Extending networks wireless capability

[zootfloot]

My home network looks "kinda" like the image below, everything is hard wired and the distance between the equipment in the computer room and our lounge is approximately 27m.

Until now i havent needed to use the wireless, however the wife does on her laptop and phone from time to time but i now want to use the wireless signal but quite frankly it is absolutely dire.

The laptop picks up a signal but it occasionally drops out and its very hit and miss as to whether the wife's phone picks up the signal.

Anyone know of a way of extending the wiress signal in this situation, for example could another wireless router be added in before the htpc in the lounge?

thanks for any help you can give.

 

[K.C. Leblanc]

You could add a second router, however you'd need to turn off quite a lot of functions to get it to work well (a domestic router is usually an Access point, router, switch and DHCP server all rolled into one). The main one is you'd need to turn off DHCP and change it's I.P address so it's different from your existing router, the first three numbers should be the sae as everything else on the network, for the last just choose a high number (100 is easy to remember) so your first router doesn't assign the number to any new equipment.

You might find it easier to add a second gigabit switch and a 'wireless access point' in the lounge.

Set the SSIDs, and all the security settings the same but. Start with the channels set to auto, if this doesn't work set them to different channels at least 5 channels apart.

 

[DJMK4]

I extended my wireless network by just purchasing a second Netgear DG834GT adsl router and using this as an access point, just turn off DHCP and give it the same wireless details as your main router, then assign the LAN IP of that unit to one up from your main router

So

Your main ADSL router (say a DG834GT) 192.168.1.1
A second DG834GT with DHCP turned off and same wireless settings as main router: 192.168.1.2

I done it this way as if for any reason my main router packs in, which is unlikely as I have had one of these Netgear units pack up in 3 years! I instantly have a backup to get me online rather than just purchasing an "Access Point" only