New router or signal booster?

[jakobjkraft]

I have a Netgear wireless-N Router, model WNR 2000. It's a few years old but has continued to work well with my phone and tablet, basically everything on the same side of my 900 sq feet apartment where it's located. My wife uses her laptop in the bedroom mostly which is clear on the other side of the apt, pretty much as far as possible from the router. She loses connectivity at least twice a day which she usually solves by just restarting the router. Also, she uses her laptop mostly while seated against an exposed brick wall, which someone told me can interfere with wireless signals. Not sure how true that is, but I was wondering if a signal booster would resolve this or maybe I just need a new router altogether?
Any help or info would be greatly appreciated -- thanks in advance!

 

[Zap]

Since the antennas are built in, you are unable to boost the signal through extra power or higher gain antenna. This leaves you with two choices.

1) Move the router to a more central location.

2) Get a repeater and place it halfway to the farthest location.

What is strange is your description of rebooting the router to "fix" the loss in connectivity.

 

[jakobjkraft]

Then what are signal boosters used for, if it's not possible to boost signal from routers?

 

[krnmastersgt]

Some router designs allow for it, yours happens to not.

And I would suggest going with option 1 if at all possible, there must be some room that you could just stuck the router into. Unless of course you're plugged into it by cable, in which case option 2 is the only other hardware solution.

 

[jakobjkraft]

Some router designs allow for it, yours happens to not.

And I would suggest going with option 1 if at all possible, there must be some room that you could just stuck the router into. Unless of course you're plugged into it by cable, in which case option 2 is the only other hardware solution.

I am plugged into it by cable so option 2 it is -- thanks for the info!

 

[Zap]

Then what are signal boosters used for, if it's not possible to boost signal from routers?

Typically it boosts the antenna gain, thus requiring the use of removable antennas because the booster sits between the radio (inside the router) and the antenna. Your router looks as if the antennas are internal.

 

[mfenn]

If resetting the router "fixes" the problem, it sounds to me like your router is busted. In which case, a repeater wouldn't really help you because it would just be repeating the signal to a box that isn't listening.

So, my advice would be to get a new router that is:
- Fitted with external antennae so that you can replace them with higher gain ones if necessary
- Compatible with DD-WRT firmware so that you can get rock-solid stability.

Something like the ASUS RT-N12 seems to fit the bill.