Author Topic: wifi woes  (Read 4204 times)

Morat

  • I tried to HTFU but something went ping :(
Re: wifi woes
« Reply #25 on: 31 August, 2019, 12:05:59 pm »
What Kim said. Especially the bit about cable>Wifi.

I run ~75 Unifi APs at work, with great results. There's a learning curve when you install the controller and set up your networks but after that you can add new APs very easily. And it's all just wifi really.

IME the challenge is to create as many discrete wifi "cells" as possible and avoid overlaps. With Unifi it's trivial to have all your APs use the same SSID but space out the channels so they don't interfere with each other - on 5Ghz anyway. 2.4Ghz is pretty much obsolete IMO. The range is too great and there are only 3 separate channels so it's only useful for legacy kit.
Everyone's favourite windbreak

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #26 on: 02 September, 2019, 09:38:17 am »
First discovery (courtesy of the Sergeant's generosity) pulled up the message that Sonos really wasn't going to play with a range extender. They smell, miss! or words to that effect. They don't really advertise the fact that Sonos only work on the single network device, it's squirrelled away in the support pages. Which I only read after the fact because I'm a boy.

I probably just need to wire one up and try it that way – of course, if I draw a Venn diagram of rooms with a wired ethernetty box and rooms with a Sonos device in them, there's no overlap.

More tinkering required and wandering around the house with a Macbook looking at the bloody signal (there should be a phone app for that, I'm sure).

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #27 on: 02 September, 2019, 10:53:32 am »
I haven't read all the other replies, mainly because I don't actually understand half of them so do feel free to ignore me if this has already been suggested.  When we had this problem (long, thin house constructed of breeze block downstairs and the router in one corner of the house) I deployed the standard middle class solution of walking into the nearest John Lewis and asking the most techie looking bloke in the electrical dept.  His proposal was to not to use the plug-in range extenders but buy the Google wifi units (which they didn't sell at the time) so I duly bought two of the Google units.  One plugs in to the router (turn the wireless off on the router first  :facepalm:) and the other now sits in the dinning room half way along the house.  Setting it all up was really easy.  So easy that I could do it without swearing.  And they are magic or something.  Wifi everywhere in the house and it works with the Sonos too.  Brilliant.  All we need now is a stable signal constantly from BT but living about 200m from the exchange that does not seem to be possible at the moment.

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #28 on: 02 September, 2019, 11:39:07 am »
My voyage of wifi discovery so far has taught me:

(a) Do not live in a house with actual walls can aren't made out of compacted tissue paper and can't be blown down with a huff and a puff.

(b) Things wifi will work when they work, and they won't don't work when they don't. Do not believe you can influence this.

(c) You could spend the rest of your life jibbering with channels and the like to no appreciable gain beyond leaving them on auto. See point (b).

(e) mesh is probably the way to go (the Google one looks reasonably priced).

Now I think Sonos will work on a mesh. Or they may mesh themselves if I wire one up.

Let's add

(f) The time spent looking at the internet is proportional to your level of confusion.

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: wifi woes
« Reply #29 on: 03 September, 2019, 08:24:59 am »
Sonos appear to have developed a boosting thingy.

https://www.sonos.com/en-us/shop/boost.html
It is simpler than it looks.

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #30 on: 03 September, 2019, 09:13:54 am »
They do, but as far as I can tell, just plugging a wired ethernet connection into any existing Sonos speaker will create a separate wireless mesh. I just need to rejig things to make that possible.

Possibly Cliff Richard had it right: he was wired for sound. Mind you, I wouldn't want Cliff Richard in my bathroom. He'd probably be trailing an entire police force, six helicopters, and the entire BBC. And a cable.

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
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Re: wifi woes
« Reply #31 on: 04 September, 2019, 04:29:55 am »
If it's any consolation, Hawkwind's Dave Brock was both wired up for sound and earthed to the ground.  Though you probably wouldn't want him in your bathroom either.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #32 on: 04 September, 2019, 09:23:59 am »
Well, to work the speaker in the bathroom I have to trail an extension cord from the hall in that very British fashion. I could, I expect, source a US-style power cable and use the shaver socket but then where would I plug in the ambient lighting?

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #33 on: 04 September, 2019, 09:41:20 am »

How many houses have structured cabling installed though?

Some Victorian houses have structured cabling throughout, including UHF distribution  ;D

tbh, I put it in 20 years ago, and it is still handy, but I probably wouldn't do it today, significantly I haven't changed the patching for years.

Mrs Pingu

  • Who ate all the pies? Me
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Re: wifi woes
« Reply #34 on: 06 September, 2019, 10:29:33 pm »
I was gonna say, if the BTHH is under the stairs, drill a wee hole up to the next floor and shove Cat5 cable through it to another router.
Do not clench. It only makes it worse.

Mrs Pingu

  • Who ate all the pies? Me
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Re: wifi woes
« Reply #35 on: 06 September, 2019, 10:40:14 pm »
When I've had ceilings/walls down, I've shoved lengths of Cat5 in. That's to beat the stone walls.
Like we did down the copper tube in the upper middle of this photie :)
https://flic.kr/p/GE34ds
Do not clench. It only makes it worse.

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #36 on: 07 September, 2019, 11:23:21 am »
I was gonna say, if the BTHH is under the stairs, drill a wee hole up to the next floor and shove Cat5 cable through it to another router.

I'm not allowed to use power toys. Or unpowered tools for that matter. We did get a quote for putting in some cat5 when we had the wiring redone, but it was fairly expensive and would have added more time and money to the project (the original plan to have the place refurbished while we were elsewhere having fallen through because of the absurdities of English property transactions and generically useless solicitors).

We could get our Man to do it, he loves drilling holes and taking a hammer to our house (he's already ripped out my downstairs loo and made a hole in the bathroom ceiling and that's just this week, we're screwed if he gets his hands on dynamite), but there's a powerline adaptor that runs from under the stairs to a router upstairs, which seems adequate. Having replaced that router with a kindly supplied better a/p delivers decent wifi (217 Mb/s as I sup my coffee in the remote command centre and there's an exterior wall between me and the machine).

It didn't solve the Sonos problem though – despite wiring it to another powerline adaptor, which should make them mesh – still a bit flaky upstairs. And I can't blame my wife and her bogon emissions this time, as she's in Spain. It could be the cats.

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #37 on: 07 September, 2019, 11:33:15 am »
They do, but as far as I can tell, just plugging a wired ethernet connection into any existing Sonos speaker will create a separate wireless mesh.

It will, but if, like me, you don’t have a speaker close to where the router is to sensibly cable it up, then the boost is excellent. Mine sits on the back bedroom windowsill, and connects reliably to the speaker in the shed, a line-of-sight 35m away. Got mine off eBay.
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #38 on: 07 September, 2019, 11:37:01 am »
It didn't solve the Sonos problem though – despite wiring it to another powerline adaptor, which should make them mesh – still a bit flaky upstairs. And I can't blame my wife and her bogon emissions this time, as she's in Spain. It could be the cats.

They don’t play well with power line adapters, which is what I initially had in the shed mentioned above. Hence the addition of the boost.
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: wifi woes
« Reply #39 on: 07 September, 2019, 05:35:53 pm »
BN: I am at the Battle Mountain Super 8 where the internets will shortly be clogged up with a hundred or more Young People doing Social Media.

GN: My room is at the right end of the building for the free wifi of the Scottish Restaurant next door to be within range.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Adam

  • It'll soon be summer
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Re: wifi woes
« Reply #40 on: 07 September, 2019, 05:49:32 pm »
Why not switch the HH3 & 5 units around?  On the assumption that the newer Home Hub 5 would be pumping out a more powerful wifi signal.
“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.” -Albert Einstein

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #41 on: 07 September, 2019, 09:07:03 pm »
I could just turn off the wireless on the HH5, nothing ever connects to it. It just sits there and bleats its SSID to an uncaring audience. It's the support act for the wifi upstairs and everyone is in the bar. I seem to have reasonable wifi now, it just didn't fix the Sonos problem. Which might not be a Sonos problem, it could AirPlay, robotic squirrels, or the fact that I have a Hell portal under the hallway floor. The myriad complexities of modern life are hard to fathom. It may be interference. I should also turn off the bloody BTwifi-x and the other crud it puts out. You have no friends, BT HH5, accept it. The Arlo hub on the other hand, puts out a fearsome signal. That punches through to the garage at the bottom of the garden. I'm not sure what Chromecast is doing, but it has its own network too. Then the neighbours, EE-that, BT-that, TalkTalk, Sky, and the randomly appearing PrettyFlyForAWifi. There's frankly a lot more SSIDs than I have neighbours. The Sonos is on channel 1 which everyone seems to hate. I should also unbury the speaker in my wife's office as she buried up under a menagerie soft toys and squished behind a monitor which I'm sure is electromajickally shielded.

That said, when it works it works, and I currently have Waxahatchee blasting out in my remote command centre, the dining room, and the kitchen. I think it's just scared to go upstairs.

ian

Re: wifi woes
« Reply #42 on: 24 September, 2019, 11:07:47 am »
Eventually mostly solved this with a Boost. I have no idea what my wife does to wifi signals, but she's quite radio-opaque. If she stands in front of a speaker for more than several seconds it cuts out. I've tried this and I have no effect. I have found that calling a woman 'radio-opaque' isn't good for my health, however.