Adding Internet to my network via wifi

[hinfeyg2]

So I moved into my new apartment and the wifi is provided by my landlords router upstairs.
I have my own wired network with my computers media player etc.
I want to add her wifi Internet to my network but I have no access to her router/modem apart from wifi.
Currently I use an old windows 7 netbook to connect to the wifi and share the Internet out through Ethernet.
This has a few issues as it ties up the netbook and I'm having trouble setting the network location of my Ethernet network.

Is there any simpler way to do this? Like a stand alone unit rather than a PC?
Any advice integrating Internet from one network into another?

Thanks
Gavin

 

[L&LD]

The easiest and best way would be to use two economical routers. One will be used to connect to the landlords WiFi and provide internet access to you, and the other would be to provide you with a network of your own and separate from hers.

Connect the first router as a Bridge to her WiFi and then from a LAN port connect to the WAN port of your second router. Make sure to use a unique IP such as 192.168.45.1 for the LAN-IP config page of the second router to separate your network from hers except for the internet access you want.

Depending on your requirements, you can get two AC1900 class routers such as the RT-AC68U or higher to do this (very expensive, but will depend on your network needs and expectations) or you can buy two RT-N12 D1 N300 class routers instead (or any combination in between).

A single router with Padavan or other third party firmware may also be able to provide you with a Bridge mode on one band and use the other band to provide WiFi access to your devices, but that will take some level of expertise to set up (I'm sure other's here can help if you're so inclined). But just know that without some fiddling, most routers will not allow you to do something like this by default (or easily).

The idea is to not use a single router and a single band for both connecting to the wireless network for your internet access and use the same band for your devices too. This will halve the throughput of all devices on the network (including your landlord's) whenever you are using any of your devices on line and is known as 'Repeater' mode.

The best performance would be to have a wired connection from her router to a single one of yours (a second router would then not be needed by you, nor a bridge mode). But in any event, you are essentially sharing the same network and her and your data can (might?) be seen depending on the security and other settings you have on your devices.