Range extender/AP confusion - need advice

[kneo]

I am a novice when it comes to networking and I find solutions to my home networking by passively scouring SNB forums

I currently have a 40 Mbps connection which is terminated in my N66 router which is at one end of a rectangular apartment which is around 60 ft long with 3 concrete walls and doors in between. Because of this I do not get good signals at the other end (which is my living room). For my entertainment center I've used Powerline but it goes through a circuit breaker so I get around 20-25 Mbps through it. Because of the concrete walls 5Ghz is almost useless and I rely on 2.4 Mhz only.

Now I am looking at expanding my network's range so that I can use some wifi devices which do not have ethernet options near my entertainment center e.g. Fire stick or Chromecast.

I want to have a device which can be used as a pure range extender (wifi to wifi extender) and also as an access point i.e. I can plug my ethernet which I get through the powerline to it and it can be an access point. This was I'll have flexibility with that device. I am afraid budget is not high and hence would have to stick to TPLink.

Any suggestions?

 

[pege63]

Better you get a AP to your router, a range extender only let you get the half speed.

 

[kneo]

Better you get a AP to your router, a range extender only let you get the half speed.

But don't some extenders have some concept where they use different bands/channels for the backhaul traffic?

Also, if I get an AP, I can still use it as an wifi extender right? The ecommerce websites are quite lenient on giving specifications of networking products

 

[Klueless]

I've seen wired Access Points that can be configured to be a "range extender" and I've seen "range extenders" that can be configured as wired APs but not as both at the same time. Nor do I see why you would want to? If you already have a hard wire acting as the "backhaul" to the router why would you also want a radio also acting as a backhaul?

The "half" comes from wireless (WiFi) being "half duplex". A wireless connection can only do one thing at a time; it can either be sending or it can be receiving. It can't do both at the same time. This can be insignificant if you're streaming video or it can be very significant if someone is uploading a large file while you're down streaming a video.

If you've a wired backhaul then that's "full duplex" and because it can send and receive at the same time it won't add to the problem.

If you use wireless for the backhaul then that's "half duplex" again. If clients use the same radio as the backhaul then you're pretty much "guaranteeing" that the radio will be unavailable twice as much, e.g., you send something to the range extender then the range extender is unavailable while it resends it to the router.

A dual band range extender can help mitigate this by using one radio for clients and the 2nd radio as the backhaul to the router. The 2nd radio may or may not be busy at any point in time but it isn't "guaranteed" to be busy.

Some dual band range extenders let you dedicate one radio to be a backhaul to the router. (Netgear calls it "fast lane".) Others do it dynamically. (Linksys calls it "cross connect", e.g., if my PC connects at 5GHz the Linksys will automatically send it to the router at 2.4GHz.) There's pros and cons to either approach.

 

[thiggins]

Sorry, Klueless, but you have your facts wrong. Wi-Fi by its nature is "half duplex"; a radio can only transmit OR receive. Connecting an AP via Ethernet doesn't change this. It does, however, eliminate the retransmission penalty because the backhaul (connection between base router and extender) is wired.

The "50%" penalty you hear about for extenders/repeaters comes from the retransmission of each packet. The radio must first receive, then retransmit the packet, taking twice the airtime, hence the 50%.

In practice, due to compression techniques, today's radios can reduce the retransmission penalty, but can't reduce it to 0.

Most dual-band extenders today can receive on one radio and retransmit on the other, avoiding the retransmission penalty. But if you have devices connected to the extender on both bands, then you will once again see the retransmission penalty.

Tri-band extenders connected to tri-band routers can avoid the retransmission penalty by using one of the 5 GHz radios as a dedicated backhaul link.

 

[Klueless]

Sorry, Klueless, but you have your facts wrong. Wi-Fi by its nature is "half duplex"

Uh, maybe my phraseology was clumsy but what you said is exactly what I was trying to say. Granted, as a professional writer, you did say it "more better" ... thx.

 

[kneo]

I've seen wired Access Points that can be configured to be a "range extender" and I've seen "range extenders" that can be configured as wired APs but not as both at the same time. Nor do I see why you would want to? If you already have a hard wire acting as the "backhaul" to the router why would you also want a radio also acting as a backhaul?

Sorry if I was not very clear earlier. I want a device which gives me an option to use it either as an extender or an AP at different times. Definitely not at the same time. I was wondering if there are devices like these. Also, strangely back here in India I've not seen many options of dual band extenders (or maybe they're not advertised as one).

I've been shortlisting a few products i.e. TPLink WA-801ND AP, WA-855. Or should I just get a router Archer C60 in the same budget. Would any of these work for me?

The "50%" penalty you hear about for extenders/repeaters comes from the retransmission of each packet. The radio must first receive, then retransmit the packet, taking twice the airtime, hence the 50%.

Sorry about the n00b question that follows but does this mean that the penalty is that it just takes that much longer to transmit the packets to the end device and there's no bandwidth losses in a scenario of video streaming? Basically just a one way lane from the main router to the extender to the end device

Sorry about being sounding pushy - but can someone actually recommend some budget devices? I can maybe try and read up their specs and then compare it to specs that I can see on the TPLink's India website or maybe Netgear's India website

 

[Bobitza]

The device that you want to act as an AP or range extender ... how does it send the data "back" to your modem?

If you're looking for a wireless solution, you should look for a router/mesh that has a dedicated radio for this backhaul or at least some sort of optimization in using the radios (I'll let other more experienced recommend something). But these don't come cheap and I believe that's out of your budget.

If you plan to piggyback on your powerline, a simple router set as an AP should do the trick (aka extend the wireless coverage). No need to bother with range extenders here.

 

[thiggins]

I've been shortlisting a few products i.e. TPLink WA-801ND AP, WA-855. Or should I just get a router Archer C60 in the same budget. Would any of these work for me?

You could use any of these devices. For the router, you need to check if it can be configured as an extender/repeater. Any router can be converted to an AP if it doesn't have an AP mode built in.

For the extenders, you need to confirm they support AP mode.

None of these devices will dynamically switch between extender and AP modes. You need to reconfigure them manually.

Sorry about the n00b question that follows but does this mean that the penalty is that it just takes that much longer to transmit the packets to the end device and there's no bandwidth losses in a scenario of video streaming? Basically just a one way lane from the main router to the extender to the end device

The retransmission penalty is a bandwidth penalty.

 

[Klueless]

I don't have much experience but I've had good luck with the Netgear 6150.

 

[Iceberg86300]

Whatever you get, you probably want to stay within the same brand, at least for consumer devices. Although, even that isn't a guarantee of compatibility.

Question for everyone(and sorry for the hijack, but this may pertain to the op as far as equipment goes): does mu-mimo come into play here? Or is that what were basically taking about with the dedicated wireless backhaul?

Dad is quite "cheap" and bought a Netgear R7900P from Costco to replace an old Asus rt-65u/r instead of going with an older model that currently has open firmware support.

This thing is making me tear my hair out. Firmware is setup with "simplicity" in mind, with "smart connect, 20/40 kHz compatibility, mu-mimo, airtime fairness," and a couple other settings that SEEM useful, but I have no clue how any of it is actually implemented. (Oh, and ipv6 settings are kind of useless, especially with whatever TWC/spectrum wants, questions which they seem to avoid like the plague.)

The R7900P is "tri-band," with one 2.4 and two 5GHz radios. Seems to work great on PC's, but it completely kills the 3 Samsung GS5's & two tablets, one being of the vintage as the GS5 (but a cheap freebie from Verizon) & one Samsung a generation or two behind. Basically, anything embedded with Android/Linux is shirt. Upon first connect my phone shows a link speed ~150-800, then immediately drops to ~5. It's completely useless. And the GS5 supposedly has dual band mu-mimo support.

Right now I'm running the Asus as an AP, but the connection is still shirt.

Thinking about factory defaulting each router & setting up the Asus as the primary with the Netgear running as an access point. Problem is that Asus is well unpowered compared to the Netgear, so I'm not sure how well that will work.

I also have powerline to distribute Ethernet, but unlike the op, I'm actually getting gigabit speeds in every location.

Thoughts? (And I'm hoping they can help both the op and myself as our situations are similar, OP just hasn't reached the "next level" that comes after buying a piece of gear)

Regards,

Steve

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[Bobitza]

The R7900P is "tri-band," with one 2.4 and two 5GHz radios. Seems to work great on PC's, but it completely kills the 3 Samsung GS5's & two tablets, one being of the vintage as the GS5 (but a cheap freebie from Verizon) & one Samsung a generation or two behind. Basically, anything embedded with Android/Linux is shirt.

At least your Samsung devices connect ... mine, as explained here, couldn't even get their IPs. I also have a GS5 phone, a Tab E and a Tab A tablets. If your old router worked well with your devices, you might consider turning that router into an AP (with DHCP duties) and connect it via your powerline to the modem or the new router so that the backhaul happens via the wires, leaving the air waves free for wireless clients.

It's not the first time I see Samsung devices not working well with specific router brands or models. I had to change/upgrade my old D-Link DIR-555 when I first got the Samsung S4 back in the days.

 

[Iceberg86300]

If your old router worked well with your devices, you might consider turning that router into an AP (with DHCP duties) and connect it via your powerline to the modem or the new router so that the backhaul happens via the wires, leaving the air waves free for wireless clients.

I had been running the Netgear as a router, with the Asus hardwired to it and running as an access point with its own wireless network just for the phones/tablets to get connectivity. Seemed to work ok. But only with streaming stuff. General browsing, Facebook, etc, still suffered with poor performance.

Is it possible to run it in AP mode and still perform DHCP duties? Set it up manually instead of choosing the preset AP mode? Think that would keep the ipv6 issues I've run into below:

Ditched the Netgear and defaulted the Asus, then it wouldn't pick up an ipv6 address. Tech support said the arriss 6183 didn't support ipv6 (even though a PC directly to the modem picked up ipv6)

Swapped the arriss and they gave me a Technicolor dcp3216, which produced the same exact issues. (And seems to be a lesser modem, FW is over a year old & "beta" is part of the bootloader name, plus I've had multiple internet connectivity issues- router shows it's connected and has a wan address, but can't reach the net)

I turned the Netgear into an AP and connected it to the Asus, same issues.

Might be exchanging that one.

This is all TWC/spectrum BTW.

And I can't get ipv6 router settings at all. It's like pulling teeth.

I'll check out your thread. But I've found ipv6 to be a huge issue with Samsung devices, and older Android stuff in general. It seems like they prefer ipv6, with Facebook REALLY preferring it, but they have a terrible time failing over to ipv4. But there's also something in the Netgear. It's constantly lowering link speeds, regardless of the settings I turn off. It's trying to be "smart" with allocated bandwidth, but that is killing it.

But the Netgear also seems to pull an ipv6 address, but I have no clue regarding the settings b/c of TWC, so I don't think that's working correctly, and to make things worse, anything connected through the Asus when it was set as an access point couldn't pull an ipv6 address.


Time to pull some more hair out!!

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

[Bobitza]

Is it possible to run it in AP mode and still perform DHCP duties? Set it up manually instead of choosing the preset AP mode? Think that would keep the ipv6 issues I've run into below

That's what I did! I run the old router in AP mode (LAN cable, not WLAN cable) but with DHCP server enabled. I didn't know that's possible; I always associated DHCP duties with the "primary" modem/router. And since the old router played nice with my Samsung/Android devices, this fixed the IP problems. I assume you previously had a setup that worked, right? Don't know much about IPV6, I'll let others answer the questions here.