use them on an office where there were between ten or twelve people constantly accessing either Wifi or a direct connection to a server all through Devolo connectors. the only issues i have ever had was in the office which was connected to my old house if the washing machine or dishwasher was going then the signal for the hard wired internet would deteriorate, but ive not had that problem since we moved.
 
Insider said:
In the first instance if you are checking your speeds all around the house make sure you do the check in each room with the same device and with only that device operating when you do the check.
I'm not an expert so I won't be offended if someone tells me different.
PS.
Just run fast.com on 2 different tablets sat in the same chair
Old tablet shows 60mbps
New tablet shows 140mbps.
I've BT Fibre 250 superfast broadband with Halo 2.
Click to expand...
You're right in what you say but to be a bit more analytical you can download a WiFi analyser app onto your phone or tablet to view your signal strengths in each room, plus it'll show you other wireless networks in your immediate locality that may be interfering with your own on the same channels. If that's the case you can change channel on your routwr/repeater. The app I use is called (oddly enough) WiFi Analyzer on android though I'm sure you'll get it or something similar on iOS
 
Depends who your provider is, but if you call up and complain most will send you a booster for free. Sky sent me a booster before Christmas and as we're in an old stone built house and my tiny little box room / home office was about as far from the router as possible and got very poor signal. The extender is now plugged in in that tiny room and I get full strength signal throughout the house. The only time it's been a bit dodgy is when there's been me and my phone, my work pc, my laptop with the ifollow stream, the step daughter with her laptop streaming Netflix and her phone on a videocall with about 20 mates and my partner with her work laptop, her personal laptop, her phone and sky on demand all on at the same time.
 
I tried so many systems and never got that much improvement.

I know have a 30m cable that I can plug in anywhere if I am doing something that is internet heavy.

This is a genuine reply by the way!!
 
Powerline adapters tend to be better than the booster. As long as both ends are on the same electrical circuit, they work. One plugs into your main router, one in the room you're struggling with. They range in price from around £40 to over £100 depending on your wants and needs
 
On The Rock said:
BT Whole Home WiFi repeaters. You can get them in a twin or 3 pack are are great. I work for the telco on the IoM and have trialled more expensive repeaters which don't perform any better. They themselves ain't cheap mind but they will paint your walls with WiFi. One plugs into the router then the other one or two have to sit within wireless range of the first one. We live in an old thick walled stone house and have one upstairs which does all of that floor. The third one is about 30m away in a log cabin at the bottom of the garden and allows us to stream to the TV down there seamlessly. In fact we'll be down there in an hour for the match today 🙂. I'd recommend the Whole Home definitely.
Click to expand...
This.
 
On The Rock said:
BT Whole Home WiFi repeaters. You can get them in a twin or 3 pack are are great. I work for the telco on the IoM and have trialled more expensive repeaters which don't perform any better. They themselves ain't cheap mind but they will paint your walls with WiFi. One plugs into the router then the other one or two have to sit within wireless range of the first one. We live in an old thick walled stone house and have one upstairs which does all of that floor. The third one is about 30m away in a log cabin at the bottom of the garden and allows us to stream to the TV down there seamlessly. In fact we'll be down there in an hour for the match today 🙂. I'd recommend the Whole Home definitely.
Click to expand...
Hi do you have BT internet to begin with ?
 
I built a man cave at the bottom of the garden about 12m from the house, ran a cat 5 cable to it plugged in an old router, changed the IP so it didn't conflict, disabled DHCP, changed the router name and password to the same as the new router, sorted 👍
 
Limechase said:
Get a Mesh system, its not like a Wi Fi extender plug, works 100000% better, costs a bit mind, I Have a TP link M5 sysytem with 3 discs, & I get 73mbs over wi fi everywhere in the house & well into the garden.. Expect to pay about £150
Click to expand...
I've got the same. We're over 3 floors and old thick walls. Works very well.

www.currys.co.uk

TP-LINK Deco M5 Whole Home WiFi System - Triple Pack

Complete WiFi coverage with any broadband provider; Network security software; AC 1300; Dual-band (2.4 GHz + 5 GHz); Three unit system
www.currys.co.uk www.currys.co.uk
 
For home affordability cat5e from router to the next floor then plug an old WiFi router or a WiFi repeater with an rj45 socket on it.
mod you want to spend some cash go for a commercial mesh WiFi system https://www.omnicoreagency.com/best-wifi-mesh-network-systems/
I’m a network engineer and I’m very much into hardline cables at home I can’t justify paying that sort of money. I have sky broadband and at night 4 of my 5 kids are all on their iPads watching stuff before bed the wife will probably be looking online at stuff to buy and I’ll probably be streaming something to the tv. We have no issues at all.
 
Had an old bt router with ropey signal so got a bt smart hub 1 of ebay for£15, now definately get firmer more reliable signal don't think its quicker or awt though, it also powers the the now tv down bottom of garden. The smart Hub2 with the disc or discs if your really struggling though more ££s.
 
We have Sky super fast broadband which they guarantee 55Mbs in every room for £27 a month....which we do get.
But I added a Netgear Nighthawk Mesh router that I got of eBay for £70 and a Netgear QC1900 range extender for £30
It's not the most up to date hardware but we happily get 100Mbs across the house...

You can find a lot of these Mesh systems cropping up on eBay for less than £100 and if you have lots of devices using wi-fi it's well worth investing.
 
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