While my uncle was visiting us this year, we found that it was difficult for our WiFi signal to reach into his room. Upon looking further, I discovered that the signal was weak at his room since there were 2 single brick walls and 2 double brick walls in between my router and the laptop he was using. Additionally, all the windows and doors of this room had grills that acted as a Faraday Cage. No wonder my wifi router's signal was weak.
This prompted me to think what could be done to ensure better range and coverage. I already had an Ethernet cable running to another room upstairs but it was in bad condition, really. It was laid about 6 years back and has weathered in the rain, sun and cold. Upon testing it, I found that it I wasn't able to get a connection.
So, what were my options here? I could either get a new cable - about 30m - and have it run from my router to the room or try to set up a wifi repeater somewhere so that it could repeat my router's signal. I already had another spare Netgear WGR614 Wifi router with me so I could check if repeater mode works with it. It did work, however, the bridge connection was poor - remember the walls and Faraday Cage.
After re-positioning the repeater in a couple of different locations (and a lot of frustration), I decided to patch this up with a new 30m Ethernet cable. Yes, 30m. I bought a longer one so that it would help cover one half of the perimeter of my house. That way, it could be reused again. This time, I got myself a Cat-6E so that I could future-proof myself for a use later on, though I don't know if internet will get faster and cheaper in my place.
I learnt a lot while experimenting with the routers and connection. I must say that I was surprised since this was not only about networking and routers, but I also learnt a lot about antennas, home remedies for increasing range, wifi channels, several different routers in the market, bugs in software, well-known commercial computer equipment manufacturers, and a bunch of other things.
So here it is - some things that I thought would help many who are trying to get the best range and coverage from their Wifi routers.
Bridging two routers wirelessly.
Wifi Channel scanning and selection.
Setting up a router as a wireless Access Point.
Finding the IP address of a router when in AP mode.
My experience with Binatone, Netgear, TP-LINK routers - which can or can't do what.
My experience with Wifi range and router antennas.
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