Best location for router?

[bighaus]

First post so please be gentle .

This is probably a subjective question but i have a 2 story home with about 2900 sqft. I was wondering, generally, where is the best location for maximum coverage? I am considering the netgear R7000. Thanks.

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
We have a similar size 2 story house, my R7000 is located center of the building at top floor loft(higher than top floor itself). It covers front and back patio, basement without problem. Wood framed, stucco exterior house.

 

[bighaus]

You can stream to any room as well? including first floor?

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
Two in the basement, occasional you tube watching. HT located in first floor
family room where we real time streaming lots of stuff(my wife's doing) on
5GHz just -N mode. ISP provides 50/3 speed steady any time of the day.
Now I am waiting for R8000 on the way. Couldn't refuse freebie, LOL! Will
see if it is any better than R7000 for what we're doing.

 

[kbp]

Always the best if placed as close to the center of all activity.

 

[stevech]

2900 sq. ft., 2 story - usually benefits greatly with one or two added Access Points.

 

[KGB7]

Top floor and center of the house and as close as possible to the cluster of the majority of WiFi devices in the house.

If you have a basement, only one router and.you need WiFi in the basement ,.then first floor is a good place.

Having multiple APs is always a better option. One on top floor and one in the basement.

 

[Miyuo]

My house is 3 floors and I use a Huawei E5186 router which is placed on my main floor. It gives me complete coverage throughout the first floor and basement as well as backyard. We are able to stream on multiple devices from my NAS sitting in the basement.

 

[stevech]

Huawei not used much in No. America.

 

[sm00thpapa]

Center of home on 2nd floor.

 

[bighaus]

Is there a particular direction each of the three antennae should be pointed or is it more trial and error?

 

[htismaqe]

Fine tuning is more of a process of trial and error but in general if you're trying to radiate the signal out (a 1-story house for example) you want to leave the antennas vertical. If you're trying to radiate out and up, like in a 2-story house, you'll want to position at least one antenna at a 45-degree angle or so.

For both the Netgear R7000 and Asus AC68U, I found my best coverage was with the middle antenna at 90 degrees forward/back as well as left/right (aka straight up and down). The two outside antennas I had positioned back 45 degrees and out 45 degrees, so that the antennas essentially formed a "W" shape kind of like this:

front view: \ | /

side view: |/

 

[stevech]

Indoors, the signals bounce of walls, furniture and esp. floors and create lots of multi-path. Changing multipath from degredating to beneficial is what MIMO is all about.

The multipath/reflected signals tend to change polarization randomly.

So all the bounced signals arrive at the receiver at different times. Changing an antenna's polarization from vertical to horizontal or semi-horizontal can change things for certain receiving sites, but as many others will be affected differently.

RF Propagation is what it is.

The best way to get reliable coverage in more than 1800 sq. ft. home is with 1+ added access points. Mainly to get better inbound coverage - that's the TO-ROUTER direction which is the challenge due to handheld devices having poorer transmitters.