Using spare router to boost wireless signal

sparkymark75 · 11 Oct 2010 at 21:45

I'm setting up my spare 360 in the bedroom as a Media Center Extender. When configuring it in WMC, it stated that network performance was poor and showed only two bars of the umpteen that were there.

The spare 360 has the original wireless adapter in it. My router is downstairs in the livingroom and is a D-Link DIR-655. It's connected via Gigabit ethernet to the media "server".

I have a spare D-Link DIR-615 (got it from Virgin). I was wondering if it would be possible to put this on the stair landing and use it to boost the wireless signal? Or would it have to be connected by cable to the main router?

Would I be better investing in the wireless N adapter for the 360?

Jamesbcd · 11 Oct 2010 at 22:20

The spare router will need to be connected to the first, I think.

snowdog · 11 Oct 2010 at 22:24

You would have 2 wireless networks this case.

It's a case of disabling DCHP on the second router and making sure they have a different ip adress.
You connect the routers with each other on the ''switch'' ports using cat5...
I have 3 routers:

Orange livebox ( modem/router with 2 switch ports) - connected to 1pc & linksys wireless router - 192.168.1.1, dchp enabled and the standard gateway.
Linksys wrt54g wireless access point & 4 port switch - connected to 2 pc's wired and 2 laptops and a phone wireless and a cheapo no name router upstairs - 192.168.1.2 dchp disabled.
Generic cheapo router upstairs - connected to the linksys and my own pc - dchp disabled and 192.168.1.3...

So basically the 2 other routers are just used as a switch and wlan access...

PC's and other devices start from 192.168.1.10, usually up to .18 is in use...
If the no name router would be a wireless access point it'd have a different network name than the linksys network, however, as long as you set the default gateway to the first modem/router ( eg. the one with the Internet connection) it should be fine.

sparkymark75 · 11 Oct 2010 at 23:04

I'd rather avoid running cable between the two routers. It looks like I can use something called WDS to allow wireless repeater bridging between the two routers. However it also appears the bandwidth is limited using this approach.

At any rate, to be able to do anything useful with the spare router, looks like I'll have to flash it to use DD-WRT :rolleyes:

Bricked router coming up....

Azuse05 · 11 Oct 2010 at 23:07

If you have a 54gl, you could just flash tomato and use WDS and put it anywhere near a socket. Just make sure and enable STP, seems to have problems without it.

Anyway, the 615 doesn't have WDS to my knowledge. You could use it as a bridge (I think) with stock firmware, or, install dd-wrt and use wds. I'd try bridging first, but if no cables is a requirement dd-wrt is the way to go imo.

sparkymark75 · 12 Oct 2010 at 00:27

OK, I've got DD-WRT installed on the DIR-615 and I've tried to set it up as a Repeater Bridge following the guide at http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Repeater_Bridge but I can't get it to work. Nothing will connect to the new SSID and rebooting the router results in me not being able to get into it without a hard reset.

Azuse05 · 12 Oct 2010 at 18:16

http://www.polarcloud.com/tomatofaq#how_do_i_use_wds

sparkymark75 · 17 Oct 2010 at 12:04

Update, I gave up on the wireless bridging/repeater approach and ran a cable up the outside wall of the house (took hours to drill through concrete walls!).

So I've got the downstairs router (a DIR-655, SSID: downstairs), connected to the upstairs router via cable to it's WAN port (DIR-615, SSID: upstairs). I've got it setup as a wireless access point (folowing the guide at http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Wireless_Access_Point) and all is working well.

However, there are devices such as laptops which will be used upstairs and down. They seem to remain connected to the AP they last connected to, whereas I'd like them to connect to the AP with the strongest signal. So if I'm in the livingroom and then go upstairs to the bedroom with my laptop, it should then "connect" to the upstairs AP. Is this do-able? Would it be better to just give the two AP's the same SSID and security settings?

Vampyre · 17 Oct 2010 at 12:14

Same SSID but a different channel should do the trick

sparkymark75 · 17 Oct 2010 at 12:38

Vampyre said:
Same SSID but a different channel should do the trick

OK, done that. Any idea how I figure out which AP I'm currently connected to if they both have the same SSID?

Azuse05 · 17 Oct 2010 at 12:57

Should be the strongest signal, automatically.

Although I have to ask (and I'm glad it works

), if you had a signal upstairs already, why did you drill holes in the walls instead of simply using it as a wireless repeater?

SoundsGood · 17 Oct 2010 at 12:59

"tracert google.com" in CMD will show you whether or not you're hopping through the 2nd router.

sparkymark75 · 17 Oct 2010 at 13:09

Azuse05 said:
Should be the strongest signal, automatically.

Although I have to ask (and I'm glad it works ), if you had a signal upstairs already, why did you drill holes in the walls instead of simply using it as a wireless repeater?

I plan to stream media to the upstairs 360 so I wanted that connected via cable.

sparkymark75 · 17 Oct 2010 at 13:09

SoundsGood said:
"tracert google.com" in CMD will show you whether or not you're hopping through the 2nd router.

Unfortunately that doesn't show the router I'm going through.

SoundsGood · 17 Oct 2010 at 13:11

mparter said:
Unfortunately that doesn't show the router I'm going through.

Oops didn't read how you were doing it. What about "arp -a" in CMD, does the mac address of the default gateway change depending on which you're connected to?