Strange network set-up possible?


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Before I asked you guys about getting a dual-band router. Well now I have another interesting question.

Here is my current network set-up:

post-389186-0-80233600-1324614998.jpg

As you can see I have the router in a small room (previously a study) and everything in our house connects to it via WiFi

I'm thinking of adding a second router in the following situation and I'm wondering if it's possible:

post-389186-0-43621500-1324615054.jpg

Basically here, some clients closer to the modem/router connect to the original router, as well as the media PC. What I want then to add a second router that is directly connected to the media PC via Ethernet, which then connects to clients that are close to it in that end of the house such as my PC and Xbox 360.

All clients will still need to be connected to the internet, and obviously the red-line (modem/router) clients are fine but I was wondering if in this set-up you could still deliver internet to the green-line clients. The dual-band router will not be connected to a modem (and so not directly to the internet)

Essentially the dual-band router will share files from the media PC and the internet to the green-line clients; the red-line clients don't need the media PC to share files so that's fine.

Is it possible? It could be a bit confusing

For reference sake the router I'm thinking of adding to the media PC via ethernet is the Netgear WNDR3700 and some of the green-line clients would be connected via 5 GHz

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it's entirely possible...you should see my properly configured network (thanks to advice from BudMan...) it's actually quite simple. On first router, make it the dhcp. on second router, assign a manual IP (I use 192.168.1.1(as first device), 192.168.1.2(as second), etc....) take output from first router(from a numbered port), but do not plug it into the 2nd router's WAN port, instead, connect it to one of the numbered points(on the second router), and voila! WiFi access point(hotspot). Works beautifully, just make sure you use the same subnet masks, etc....but that's how I've got mine configured, and I have wifi 40 ft. from my actual hotspot, in an entirely different building (plus, one really long ethernet cord....from router 1 to router 2)

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Thanks for the advice, but I do have to specify that the two routers are NOT going to be connected by any sort of cable whatsoever

That's called wireless bridging. Just make sure that the wireless access point you purchase supports it.

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To play it completely safe, get a router that can run DD-WRT. I'm running a similar setup using two Linksys WRT320Ns without any problems.

Then all you need to do is follow these steps: http://www.dd-wrt.co...p/Client_Bridge

Edit: I misread your post, client bridge doesn't work if you need to connect to the second router over wireless. You should be able to setup repeater bridge very similarly though: http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Repeater_Bridge

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Are you sure you want to get a 2nd router ?? I wouldnt advise it - what you need is a WiFi Access Point. Having 2 routers in this sceanrio might be a bad idea -

BudMan is the one you need to ask about questions regarding LAN & routers & configs - he's damned knowledgeable

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Is your proposed setup possible? Yes, you can bridge the Wireless and Wired connections using the PC.

Is your proposed setup optimal? No. Your Media PC will need to be left on to provide connectivity to other clients, it is an added layer of complexity, and will just add latency.

My suggestions in order of preference of most optimal to least optimal, depending on what is possible for you:

(1) Move ADSL Modem/Router to the position near the Media PC

For the following options, uou will need to disable DHCP and leave the WAN port unplugged on the Dual Band Router, so that it functions the same as an Access Point rather than a Router - unless of course the router already has a setting to make it purely an Access Point.

(2) Connect the ADSL Modem/Router to the Dual-Band Router using ethernet (Quickest and most reiiable).

(3) Connect the ADSL Modem/Router to the Dual-Band Router using a HomePlug (which can go up to 300Mbps, an option if you can't run an ethernet line for some reason).

(4) Connect the ADSL Modem/Router to the Dual-Band Router using wireless repeating mode on the Dual-Band router (only some routers support this, if it doesn't, you can also use OpenWRT if your router is compatible with that. Bandwidth will be halved and any Wireless connection adds latency)

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Okay thanks Simon for the info. The Media PC is always on so that's not an issue. 1-3 are not really possible, so that leaves either the wireless-to-wired bridge on the PC or wireless repeating on the router.

I'm leaning towards creating a separate access point from the dual-band router so I can actually use the dual-band functionality (I understand repeating would not make this possible...?). As long as the router gets an internet connection from somewhere then I will be happy, and in this case it would be a bridge on the PC.

Also, it sounds like bridge mode will deliver the best speeds if I was to share files from the media PC over a wireless network

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Any reason why a HomePlug wouldn't work out of interest?

A HomePlug comes as a pair of two. You just plug an ethernet cable into each homeplug, the homeplugs are plugged into the powerpoint, and then the two homeplugs establish a network connection with each other using the internal electrical wiring already installed in your home. It is easy, faster, and much more reliable than Wireless.

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I would prefer to do this as cheaply as possible. Homeplugs are not cheap, and I'm after the fastest speeds from the media PC to my PC without using a cable, while still retaining internet connectivity

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I would prefer to do this as cheaply as possible. Homeplugs are not cheap, and I'm after the fastest speeds from the media PC to my PC without using a cable, while still retaining internet connectivity

http://staticice.com.au/cgi-bin/search.cgi?q=homeplug

Around 40 bucks for the TP-Link too expensive?

edit: I recommend going with Scorptec if you are in VIC

edit2: Also have a look at http://www.msy.com.au/product.jsp?productId=8300 ... It is a HomePlug and WiFi Access Point in one, avoids the need to the Dual Band router altogether. I have heard good things about these, maybe you would want to do a Neowin review on one? ;) Scorptec might be your best bet on this as they have an ex-demo unit on their hands and are more open to review sites and sponsorship deals.

Edited by Simon-
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"I'm after the fastest speeds from the media PC to my PC"

USE a WIRE!!! - PERIOD!

While in theory your setup would work, yes you could use a PC to bridge wired network to wireless -- and even wireless to wired to wireless like you have it drawn could in theory work.. Its not going to be very fast, and its going to see all kinds of issues!

You do understand with a "BRIDGE" -- ALL TRAFFIC seen on your media PC wired interface could/would be sent out the wireless interface.. So your streaming a movie from media PC which is the bridge -- that could shutdown your wireless connection to your first router. I would have to actually fire up a bridge on one of my window boxes to verify this - a learning bridge would flood at first but then learn what macs are on what side of the bridge, etc. So its possible not all traffic would be sent over the bridge - I don't have a lot of play time with windows bridging interfaces (mostly because its not a very good option). You also can run into issues with just not working at all, some wireless devices don't like to be a bridge ;)

But for sure all broadcast/multicast traffic seen at the wired interface of your media pc will be sent out the G wireless network..

To be honest unless your talking about a transparent firewall type setup -- bridging normally not a great idea ;)

A better setup would be to actually just route and use a wire to connect your what sounds like what you want is two isolated network segments for your differnt traffic which would be best.

"Homeplugs are not cheap"

You do understand how this makes you sound when you post up a picture of a network showing 4 different PCs, a Xbox 360, smart phone -- and now your going to buy a 2nd wireless router which runs $100 or so.

Come on dude -- really!!! Your going to play the I'm poor card so can not actually setup all my toys correctly because running a wire or buying homeplugs cost too much?? Really?

Here is how I would setup how I think you want it setup.

post-14624-0-60158900-1324655214_thumb.j

So you run a wire or use homeplugs to connect your internet router with 2nd wireless router. But you do not use this device as GATEWAY where it does NAT, you just change its mode to normal router. So your wireless or any wired devices to this router are on 192.168.2.0/24 network. Its wan would be on the 1st routers network of 192.168.1.0/24

Just add a route on your 1st router to get to the 192.168.2.0/24 network talk to 2nd routers wan interface 192.1681.2

2nd router would just need default route of first routers IP 192.168.1.1

Dhcp would be running on both router for their networks. You could use what ever dns you want, be it just the first router or your ISP or opendns, etc.

Since your getting dual band, your media PC is wired like you said, but your main PC is only one on 5ghz and has that wireless bandwidth all to itself. Other devices would use the 2.4 radio.

Now any traffic going to the internet or devices on the 192.168.1.0/24 network would get their over wire and not have to cause extra load on that wireless network. Keep in mind wireless is shared bandwidth -- Wireless to wireless traffic is always slower so if you can put one end of the traffic on wire the better! Now even though you have 2 devices that could be talking over wireless neteworks -- they are different wireless networks and not sharing bandwidth.

This is really simple to setup and you just need 1 extra wire to connect your wireless routers, or a set of homeplugs.

Let me know if you have more questions -- but your setup is NOT how it should be setup, and sorry not going to help going that wrong because its a terrible way to do it.

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Hey Tim, i think in the last thread you mentioned you couldn't or didn't want to do wires for some reason but is it possible to show a few pics of the room where the router is and other systems? I'm still just baffled at the not wanting to go wired part is why. The homePNA stuff was mentioned last time but you were set on doing a WDS or other Bridge. Depending on congession in your area you'll actually get LESS bandwidth than your current setup even with a weak signal. If the mediaPC is receiving a weak signal where it is and you put a wireless router there to do bridging it will obviously only have a weak signal there as well. The only difference now is that the signal is now be split even more (technically 1/4 as WDS splits bandwith in 1/2 and Wireless by it self is already 1/2 so now you are down to 1/4).

So while the mediaPC might get connected at 144Mbps LINK speed (in perfect condition) and the router does the same, that bandwidth is now split even more as a result. So say you had full signal at 144Mbps link speed, normally you divide it by half to get ACTUAL speeds (since wifi is half-duplex). For WDS you'd have to then divide that 70Mbps by 1/2 again to give you what speeds you'd get from the client.

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Okay thanks BudMan, I will look at getting some homeplugs and connecting the two routers via a cable.

In the setup you mention, it looks like I would end up with two wireless networks. There would be some overlap between the 2.4 GHz N network and the 2.4 GHz G network, is it a good idea to tell my routers to have these on separate channels? Also if I decide to run my N network on 2.4 GHz across 40 MHz (using 2 channels), using the third channel for my G network would cause the least interference, right?

The reason why I can't cable the house is because for some reason in this house there are strange wall supports that block any sort of cables in any wall. When the house was being built the electricians would have had to drill holes in the supports to route cables (which are the exact size required for the cables) before the plasterboard was added, and I don't want to remove the plasterboard to get the cables down the walls.

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You could always run cable down the corner of the room and then along the baseboard - they sell covers just for this, you can then even paint same color as well and you don't even see them.

As to channels - yes you would want to run 2.4 as far apart as possible 1,6,11 are the 3 channels that do not overlap.

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I am not sure of Budman's idea of routing between two networks internally. Apart from adding complexity to a home network, there are wireless access points running on both segments. Usually you would set the SSIDs to be the same on all the access points so that the client device would pick up whichever is the strongest signal rather than manually changing networks on the device when you change rooms. My concern is that if a device seamlessly changes access points running the same SSID, I am not sure if the device would also renew it's IP address when it does this. If it doesn't renew IP address it will still have the IP address from the other network segment and cause issues with the current network segment until it is manually renewed.

Something that may need to be tested to be sure what will happen, but I know that having it all on the same network segment will work 100%.

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They would not be the same SSID in this sort of setup -- where did I even mention anything of the sort?

So you think 2 network segments is more complex than his multiple bridging setup?

Sure normally just multiple APs is what I would suggest for better wireless coverage -- and that is a very common setup - but he seemed clear of isolation of his one wireless network. And I kind of went with that in the setup. In the 2 segment you don't get any broadcast or multicast traffic onto the other wireless networks between routers.

But sure he does not have to segment the network if he doesnt want to -- but from this statement

"I'm after the fastest speeds from the media PC to my PC without using a cable"

If he uses the SAME SSID and just accesspoint on the same network its quite possible for other devices to connect to that network. Now he could lock them down in other ways so they do not connect to specific AP even when on the same SSID, etc.

This allows for best wireless bandwidth of all devices involved by keeping them on 3 different wireless networks he can produce with his devices.

But sure I agree with you this can be done while still putting everything on one network segment to be sure. And yes 1 network segment would be less complex, and he could either run same SSID or different SSIDs depending if he wanted devices to jump APs, etc.

Only thing he has to do to change to that design is connect to lan port on 2nd router, give it an IP on the 1st routers network and disable its dhcp server.

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Thanks for more info BudMan and Simon, but I would prefer to have two separate SSIDs and networks so I can deliberately connect the older G devices to the G router will leaving the N router for N-only devices

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And you could do that with same network, just that with same network broadcast and multicast will be sent across all wireless networks from all devices.

With the 2 different segments like I setup, your N devices and G devices would not be seeing each other broadcast traffic.

But yes it is a more complex setup than just sharing the same, I would go with the same network first and then if you want change the segments. But again there is nothing saying you have to use the same SSID or even security for your 3 different wireless networks. That way only specific devices will even try to talk to the other device.

With same SSID, your devices will chatter with the other AP. If they are on same wireless network, ie G, B or N. But you can put your N router in N mode only so if your devices only have G wireless they will not even see the other AP.

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I guess that separate SSIDs is workable as long as Scorpus is wary of it so he knows to change SSIDs when he changes rooms.

I personally still think that a single SSID is better. The devices closest to the N router will still connect to N because it has the stronger signal strength. If you are closer to the G router, I think that the Strong G signal + Homeplug would be faster than Weak N signal. I doubt that the multicast/broadcast traffic on the network would be significant enough to make a difference anyway. Whether it is 1 segment or 2, all the traffic will still need to go through the Dual-Band router anyway, it is just a question of routing mode or bridging mode, and a networking device will always Bridge faster than Router because a bridge is a Layer 2 function whereas a route is Layer 3.

Your phone will probably have the most trouble, if it connects to the N router and then you change rooms, it might have very low signal strength (low signal strength can sometimes get so low that it is actually to slow to do any actual data transfer) and won't automatically switch to the G router until it loses the connection to N completely. In a single-SSID situation it will connect to the one with the strongest signal regardless.

Also don't forget that your G router is not running anything at 5GHz and your N router is. Most N routers with 5GHz allow different SSIDs between G and N networks, so if you give the 5GHz network a different SSID to the G, then this will guarantee that you are connecting at 802.11n 5GHz for when you really need the bandwidth, while leaving the 2.4GHz G router and 2.4GHz on the N router to share an SSID.

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"Scorpus is wary of it so he knows to change SSIDs when he changes rooms."

Why should he do that? Who says he wants devices to change wireless networks, I did not take from his posts that he is looking to increase coverage, etc. His PC are not even movable from what he drew and don't think he ever used the term laptop/tablet/notebook/etc

"all the traffic will still need to go through the Dual-Band router anyway"

What? No only traffic behind that router would be going through it and only traffic that is internet traffic or the other segment. Traffic between devices on that segment would not go "through" the dual band, just its switch, etc.

I agree with you in a normal setup to allow for complete coverage you would use the same SSID on all AP, and then as you devices roam about the space they would switch to the best signal AP. But that is not what he is after from my understanding - maybe he can clarify if he has devices that move and low coverage areas for these devices, etc.

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Signal is not an issue at all really. I mean it's poor in the location of my Xbox/PC but it still reaches my entire house.

What I'm after is the fastest possible speeds from my media PC to my PC without a cable. Putting a router next to the media PC, connected via Ethernet, and then connecting to this router via 802.11n seems to be the fastest way to stream data from the media PC to my PC. Then using the homeplugs to connect to the modem/router gives internet access to said new router and all is good.

Choosing which AP each of my devices use is just a matter of preference. I would prefer to have separate SSIDs so I can easily control which device is on what router, and so I'll set it up that way.

I do have portable devices (a few laptops and a few smartphones), but the N router will pretty much cover the entire house in the position I'm thinking of so I'll just connect it to that.

Anyway the hard part is sorted out, so again thanks heaps. After Christmas I'll go out and get the equipment to get my new network set up

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"What I'm after is the fastest possible speeds from my media PC to my PC without a cable"

What card do you have, are you going to put into your PC? That WNDR3700 might not be the FASTEST?, and speed is also going to depend on your card, are you going to be able to do 3x3, etc..

You prob want to checkout some reviews and benchmarks of the different routers out there and look into if you benchmarks of your wireless card.. If I recall Shotta has posted some just screaming wireless results -- you might want to get with him on his hardware.

Also http://www.smallnetbuilder.com is a good place for benchmarks and review with good numbers to compare with, etc.

Also your media PC has a gig nic? If your really going for the fastest speed possible, your not going to want a 100mbit nic in your media PC ;)

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