What do I need to cover my. House with wifi

[utajoker]

Hi

I have a 3 floor home that I need to cover with WiFi.

I have a room under the stairs on the ground floor where my virgin comes in and where all my networking goes to. Every room has network points and virgin points in the wall that all meet here.

I currently have my :
Virgin modem in modem mode > Asus rtn66u router > switch > house ports

With my pc the only thing wired to the Asus router

My current WiFi is just picked up by my phone/laptop on the top floor but seems to drop occasionally but me echo dots have no chance.

I have 350mb virgin that will prob go up to 500mb soon and I want to get that speed everywhere in the house.

Is there something I can connect to the network ports in a room on each floor that will broadcast my Wifi? Would this be better than something that recieves the WiFi and re emits it?

I've seen these WiFi nets also. My network knowledge stops after setting up a router.

Thanks.

 

[DBT85]

Unifi wall APs will do what you want though I'm not sure on speed.

https://store.ui.com/products/inwall-ap

There are a few versions. All I believe are POE and have at a couple of ethernet ports on the bottom to cable into if you needed them.

Looking at a few myself, just not really got around to looking properly yet!

Have a couple of their ceiling ones for 3 years and wouldn't bother looking any any other suppliers. They just work, no hand-off, easy to manage. Some people buy loads of extra stuff but mine work just fine with just the APs and controller software installed on my server to set them up and forget about them.

 

[BigT]

The 'best' solution is to have a device called a Wireless Access Point plugged into one or more of the network points spaced evenly around your house. How many you'd need depends on layout, size of house etc. I'd start with one attached to the network point that is the highest and most centrally located in your house. If that doesn't give you enough coverage then get a second and place the two of them equally spaced as high up in the house as you can. Again if that's not enough you can start adding more although if you choose a good access point then I'd be surprised if you need more than two unless you have a mansion.

As @DBT85 mentions, Ubiquiti have a good reputation. I personally run UAP-LRs and have done for years without issue. I don't know the in-wall devices but I'm sure will be fine too. All will be capable of running close to the speed of your internet if your wireless devices support it.

You mention two other approaches by which I think you mean wireless extenders or a mesh system. Extenders are not very good in my experience. Mesh is a lot better but really both those solutions are alternatives to running ethernet cables around the house and using wireless access points. You already have the cables wired in so make use of the most reliable and performant solution which is Wireless Access Points. On top of that it is also likely to be cheaper than a mesh solution.

 

[dessimpson]

I've got a 3 storey house too.
I've got two Ubiquiti AP's. One on the ground floor and one on the top. Gives me great coverage over the whole house.
I've also got 4 poe switches. One on the ground floor, two in the middle (man cave and home office) and one on the top floor.
Along with the cloud key controller and the USG firewall I pad about £800 or so.
You probably don't need as many switches or the firewall so you could pay a fair bit less.

 

[DBT85]

Two UAP-AC-IW will set you back about £170 and could probably cover the whole house. There is also a TP Link EAP225-WALL which looks like the same thing and a bit cheaper and has 3 100mb ethernet ports on the bottom compared to the 2 gig ethernet ports on the AC-IW. I have no idea if it has a similar handoff ability to the Unifi stuff which is one of the boons for me personally. Unifi also do a AC-IW-PRO and AC-IW-HD, though both are significantly more expensive than the plain old AC-IW.

On top of that £170 you'd also need to get power to them so either a small POE switch in your network cupboard or some injectors. Might be cheaper if you only need the 2.

I'm actually looking at them to not only provide the wifi in a couple of adjoined holiday cottages and farmhouse, but also then allow me to run some IP cams off the extra POE port on the bottom.

 

[utajoker]

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ubiquiti-networks-unifi-ap-ac-lite-indoor-access-point-nw-002-uq.html

Is this what I need?

Plug ethernet into back and it then creates a WiFi network?

Are they difficult to setup?

Thanks for the help.

 

[Stephanie Peterson]

Get the TP link DBT85 mentions, i have one of the lower end models with only 100Mb lan input but its POE and works great and is fully manageable - if you do get these then think about running POE using a new switch somewhere to feed them or POE injectors leaving you power cable free at the AP end.

 

[utajoker]

Will this give a seamless WiFi?

ie if I connect to WiFi down stairs and head upstairs I won't have to reconnect to the WiFi network again?

 

[Sparx]

Ubiquiti APs will roam seamlessly to other Ubiquiti APs, but they won't seamless roam to the Asus AP if you use that still.

You would need to switch off the Asus wireless and have 2 Ubiquiti APs (if you need 2 for ground and top floors) - to then have a 'seamless' wifi experience overall.

 

[utajoker]

Would it cause issues if I did this.

Virgin modem > Router > wall ports > 2 x ubiquiti

Pc and media server wired to Asus router.

Everything else wireless to ubiquiti.

Would this put my pc on a different network than my wireless devices?

 

[DBT85]

Would it cause issues if I did this.

Virgin modem > Router > wall ports > 2 x ubiquiti

Pc and media server wired to Asus router.

Everything else wireless to ubiquiti.

Would this put my pc on a different network than my wireless devices?

That'll work fine. My pc and media server are wired and wireless devices can still talk to them.

I've no doubt there are settings you can enable to stop that if you don't want it to happen.

 

[utajoker]

I do want it to happen. I want to be able to stream media to tablets.

Sorry for all the questions. Trying to get my head around it.

If the access point is plugged into my router(to receive Internet to broadcast) it is the same network as my Wired devices?

But if my router emits WiFi it will be different login but the same network?

 

[BigT]

If your router emits WiFi it will still be in the same network as everything else but devices won’t seamlessly roam between its own WiFi and the access points. So you turn it off generally but don’t have to.

Devices connecting to access points will be on the same network as your wired devices. Your router does the routing and creates your ‘network’ and you only have one router. Every wired device, wireless device and access point all get their network info from your router by default.

 

[DBT85]

I do want it to happen. I want to be able to stream media to tablets.

Sorry for all the questions. Trying to get my head around it.

If the access point is plugged into my router(to receive Internet to broadcast) it is the same network as my Wired devices?

But if my router emits WiFi it will be different login but the same network?

Personally I've turned my router WiFi off and just let the unifi devices deal with everything. If you use both the unifi devices and your router WiFi, your device needs to swap between them to get the best signal. Sometimes it's going to just stick with the Asus and have **** signal when it could have swapped to the unifi devices. Running only the unifi WiFi eliminates that problem as they handoff to each other when one can send you a stronger signal.

I stream to tablets and stuff from my media server all the time.

 

[MassiveJim]

I have a room under the stairs on the ground floor where my virgin comes in

need more details plz

 

[Sparx]

I do want it to happen. I want to be able to stream media to tablets.

Sorry for all the questions. Trying to get my head around it.

If the access point is plugged into my router(to receive Internet to broadcast) it is the same network as my Wired devices?

But if my router emits WiFi it will be different login but the same network?

You will be on the same network with everything still - wired or wireless.

 

[utajoker]

Think i'm going to pick up a UAP-AC-LITE on tuesday, watched a few vids on them and they seem good.

Just need to work out how to hide the cabling to where ever i mount them.

 

[DBT85]

They work great.

Can I ask why you're going that route and having to run/hide more cable rather than an in wall one? It would be installed in like 5 mins and up and running not long after.

 

[utajoker]

Can you link what you mean with the in wall one.

 

[ricid]

Apologies for thread hijacking, but can anyone with a Ubiquiti AP confirm / deny the Amazon reports of the PoE injector making a whining noise?
Thinking of buying one, but depending on where I end up putting it that might be an issue.
I could always buy a third party unit to do the PoE but that's added cost.