20m cat5e ok to connect router and access point together?

Phil2008 · 5 Jun 2012 at 21:40

Because I live in a large house my wireless router doesn't cover the complete house wirelessly, so I decided to get the TP-Link 300Mbps Wireless N Access Point, have it in the centre of the house connected wirelessly to my main router.. Anyway the cut a long story short I had to buy another access point to get it all working.

But still its not very reliable, and my sis keeps nagging me saying her laptop wont connect to the net. So Ive decided to connect main router and TP-Link 300Mbps Wireless N Access Point with a ugly cat5e cable, and Im just wondering have I ordered the correct cable? Hopefully this will sort out the problems once and for all, cross fingers.

Dist · 5 Jun 2012 at 23:27

That is the correct type of cable for just connecting 2 devices together, cat5e is fine for what you need to do and lengths up to 100m are no issue.

Ideally to get the best wireless connection where you need multiple APs on the network, having them all wired together is always the preferred option, as if you wireless connect APs, then you have to worry not only about the connection between between the end device and the AP, but also between APs. Also, with the APs being connected by wire, it means that each AP can be set up on a different channel as they don't need to talk to each other over Wi-Fi, and as long as the channels are far enough apart they won't interfere with each other at all.

Phil2008 · 6 Jun 2012 at 00:32

Thanks,, I guess with having to run 2 access points its just making more probs? But for some reason when I had 1 access point any devices that connected to the access point, just wouldn't stay connected more then 10 secs at a time, even though the signal strength was fine. Even now the first access point wont stay connected to any other device then the 2nd access point, so Ive stopped any device connecting to the 1st access point.

So this is getting quite expensive now, and I so didn't want to use cables but Ive just about run out of ideas now. Anyway hopefully this will work flawlessly, so my sister wont be bugging me every few days saying "it's not working" hehe.

ChrisD. · 6 Jun 2012 at 06:54

You could connect them via power lines, saves running a cable across the house/flat.

Phil2008 · 6 Jun 2012 at 11:49

I thought about that but my room runs on a diff circuit to the rest of the house, so that prob wont work?

ChocolateStarfishRammer · 6 Jun 2012 at 11:54

Phil2008 said:
I thought about that but my room runs on a diff circuit to the rest of the house, so that prob wont work?

Ive found that aslong as they all go back to the same fuse box.. they work ok.

EDIT: But, I still prefer to run a cable