Noob Needs help with Home Network

[Caveman]

My house is wired with qty 11 CAT6 lines to multiple drops. All of those lines start in an upstairs media room closet where the Cable Internet input comes into the house. I was runnning a Modem to a Switch to a Router right there at the metal junction box. A wireless BD player is about 4 feet away from that junction box so never any issues there getting the wireless to communicate with an old G router good enough for Netflix (though there were a few times it was throughput limited). I had an 8 port switch that was connected to the router to catch most of the 11 wired drops (the G router handled some of the 11).

With the old 10MBps service and my G router, I could only get 5MBps (of the 10BPs I was paying for) because the G router (inside the junction box with the modem and switch) was ~70ft away from the downstairs "office" where most of the internet browsing is done. Distance & metal all around the router = bad performance.

I just upgraded to 50MBps service and got a new Asus N router and a new Cisco 16 port switch. When in the same location as the old G Router, my new router gives me ~17MBps (of the 50 I'm paying for) when I'm in the office. I want as much wireless capability as possible at office location so I connected the router to the wired drop in the office and get ~43MBps now in the office. Connecting directly to the wired drop I can get ~48MBps. Although I'm still wondering why I can't get 48MBps with the wireless, 43MBps is still infinitely better than 5 so no complaints...

But now that the router is downstairs in the office, my switch will need to come before my router which as I understand is NOT the right order (switches are supposed to go downstream from the router, yes?)...

So... How can I make this all work so I get close to 50MBps at each wired drop and still maintain the 43MBps I get wirelessly when the router is close to the PCs it's serving?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Sounds like you will need to purchase an additional N router, and use one as the "main" router, in the closet, and then another one in the office, as an "access point".

 

[Carson Dyle]

Why aren't you using the wired connection in your office to connect your PC? That's what they're there for. Faster, more reliable, etc. etc. The other consideration is computer to computer transfers in your home. They'll be faster using wired connections.

If the office location is a better location for your wireless access point, you could use two routers, with the one in the wiring closet only functioning as firewall and DHCP server. Then locate a second, wireless router in the office or another location on one of the drops. The second router will need to be configured so that it functions as only a wireless access point (google how to configure a router this way) and should not do any routing, NAT or DHCP.

modem > router (wired only) -> switch -> wireless router

 

[azazel1024]

VirtualLarry has it. Setup a router in the office as an access point and leave your current router in the wiring close either just doing routing, or with the wireless radios also enabled doing double duty as a router and access point.

As for the speed...what are you connecting to it? If you are connecting a 11n device that is setup on 20MHz and is only a single radio (IE 1:1), that is 65Mbps and you are doing REALLY well to get 43Mbps of throughput. If it is set to 40MHz and 1:1 that is 150Mbps and a 43Mbps connection is...meh. I've certainly seen worse though. If 2:2 and on 20MHz, that is 130Mbps and 43Mbps is only slightly less meh.

Or you have interfering neighbor networks or something else.

 

[Caveman]

Thanks so much for your help.

Yeah, I kinda figured the advice would be to set up another WAP. New territory for me there but I understand "why".

So, I can't use my old Buffalo G router to serve the office? Does it need to match the main "N" Asus Router?

One thing I want to understand is how the throughput specs are reported... "G" is rates as 50MBps and I think most Ns are 300Bps. Does this mean a G can give 50MBps to 1 client and only 25MBps to 2 clients?

I do plan on using the wired drop to feed my office PCs, eventually. The only reason I don't is because of my current furniture situation (cords would be strung across the floor, etc.) Once things get rearranged with some new furniture, then the wired drop will be used... At any rate, the laptops(s) in that room will probably continue using Wireless for convenience.

Azazel, I think I understand what you are trying to ask but I don't know enough yet to answer... I just did "plug and play" with no real understanding of how to maximize performance, but plan on doing more research...

 

[azazel1024]

By match you mean the same SSID and password? No to the first, but if the first is yes then the second has to be yes also.

I would recommend you use the same SSID on both. I've seen some roaming issues when seperate SSIDs were used (mostly sticky clients).

As for rating, its 11g, so max rate is 54Mbps.

N varies. 65/130 and 150/300 are what is common. It varies because 65/130 are 1:1 or 2:2 adapater in 20MHz mode and 150/300 are 1:1 and 2:2 adapters in 40MHz mode respectively.

This is NOT true through put. Wifi has a significant amount of forward error correction as well as overhead, for example the Wifi router sends out a beacon (by default every ~100ms) which it has to time out from receiving and sending data to clients to do (its the "HELLO! This is my SSID and this is what my SSID can do" message so you can see the network).

As a result, best case scenario in a very low noise setup with a very good router and a very good client you can get approximately 60% of the rated speed. You can tweak settings (if they are exposed) to improve this somewhat, but not by a lot.

As an example, I am in a super low noise setup and I can get around 180Mbps on 2.4GHz from my laptop to my router (300Mbps/40MHz 11n 2:2). On 5GHz I can get 200Mbps...which is a phenomenal 66% net yield which I have never actually seen before.

In general, clients/routers just might not be ideal, nor might your setup, or background interference (neighboring networks, microwaves, phones, what have you) resulting in more like 50% yield being good and 30-40% yield being more typical.

As for the break out, yes, that is correct. Is divided among all users (until MU:MIMO, Multi User:Multiple Input Multiple Output comes along with Wave 2 11ac stuff sometime this fall/next year). Its also divided among transmit and receive.

More clients actually typically reduces max yield as there is often at least minimum contention forcing retransmits.

So on 11g you might get around 25Mbps yield/payload on a single client. Throw in a second one, both yammering away and you might get more like 10-12Mbps on both. Throw in a third and you might get more like 5-6Mbps each and so on.

Also of interest, routers often suck at proportioning bandwidth/talk time between clients. So get more than 2-3 clients and you'll start seeing situations where one might get 10% of the bandwidth and another gets 50%. With just 2-3 clients even most crappy routers do okay with fair air time. Much more than that and often you are looking at needing a nicer router (or better yet an enterprise router) or you are getting in to really unfair air time situations.

Also mixing stands sucks. Running 11g clients on an 11n network usually means that the 11n clients get their speed hosed because of the backwards compatibility things that 11g requires that 11n doesn't. So using an 11g client...even LIGHT use, on an 11n network can mean that 11n clients can see a nice big 30-40% speed reduction.

My suggestion is if you have any 11g clients, keep the Buffalo G router on its own SSID and have only 11g clients connect to it. Keep it on its own seperate channel and call it a day. Have two other APs running an 11n network for the 11n clients with them on their own channel(s) seperate from the 11g AP's channel and its own SSID.

 

[Caveman]

After reading your post, I feel like my Avatar looks.

Thanks for the info! It will take some time to digest...

 

[Carson Dyle]

Do you actually need multiple access points, or would your house be served OK if you just locate the new access point in/near your office?

 

[Caveman]

I don't think I need multiple access points. The system is doing most of what I need it to do very well: The N router downstairs in the office is giving a great, unobstructed signal to the 2 Laptops in the office and enough of a signal back to the BD player in the media closet to Stream movies on Netflix better than the old system.

My biggest question is where I can put the switch since I need to get the 11 hard wire drops back. My initial though was to simply run the main line from the modem into the switch and then have the single hard wire drop to the office plugged into the new router.

What would be wrong with this setup? What disdvantages would I have here?

 

[Carson Dyle]

The N router downstairs in the office is giving a great, unobstructed signal to the 2 Laptops in the office and enough of a signal back to the BD player in the media closet to Stream movies on Netflix better than the old system.

I would hope that using wifi to connect a device located _in_ the wiring closet is only temporary while you get this all figured out. Wherever you can, use a wired connection.

My biggest question is where I can put the switch since I need to get the 11 hard wire drops back. My initial though was to simply run the main line from the modem into the switch and then have the single hard wire drop to the office plugged into the new router.

What would be wrong with this setup? What disdvantages would I have here?

Your modem probably does not do NAT (network address translation) and it expects exactly _one_ network device to be connected through it. So you can't put the switch directly behind the modem because that, in effect, connects multiple devices directly to the modem.

Your entire home network shares a single _public_ IP address. On your home network, each device is assigned a unique _private_ IP address. You use a router to perform the address translation and keep track of which device is which. When traffic comes in directed at a certain device, it translates the public IP address to a private one, so the traffic reaches the correct destination internally. So, all the devices on your network need to be behind a router doing NAT.

That's why all of the suggestions have been to use two routers, with only the one upstairs doing routing, and the router downstairs functioning only as a wireless access point.

I would put everything back to the way it was before you got the new wireless router. If you don't need it, see if you can disable the wireless radio in the old router's configuration. At a minimum, remove any external antennae and make sure that the SSID is different from the one you'll be using with the new wireless router. If you can't disable the wireless on the old router, make sure you lock the wifi down with a very secure password, even if you won't be using it.

Then take the new wireless router and set it up to function as only a wireless access point. As I said, there are numerous Internet guides on how to do this. But the basics are: Connect the router to your network through one of its LAN ports and leave the WAN port empty. Then disable the DHCP server on this router. In the configuration, it's best to assign this router a static IP address on your network, so that in the future you'll always know its address when you want to get into its configuration web interface.

 

[Caveman]

Sure wish I could figure out how to us the multi-quote functionality on this forum to respond to small pieces of your message...

Also, a picture is worth 1000 words... It looks like inserting an image requires I do so from a 3rd part net site... Any recommendations? When I get a chance I could sketch my system and provide it via schematic.

Thanks for your help... It may be a few days before I can get back to this thread with something useful...

 

[Carson Dyle]

One thing I'll add for the time-being: It would be possible to use only the one (new) router downstairs, but it would require you to run cables both to and _from_ that router. Down from the wiring closet to the router, then back up to the wiring closet and your switch.

modem > router_in_office > switch > PCs and other devices

But we're assuming that this isn't logistically possible, because you only have one drop going into the office. If, however, you had two cables (drops) between the wiring closet and the office (or another nearby location) then you could use only one router.

 

[Caveman]

One thing I'll add for the time-being: It would be possible to use only the one (new) router downstairs, but it would require you to run cables both to and _from_ that router. Down from the wiring closet to the router, then back up to the wiring closet and your switch.

modem > router_in_office > switch > PCs and other devices

But we're assuming that this isn't logistically possible, because you only have one drop going into the office. If, however, you had two cables (drops) between the wiring closet and the office (or another nearby location) then you could use only one router.

Wow. I didn't think anyone would think of that one... I figured my description of the system was so bad that the "picture" of my setup wouln't be clear enough to think up an idea like that... It was an idea I'd initially gotten all excited about... THen realized oh yeah, I'd need to run another line all the way back to the junction box...:|

I'd guess the run from the junction box to the office is already 80+ ft... Then back again... I could do it but it would be a lot of work in a hot attic... How long is too long for CAT5?

 

[Carson Dyle]

100 meters. 80 ft would be no problem.