Wifi solution for long range

dodgydogman · 22 Feb 2015 at 13:37

I currently have a TP-Link TL-WN822N connected to a BT home hub 5 on the complete opposite end of a house with very thick walls. Wired gets about 70mbps but my wireless gets about 10-20mbps which I am fine with. What I'm not fine with is the packet loss and ping spikes I get constantly when gaming. I have been looking at usb dongles online for ages but have no idea if any one of them will even be better than the one I have.

I have a TP-Link TL-PA511KIT powerline adapter which suffers from more packet loss and lower mbps no matter which sockets I try (its an old house with terrible wiring and probably lead lined walls).

I'm willing to pay up to £100 to solve this problem, what do you guys recommend? Is there a great usb dongle out there? Is bridging/repeating a better solution, if so what ones would you recommend? Would I be better off getting a better router than the home hub 5?

Caged · 22 Feb 2015 at 14:00

Run a cable out the wall in one corner of the house, bury it in the ground and bring it around to the other side of the house. There is nothing else you can really do.

dmsims · 22 Feb 2015 at 14:34

You could try a better Powerline set like the Devolo (at least the 550+) which use the earth wire as well

Easy and no cost if it does not work

dodgydogman · 22 Feb 2015 at 16:40

Those options are probably more of a last resort, does anyone know of a better usb wifi adapter than the TP-Link TL-WN822N ?

Caged · 22 Feb 2015 at 16:42

Wi-Fi is a two way thing - changing one end of the link is unlikely to give you the performance increase that you want. You're putting a very weak RF signal up against thick lumps of brick/stone, there's a limit as to how much you achieve by starting with a stronger signal at each end.

APM · 23 Feb 2015 at 09:51

run a cable,go through a window frame,can't beat a cable

swinnie · 23 Feb 2015 at 11:49

External grade cable, out the house, round the outside and in. Fix access point/switch at the end.