Improving WiFi with Construction Issues?

[jaybar]

Hi

I live in NYC. We have Verizon Fios TV, internet and phone. We are using the latest Verizon router. The apartment construction presents great challenges. Concrete and cinderblock and plaster walls with wire steel mesh. My WiFi signal according to Verizon WiFi analyzer is about 68-70dBm. I use the Airport Express to stream Apple Music to our Stereo. Some dropouts. Would the Verizon Network extender be a solution? Would another router in a bridge mode be better? A Senior Apple engineer has said, given the construction, not much will help. Rewiring, given the construction is not possible.

Any thought about making it better or is it a waste of time?

Thanks

Jay

 

[techwarrior]

You might consider power line adapters. AV1200 or AV2000 models will deliver 1Gbps or better over your power lines. With that, you could put access points in a few rooms to improve signals where it is weak. Or, just plug things into switches and use ethernet wherever possible.

 

[jaybar]

What are switches?

 

[techwarrior]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_switch

Basically, a smarter version of a network Hub. A Hub sends every packet out every port and lets devices decide what is designated for the host, switches learn the addresses of connected devices and only send packets out on the port the destination device is connected to. So switches can handle more simultaneous data than hubs.

So, the idea would be to use Powerline to extend Ethernet from the router to another room, then attach a switch (they typically come in 4-48 ports and make sure you get 1Gbps capable switches). From here, multiple devices can connect to the switch, including SmartTV, Streaming players, Game Consoles, Wireless Access Points, etc. The more devices you can get hardwired, the more WiFi capacity that is available for wireless devices.

Most Powerline adapters can do a 1 to 2 or 3 type connection, so if you need to extend to more that one room, you could buy 3 or 4 adapters. Here is an example. With this one, you could connect one cable on the router side, and up to two on the far end to connect two devices. Further, if you have more than two ethernet capable devices on the far end, one of the connections could be to a network switch. If you need more rooms, buy more adapters and they will all connect through the one connected to the router. Nice thing about these is they can pass power through to other devices, so you don't lose an outlet.

 

[hobowankenobi]

If you can't get wire to the area you need, powerline data is likely the best option.

A mesh network may be possible, but each access point has to be close enough to each other to negate the poor wireless range. A bigger risk to get right. I would go powerline as a first choice.