The Home Networking Megathread - Yes the OP is out of date

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Home Networking Megathread - Yes the OP is out of date

«‹›3 »

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

pliantkitchen posted:

I just configured PXE booting/CentOS kickstarting off of my RT-N16 using TomatoUSB and Optware, any interest in a write up?

Yes please.

# ¿ Jan 22, 2012 21:06

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 18:49

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

RagingBoner posted:

My home network is 3 PCs all running Windows 7. This is going to sound really lazy, but is there any way to force one of the computers on the network to open a browser and start loading a page from one of my other computers? Some sort of simple inter-network messenger would be ok too, something I could just netsend a url with, and copy and paste that url into the living room computer's browser. Basically I need to pre-buffer movies, my internet connection in the verdant hills of Arkansas is pretty slow.

Try Remote Desktop?

# ¿ Mar 14, 2012 17:56

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Nighthand posted:

Looking to hopefully fix some network issues.

Quick version: router's wireless is dropping and seems to require rebooting the router to fix, but the wired connection is unaffected.

My ISP is Charter, my modem is a SB5101 Surfboard, and my router is a Linksys WRT400N with "Firmware: DD-WRT v24-sp2 (08/07/10) std"

Devices that connect wirelessly range from my and my gf's win7 laptops, my landlord's HP wireless printer (in his office that I can't access so I don't know what specifically it is) and occasionally his computer/tablet. The wired connection is used solely for the xbox for gaming and netflix.

Right around the time my landlord asked to tap into our network (and cut some off rent to do so) we started getting intermittent connection drops. The wireless just goes dead, I can't connect to the network at all. If I plug a cable in my laptop can connect just fine, and netflix still works on the xbox.

It sounds from my searching like it's an issue with too many connections at once, but it doesn't strictly happen when everything is on. I've had it disconnect when only my laptop and the printer are on the networked -- other devices being turned off. I'm not running torrents or p2p anything when it happens.

Today my computer's connection is acting significantly slower than normal, including taking long periods of time to load Google (the forums are faster, but still slower than normal.) ((Switching temporarily to the wired connection for the laptop, it's equally slow right now, so that may be unrelated.))

I can't figure out how to get the DD-WRT log working in the router -- I enable it and apply changes, and when the page refreshes it's disabled again. So I don't have logs from the router to peruse.

Edit: Switching temporarily to a direct connection with the modem, removing the router from the system, shows I still have slowdown, so that's a different issue. Also it could be mentioned that the router is fairly new. I only got it for my birthday last September.

Try setting your wireless mode to either G-Only or N-Only. I don't know why, but this seems to fix an inordinate amount of problems.

# ¿ Mar 14, 2012 17:57

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

I bought a refurbished Linksys e2000 and loaded Tomato on it, for the express purpose of using it as a 5ghz N access point. The issue is that it basically locks up the radio once a day and the network disappears. Scheduled reboots don't work, it must physically be restarted. In any case, it's a piece of poo poo.

I'm basically looking for the cheapest STABLE 5 ghz option that I can use as an AP. I already have a router with 2.4 ghz

# ¿ Mar 26, 2012 16:52

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Bucket Joneses posted:

Are the recommendations in the OP still relevant? I was using a WRT54GL with DD-WRT until it no longer worked and now need something new for under $150. I don't mind going to Tomato as long as the router is able to load some kind of useful third party firmware.

My network, used only by my wife and I, is two iphones (wifi), a laptop (wifi) a wired atv2, a wired laser printer, and a wired PC. Soon I will have a Synology DS411 wired into this as well.

I use bittorrent in rare cases but get most of my content from usenet. Other than that, the only other content-heavy downloading I do is Netflix streaming.

This is me asking for a recommendation so I don't buy some piece of poo poo that breaks in two months

The ASUS RT-N16 running the Toastman build of Tomato USB is the best loving router I've ever had. I've used them to handle clients with 15 PCs and a 50mb cable connection and it's been stable for months without a reboot.

I think the stock firmware is crap, but who cares, its so easy to get Tomato on it. Start Asus recovery utility, point it to tomato build, put router into recovery mode, walk away for about 5 minutes and BAM, best single band router in existence.

# ¿ Mar 27, 2012 23:19

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Space Gopher posted:

What's the quality like on Linksys factory refurbs? I'm looking for something inexpensive to use as a wireless bridge to push coverage into a dead spot in the house, and a refurb E2000 with Tomato seems like it'd do the job well for about $40 - if the quality's good, anyway.

Awful. They aren't so much refurbs as "used," usually coming completete with the previous owners settings. I'm pretty sure Linksys plugs them in, sees they turn on and sends them out the door. I bought an e2000 to use as a 5ghz AP and the wireless wound not stay stable for more than 45 minutes before it required a physical reboot. Probably why it was returned in the first place.

# ¿ Mar 28, 2012 15:16

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Meta Ridley posted:

So I have both Comcast cable (16Mbps) and CenturyLink DSL (40Mbps). Basically the cable sucks for gaming (random lag spikes) but is fine for downloading, and the DSL is great for downloading and games.

I am wondering though, is there any way to bond them together for downloading (mainly Usenet), but only use the DSL for gaming?

I have yet to find an affordable non-hacky solution for Dual-WAN. Apparently it's just that loving hard.

Short of building a PFSense box, which even then, has a nightmare setup that involves forced static IPs (Don't have static IPs? They suggest connecting each of your modems to a router and then connecting each router to the PFSense box...I wish I were kidding)

I also considered trying to use two separate routers and just having each machine point to the "correct" router, but any attempt to figure out how I could have my Usenet downloading box use both for better speeds met with futility.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2012 23:24

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

kri kri posted:

What is a decent way to RDP into my home network from outside my LAN? I would prefer RDP or VNC and I would also rather not use teamviewer or logmein.

I run a 54g with tomato.

Poke a hole in your firewall and setup DDNS?

# ¿ Apr 2, 2012 00:43

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

kri kri posted:

I have DDNS, guess I will set up SSH and call it a day. Is puttytray still the go-to ssh client?

Yup, pretty much everyone still uses putty.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2012 01:12

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Nerf Herder posted:

I'm going to throw my 2 cents into the ~$180 router recommendations. My netgear WNDR3700 died last week and had to get a new one.

Enter the ASUS RT-N66U.

- Dual band
- Gigabit
- Tomato/DDWRT support
- External antennas
- Great features in stock firmware (FTP, VPN, SMB, BitTorrent, Good QoS)
- 2 USB ports
- good cooling

This is by far one of the best consumer routers on the market. I have yet to have any issues. Asus has built this thing to get your open source firmware on, I have seen a tomato release but not much on ddwrt but it looks like someone is close to getting a stable build out.

Anyone else tested this thing yet?

I have a toastman tomato build running on this guy. The wireless seems quick and doesn't drop out (although I barely use wireless)
Everything else is rock solid.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2012 04:58

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Gherkin Jerkin posted:

There's a lot of good advice in this thread. I need some! I seem to be having random DNS lookup issues after installing DD-WRT on my Linksys WRT54G V8.2. I flashed DD-WRT v24-sp2 micro without a hitch. My setup is just a basic cable broadband 1.5Mbs > modem > wifi router so nothing really tricky. DNS lookup will stop at seemingly odd times, but more frequently when there's more traffic on my network. Sometimes browsing the PYF Gifs thread is enough to start showing red Xs where gifs should be downloading. After a few more minutes, DNS lookup fails totally and I'll need to telnet into the router to reboot. Sometimes I can't even ping the router so I'll need to do a hard reboot. Sometimes DNS lookup will return on its own if I wait long enough after my network traffic has died down but obviously the reboot fixes the issue immediately.

I first noticed problems while trying to download games through Steam. Any current connections would continue to work (IM; Skype; Steam download; bittorent) but after 5 to 10 minutes of downloading or so, trying to browse webpages would yield:
code:
The server at forums.somethingawful.com can't be found, because the DNS lookup failed. 
Since my router only has 8MB (2MB flash) I thought maybe I was maxing out active IP connections. I have my max ports at 1024 but reduced the TCP and UDP timeouts down to 90 seconds. Initially I thought this fixed my problem since it only existed when I was using Bittorrent/Steam installs/downloading 4 or more files. A few days later, now just browsing youtube or imgur is sometimes enough to eventually have DNS lookup fail.

It's just myself with a desktop and my roommate with a laptop. He tells me he isn't torrenting or the like and has shown me his laptop was off when we intermittently have problems. The status page on the router webpage confirms there's only two clients connected. When I have DNS problems, his computer will have the same so I've pretty much nailed it down to the router.

Am I missing a setting somewhere? I'll admit I'm pretty much a novice when it comes to flashing routers but the process seemed straightforward enough and it came up just fine after a 30/30/30 reset. Using Windows Firewall and MSE.

Try hard coding google public dns servers 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 to see if your ISPs sucks. Failing that, instead of using your routers dns proxy, enter the DNS values on the machines themselves

# ¿ Apr 8, 2012 14:52

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Devian666 posted:

It has a rather impressive feature list. How stable is you connection?

I'm running Tomato on this guy (ASUS RT-N66U) and it's been rock solid for about a month.

# ¿ Apr 16, 2012 06:47

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

n0n0 posted:

My newly-built PC has an 802.11n PCI card. The problem is that it's really low to the floor and it gets horrible signal strength down there. On top of the desk, the signal is much stronger.

So, I'd like to get an extension cord/antenna that would sit on top of my desk while the computer itself remains below.

I'm having a hard time finding free-standing antennas with long cords.

Any suggestions?

Due to the lovely cabling they use for external antennas, you're going to have far better luck buying a USB wifi card that comes with a little stand/extension cable and putting that on your desk.

The loss from 6 foot of antenna cable is stupid huge, the loss from 6 foot of USB cable is nothing.

# ¿ Jun 23, 2012 12:22

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Fluue posted:

Hm :\ That's what I feared but it may end up coming to that. Is Asus known for making reliable routers? I have my eye on this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833320091

but it seems a bit expensive. I'm tired of replacing crappy routers, though.

This router with Tomato owns face.

# ¿ Jul 3, 2012 07:33

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Cream_Filling posted:

Does it work with simultaneous dual band?

Yes, it does.

Edit: That is to say, it allows you to configure 2.4ghz and 5 ghz networks active at the same time. I run separate SSIDs for the different frequencies, but they connect to the same network. I haven't tried it with the same SSID because I don't like it.

Is that what you mean by "simultaneous dual band?"

UndyingShadow fucked around with this message at 22:23 on Jul 5, 2012

# ¿ Jul 5, 2012 22:21

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Hiyoshi posted:

Why? I think it's simpler; the 5 Ghz devices automatically join the 5 Ghz band likewise for the 2.4 Ghz devices. You don't have to explain to guests which Wi-Fi network they should join which is really nice.

Because dual band devices will latch onto the first thing they see, which is always 2.4 ghz due to it penetrating walls better, then it stays on 2.4 and you get none of the benefits of 5

# ¿ Jul 6, 2012 06:43

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Cream_Filling posted:

Ah, cool. I know the older builds of TomatoUSB only supported this on a handful of devices, so I wasn't sure about the definite answer. For a long time, you had to choose between one or the other.

And yeah, having the same SSID would be confusing.

I know there's a toastman build, which I'm using. There's also a shibby build as well. The router can take the biggest images/builds, so get the maxed out one and go nuts

# ¿ Jul 6, 2012 06:45

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Frozen-Solid posted:

Taking my laptop out of the reserved pool didn't help. It just bounced again. Maybe I'll build my first custom DHCP server this weekend, and just run DHCP/DNS on my IronPort instead.

Edit: Just bumped the DHCP pool to start at 20, and left reservations the same. I doubt it'll make a difference, but might as well try it.

What are you doing with an IronPort?

# ¿ Jul 20, 2012 06:12

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Jago posted:

Moving into a new place... What are the odds that I can get 100mb over the cat 3? It is a small house with new wires. Anyone have experience with this?

I got 100mb over 100ft of cat3 phone wire. It wasn't ideal, but it did work fast enough for our application back in 1999. Of course this was when the pinnacle of tech was the cd-rw!

# ¿ Jul 20, 2012 07:01

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

zalmoxes posted:

You want a dual band router. Something like Linksys E3000 is capable of transmitting on both frequencies, and you have 2 different SSIDs, one for g and one for N.

How big is the house? N has terrible range, so if you're too far from it, you'll be using G anyway.

This isn't necessarily true. There are two sets of frequencies that run wifi: 2.4ghz (802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11n) and 5ghz (802.11a and 802.11n)

Notice 802.11n is in there twice! 802.11n dual band routers have 2.4 and 5ghz radios, but unless your 802.11n equipment is 5ghz (rarer than it should be) you're going to be running on the crowded 2.4 band with all the G devices and cordless phones and microwaves

# ¿ Jul 20, 2012 15:13

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

My Rhythmic Crotch posted:

I was just curious if anybody has used the monoprice CAT6 keystone jacks? I just can't imagine that they aren't total poo poo when a good keystone jack is like $7 or whatever.

Nearly every drat thing Monoprice has is amazing quality. All their networking poo poo is amazing and costs 10% of retail.

# ¿ Aug 7, 2012 18:19

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Etrips posted:

Hey guys,

I need a bit of help in trying to determine where some uncrimped cables are going to and how people normally figure this out. Below is a before picture of the mess I am working with, I've already removed the unnecessary extra switches and routers (Why there were two extra small switches when there was a large one with open ports already there and a wireless router I will never know ) and have cleaned it up a bit. Anyway, my neighbor has asked me to see if I can get the rest of the house set up with internet for each room in the house (Probably looking at 7-10 rooms or so), which the wall jacks should already be set up, but they lead to the uncrimped cables that are circled in red. So how do I go abouts figuring out where each wire goes to and having them crimped properly?

Edit: Tools I currently have at my disposal are simple cable tester, crimping tool, RJ45s, etc. I can probably pick up anything else I need assuming it won't cost an arm and a leg.

Buy a patch panel, wire them all up, plug a computer into one room and change the patch cable from the switch to the panel until you get a light on the switch...rinse and repeat?

# ¿ Aug 15, 2012 16:47

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

fcbarros posted:

Well, being a little late....
I have a 3700 either, I have around 12 2.4ghz wireless networks around my apartment, I ran inSSIDer and verified that the channel 14 was not used (generally it is not allowed :P), so I installed OpenWRT on the 3700 and configured the 2.4ghz radio to channel 14 and successfully raised the transmit power to 28dbm (from 26), my network is more stable and a little faster now.
If you need help I think that maybe I can provide..

Yeah, you can set your router to run on 14, but good luck getting half the drat wifi radios sold in the US to connect on channel 14, and they aren't nearly as easy to hack as the router.

# ¿ Sep 11, 2012 20:54

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

fcbarros posted:

True, but OpenWRT is now a very easy and configurable system for routers, the web interface is great, runs linux and have tons of support online, there is a chance that if your router is supported it can be hacked (disable the channel block).
Another thing I did, was to order a high gain antenna for my network card, but it did not arrive yet, will see how much I will gain with that.

Yes, I realize that the channel block can be disabled on the ROUTER, but most of the things that connect to it (Phones, Laptops, etc) will flat out refuse to show any SSID on non-standard channels.

I've generally discovered that high gain omni-directional antennas are more of a compromise than anything. They shape the signal to be VERY flat, so you'll have great range in a 3 foot tall circle around your device, but very bad above or below that. If you have a 2 story house, or live in an upstairs apartment and were hoping to get access down by the pool, you probably won't.

# ¿ Sep 11, 2012 23:08

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

CaladSigilon posted:

From reading elsewhere, it looks like 802.11ac is still so in draft that there's no point in buying anything with it yet. For distance and strength of punching through walls, is the WNDR4500 a good choice? Why am I having so much trouble with the loving WZR-HP-G450H?

The RT-N66U is pretty amazing when it comes to signal. It connects to my phone from 40 feet away from my apartment through 3 interior and 1 exterior walls

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-reviews/31687-asus-rt-n66u-dark-knight-dual-band-wireless-n900-gigabit-router-reviewed

# ¿ Sep 11, 2012 23:12

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Kalix posted:

So I'm not sure if this is the best place for this post.

I work for a small department at a university; IT here is very busy. We want to run our own server and two networks, one for staff and one for students in the department. The server will be on the staff network.

I'm thinking two routers; undecided on which. I want it to be very user friendly, as we won't always have someone who can handle these problems.

My thought process is; Apple Airport Extreme for the students, that way it's easy to configure and can also print-serve.
I guess the staff can go with airport extreme as well, but i'm not sure.

I'm thinking Windows Server to store files and potentially a database.

Not sure if this is the best way to approach this problem, especially since we're working within university confines.

Yeah, IT departments tend to be verrrry wary of people attaching random equipment to the network. At best, it could be a security problem, at worst, it might hijack DHCP requests and take the entire network down and then they will come and kill you.

Have you asked them about this?

# ¿ Sep 25, 2012 21:26

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Earl of Lavender posted:

I've got three WAPs at a place (two AirPort Extremes, one AirPort Express, if that makes any difference). Is it best practice to have all the 2.4GHz signals on the same channel, or different channels? The area is pretty much devoid of other wireless networks.

Definitely use a different channel for each. They should roam between APs if they have the same SSID.

# ¿ Oct 17, 2012 19:21

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

DaNzA posted:

Have two airport express on each end mounted fairly high on the wall behind a curtain or something and set them up with the exact same wifi settings/password while having them both connected to the LAN with ethernet cable.
Now you should be able to roam between them automatically and seamlessly without dropping connection at all.
Also adjust one of them closer to your study accordingly so you still get a decent connection there instead of being constantly switched between the front/back AP.

IIRC wireless bridge will connect back to the original AP with wireless and essentially halfing the bandwidth. It can be a bit dodgy and there's really no need for that since you have ethernet cable setup already.

Not the exact same settings, you need to put them on non-overlapping channels.

# ¿ Dec 17, 2012 23:17

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Broose posted:

I have a dilemma.
I live in a fairly long house with wifi destroying walls and kitchen in the middle. Each end of the house needs both wifi and ethernet ports. I currently have a single WRT54G v5 that still runs strong and rarely ever need to mess with it, it runs on its most updated default software. I've placed it in the middle of the house in the hopes that it would reach the areas where I get little/no wifi, but some areas are still unable to get a reliable connection. Devices claim to be getting a good signal, but everything takes forever to load anyways. I'm also in need of additional ethernet ports in those same areas.

I know absolutely nothing about networking. So I'm sorry if this is wrong and/or groan inducing. But from the googling I've done it sounds like I have a solution. It seems like I could buy a second router and set it up as an access point and physically wire it to the other so I'd have a router on both sides of the house. I already have two lines of cat5e that connect both sides of the house due to how I originally had the router set up. I can really do this, right? I am a bit confused on how the wifi would work in this situation though.

Now I'm looking at my wrt54g. It's old. It works great and I bought it cheap years ago, but it is old. I have cable internet, but I'm actually wondering now if it is able to handle this connection. A wired connection to the modem gives me about 25 Mbit down and 3 up. The most bandwidth intensive this house would realistically ever get is two instances of netflix using wifi, one playing online games, and one phone that is web browsing. Most often however it is just one person streaming and another playing games.

I don't know if I should replace the wrt54g as well when I buy a new router. I don't know if manufacturer conflicts are a thing when it comes to routers and I question the speed of the router itself. Should I still be buying $100+ routers for simple home networking? I'd rather not spend a lot of money, $150 for two routers is already seriously pushing it, but this thread makes anything less than $100 sound like it has a countdown to being an expensive paperweight. If worse comes to worst though, I'll probably end up getting two ASUS RT-N16 from the OP.

Get the ASUS RT-N16s for sure, which will help a great deal.

If you can't afford 2, get the RT-N16 and another cheaper model like the RT-N12 (it's going to be used as an access point, it doesn't need horsepower.) Give the secondary a static IP and Disable DHCP. Connect one end of the CAT5 cable to a LAN port on the main router, then the other end to a LAN port on the secondary (DO NOT PLUG ANYTHING INTO THE WAN PORT ON THE SECONDARY ROUTER). Set both routers to the EXACT same SSID and security, but DIFFERENT CHANNELS. They will connect seamlessly to whichever has the stronger signal.

# ¿ Apr 12, 2013 07:02

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

gold brick posted:

I'm looking for a router that has DD-WRT support and a real-time clock (with battery). I need an NTP server that can still serve time accurately after a power outage that also knocks out the internet connection.

I'm looking online but real-time clock support doesn't seem to be something that they put on the spec sheet very often (maybe because it's rarely included). I know the Cisco stuff has this capability, but I'd like to avoid that expense, if possible (unless it's sub-$400 range or so)

Wouldn't it be easier to just run an NTP server off a raspberry Pi or something attached to a constantly charging agm battery? A 50 dollar battery and a 20 dollar 12 volt smart charger will give you practically 2 days of run time without power.

# ¿ Apr 18, 2013 05:29

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Citycop posted:

I have built my own house and before the Sheetrock went up I invested in Cat6 in every room with an additional port in the living room and the master closet. It all runs back to a 24 port patch panel in the wall in the laundry room. In the patch panel I have a small 10 port netgear hub connecting my devices. On one of those ports I have a Netgear WNDR4000 that I used to use for a wireless network in my old house. All of this works great.

Unfortunately I cannot get DSL or anything like it outside of town where I live. My options are dialup (is that even still a thing?) or a cellphone based hotspot. I tried Clear wireless and the hub was unable to get a signal, as I am just about 1300 feet off the edge of the coverage map. I bought a Tmobile hotspot (ZTE MF61) and it gets signal about 60% of the time. I have this hanging from an extension cord in the top of the attic and if it moves even an inch from it's sweet spot it's no good.

Currently the only way for me to use the internet is to connect my main pc via wifi to the hotspot. Orignially when I did this windows 7 would not connect to anything on the internet when both the LAN and the wireless were connected at the same time. I have solved that problem by manually setting my IP addreses but it seems to me that windows should be able to figure out which network has internet and use it accordingly.

Is there any way at all I can connect that hotspot into my home network so everything can have access to it.? I tried setting the netgear and the hotspot to the same SSID and password and that didn't work, I'm not sure why.

You need a router that can be put in client bridge mode. I used to have a wrt-54g running dd-wrt that fed my whole network off a neighbors wifi, there shouldn't be any reason you can't do the same. Also, sorry about your bad Internet options

# ¿ Jun 9, 2013 19:57

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Thanatosian posted:

Modem: Motorola Surfboard 6141
Router: Cisco-Linksys E3000 running Tomato USB 1.28.9054

Okay, so my roommates started having problems with lag in games; like, 500-ping level lag. So, some investigation revealed that it was the 2.4ghz wireless network that was lagging. We have one computer and several phones in the house that can't connect to 5ghz networks. So, I disabled the 5ghz network, and it seemed to fix the issue. In addition, it was running quite hot (as apparently these routers are wont to do). So, I've got a couple of ideas for fixes:

1) Is it the heat that's the problem? This is entirely possible. I really don't want to disable the 5ghz network, because it's great; significantly less interference, about half the lag of the 2.4ghz network when the 2.4ghz network is working. So, cooling pad (I've currently elevated the back of the router so it's getting better airflow, but I could invest in a cooling pad).

2) Is it possible to wire two Cisco-Linksys E3000s in series, with one of them running a 5ghz network and the other running a 2.4ghz network? Is there anything weird I'd have to do to achieve this, or could I just plug one into the other? If so, this would probably reduce the heat problem, right?

One of my roommates owns the same router, so I actually have a spare one sitting around I could flash with Tomato and set up without too much trouble.

I'm correct that there shouldn't be any way for a 2.4ghz network to interfere with a 5ghz network, right, barring the two different networks running up way too much heat? Or is there another issue I could be looking at, here? I already tried changing the channel on the 2.4ghz network, and there doesn't seem to be any interference when the 5ghz network isn't running. Ideas?

Take top cover off, apply drill to plastic cover in pleasing pattern of holes. Replace top cover.

This is what I did to my e-series when it started overheating and it fixed the problem until I got tired of having a separate 5ghz and 2.4ghz AP and bought an Asus RT-N66U

# ¿ Jun 27, 2013 19:37

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

ImPureAwesome posted:

Quick google on the the Motorola SB6141, says its $90. Time Warner says the rental fee for a modem is $6, so thats 15 months before it starts saving money. Any idea how often in the past they've forced modem upgrades, it can't be a yearly thing can it?

No, DOCSIS 3.0 will be around for quite a while. I still have a 10 year old surfboard on the DOCSIS 2.0 standard that I use for backup (and could use for primary if I were still on the 20/2 tier)

# ¿ Aug 1, 2013 05:53

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Peanut3141 posted:

Getting something with decent range is the highest priority, with 5GHz coming in a close second. Here is my wireless environment at 2.4 and 5:

I'm the_eagle and I only get that kind of signal when I'm sitting in this chair 3 feet away. Even then, there are some times when it refreshes and sanchez appears to have the same signal strength.

So, based upon your comment, I'd like to go 5GHz N, without overspending *or* trying to save money and end up with another DIR-601esque piece of crap. I bought it thinking it's an N router, how bad could it be? The answer is really bad. I'd like to not flush another $30 down the toilet this time. Is the ASUS RT-N66U where I need to be, or would I be happy with the ASUS RT-N16 given my use case?

Your problem is that your 2.4 ghz spectrum is hosed. Too many people mean no matter what router you get, it's gonna suck. The RT-N16 wont solve your problem. Get on 5GHZ. You have two choices:

http://www.amazon.com/RT-N66U-Dual-...rds=asus+router
http://www.amazon.com/RT-AC66U-Dual...rds=asus+router

One has AC, the other is just regular old 450mbs 5GHz 802.11N. If you want your problems to go away, prepare to pay out the rear end for it

# ¿ Aug 2, 2013 22:37

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

I'm about to move into a new place, and because open floor-plan, there's just no way I can get a cable from one half of my network to the other. I need to know what's the ABSOLUTE FASTEST non destructive thing that will get my computer connected through 1 wall and about 20 feet of air to the switch that my router and file server are plugged into. I don't care how much it costs. Powerline, MOCA, 802.11XX, whatever. It's an apartment so 2.4ghz is out.

# ¿ Aug 14, 2013 06:54

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

UndyingShadow posted:

I'm about to move into a new place, and because open floor-plan, there's just no way I can get a cable from one half of my network to the other. I need to know what's the ABSOLUTE FASTEST non destructive thing that will get my computer connected through 1 wall and about 20 feet of air to the switch that my router and file server are plugged into. I don't care how much it costs. Powerline, MOCA, 802.11XX, whatever. It's an apartment so 2.4ghz is out.

I don't mean to be pushy, but I think my question was overlooked. I've done quite a bit of research into all the various methods for not cat-6 data transmission: MOCA, Powerline, and Wireless, and while its easy to see what's theoretically the fastest, I was hoping to get some insight about real world speeds.

Does anyone have any experience with 802.11ac through a single wall?

What about powerline?

I'm fairly certain MOCA isn't really affected much by distance (at least in an apartment)

# ¿ Aug 15, 2013 20:00

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Jan posted:

802.11ac is 5GHz, so most likely it will suck through a wall. But it's not like I have any experience with it. (Who would?)

Are you ruling out 2.4GHz just because it's an apartment, or did you actually run some wi-fi analyzer to see how crowded it is? Even with competing local networks, it's still a better option to reach my TV+consoles than 5GHz due to a single, thin wall severely reducing the latter.

What exactly is the problem with running a CAT-6 cable around? If you're considering MOCA, obviously there already are coaxial cables doing the same.

Because the coax is already run through the apartment, and I can't drill holes, and my roommate balked at the idea of my stapling a cable around door frames and the like. The reason 2.4 is out is because I ran a wifi analyzer and found roughly 45 access points.

I may just have to buy some 802.11ac stuff and see how it goes. If I do, I'll come back and let you guys know how good/bad it is.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2013 20:39

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

So as a test, I got a TEW-684UB (which is a dual band 450 usb wifi card) and connected it to my 5ghz Asus RT-N66U. I get roughly 16MBps (128Mbps.) This is going through 1 interior wall, a couch, about 15 feet of air, and an entertainment center. Results for my Linksys AE1000 (which is a dual band 300 usb wifi card) were about 11 MBPS (88 Mbps.)

Results for a brand new Intel 7260 (which is a dual band 2 radio 802.11ac mini-pcie card in a Zotac AD-10) connected to my Asus RT-N66U showed roughly 10MBps (80Mbps.) It's about 2 feet further away and only has 1 external antenna (where the other antenna lead goes off to I have no idea) I am considering trying an internal laptop type antenna and seeing if that helps.

Bottom line: 5GHZ signal penetration makes me sad, and 450mbps 802.11N isn't even close, although adding a 3rd radio did help. Also, Intel 802.11ac cards do 802.11n just fine.

UndyingShadow fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Aug 16, 2013

# ¿ Aug 16, 2013 02:30

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

dis astranagant posted:

What's a good way to secure about a 60 foot patch cable run along a ceiling without drilling any holes or driving a bunch of nails? I'm trying to get 2 bedrooms wired up on opposite ends of a lovely rental house.

Cable (rounded end) staple gun.

# ¿ Aug 27, 2013 22:27

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 18:49

UndyingShadow: May 15, 2006; You're looking ESPECIALLY shadowy this evening, Sir

Fastbreak posted:

I am finally retiring my old Linksys router which served me for 7 years and upgrading. I need to have a main router and then an access point for my Xbox/PS3/etc. Just want to run a sanity check that this setup should work, and is a decent price compared to the alternatives, since I have only done research for today; the AP and the router will not be more than 30-40 feet apart with one wall. Does the hardware matter THAT much just for an access point?

AP (ASUS RT-N10P): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00C7NSIO8/
Router (ASUS RT-N16): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00387G6R8/

Thanks in advance.

Why do you need an access point? You've got a wireless router?

# ¿ Sep 23, 2013 23:06

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > The Home Networking Megathread - Yes the OP is out of date

«‹›3 »