Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Hi
I've just signed up for Virgin broadband and now need to invest in some wireless equipment in order to use it once it's installed.

The cable modem will be in the downstairs front room of the house with one PC in a room directly above this (i.e. 1st floor at the front of house) and another PC on the 2nd floor at the back of the house (I also have a Sony laptop but that has wireless built in so should be OK). What I'm wondering is, which wireless router will give the best performance for this kind of scenario?

I've read a number of posts on here about the Linksys WRT54GS which all seem to imply that it is a good router....will it be OK over this kind of distance indoors?

As part of my reading up on this I've come across MIMO routers (802.11n I think...?) which apparently give better performance indoors. But I'm not sure if it would really be necessary for this kind of set up or whether just a normal 802.11g (such as the Linksys above) would do the trick?

Thanks very much

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

i have a WRT54GS and had problems with a PCI wireless card (also linksys) in a PC on the same floor! mind you in a straight line the signal would have gone through a metal door and two walls.

However you can put different firmware on that allows you to increase the power output by the router.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

You could also have a look at homeplug. It will cost more (you still need the router), but I hear it works well.

Some info here

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I am in the same predicitment. Due to the praise on here I bought the WRT54GS which is on the ground floor (I thought sighting it in the cellar would be too much for it) but I am happy to say the Wii picks the signal up fine and that's on the top (2nd) floor. Its the Speedbooster model although the Wii doesn't support that.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I have a wrg45g in my attic room and i can get a strong signal in the kitchen two floors below. I can also get the signal in the garden and my daughter surfs the net from the living room. I live in a big old Edwardian terrace so its high and with thick walls. Never tried the cellar though!

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Definatly the Belkin PREN router, Im using this router with NTL and the signal streches right down my street! Before it's connection becomes LOW even then it still doesnt lose its connection!

PRE-N router is what Im using with a standered 54g in my laptop and a 54g pci card in my pc.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I've got the WRT54G router. It's on the first floor.
I can happily get a good signal at the end of the garden, and also in the neighbour's house across the road. I could probably get further, but you look a bit silly walking down the road with a laptop... :)

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

i wouldnt look at anything other than netgear and linksys.

Linksys is part of cisco, whos hardware is known worldwide for its performace.
Netgear also have a proven track record.
Belkin are a well known brand, but there CS is no use when you run into a problem.

If you find you need more distance once you have it installed, then grab a bigger antenna.

Remeber to install it as close the the center of the house as possiable to give you the best coverage (if you want to use it in the garden, then as close the the center of your property) im including height on that.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Dont go the wireless route, it wont give you what you want - instead look at Homeplugs to distribute your broadband connection round your house (very easily).

I live in a 1 bed flat and had wireless issues, i tried Linksys and Netgear routers before i went down the homeplug route - trust me your wasting your money.

If you MUST though - go for netgear and avoid Linksys like the plague unless its the WRT54GS and you dont mind modding firmware.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I and a lot other people use Wireless completely free from problems?

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

IF you have thin walls you may get away with it - but Homeplug for me is in a league of its own especially when you deliver wireless directly to the room you want it in with the Wireless homeplug adapter.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I'll second that - I have both Homeplug and wireless (and even a few cables). Good point about the wireless homeplug device - you can move it to whichever room you are currently working in (cellar, loft, powder room...)

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Thanks for the input everyone, much appreciated

The Homeplug thing definately sounds interesting, but with regards to the wireless Homeplug adapters, what sort of range do they have? I have a laptop that has wireless built in so I'm going to need some kind of wireless interface for that, but isn't it going to sort of defeat the object of wireless if I have to carry a plug round with me and plug it in to whichever room I happen to be in when using the laptop?

Also, how is security enforced in Homeplug? I'm sure they've thought of and sorted all this but how do the devices stop your network signals propagating all down the powerlines and out onto the national grid (i.e. where someone else could pick them up)? Some kind of multiplexing?

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Lots of questions! A few answers can be found here: http://www.solwise.co.uk/net-powerline.htm

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Interesting site....thanks for that!

However, one thing I read there is that performance is seriously degraded if Homeplug devices are plugged into extension blocks rather than directly into the wall. The house I live in is old and doesn't have a lot of dedicated wall sockets, meaning I use extension blocks for just about everything (for example in my bedroom I have 4 dedicated sockets to power TV, video, DVD, lamp x 2, PC x 2, monitor x 2, speakers, printer, hi-fi, heater/fan, charging socket for iPod, phone, etc, etc). So I'm pretty much reliant on extension blocks, and to use a single wall socket for a single device would mean hanging even more devices on the remaining sockets which I'm not sure I'd be too keen on...

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

You're welcome!

Well, mine work through ordinary extension sockets, and I've not noticed any degradation of signal. However, I wouldn't attach it to a "surge protector".

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I've never tried homeplugs but they do sound interesting...

If you still want a wireless router, the Linksys WRT54GS is definitely worth looking at. The range is good on it but if you need to increase it even more you can flash it with DD-WRT firmware. I'd recommend the DD-WRT firmware anyway... ;)

I've flashed my Linksys WRT54G router with DD-WRT and I get signal from the end of my street!! Didn't believe it was possible by just using different firmware!!

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I just use my WRT54G with the firmware it came with, and get a good signal at the neighbours and over the road. Might be interesting to see just how far I could go...

Wireless also brings up the subject of security, and I think I'm fairly secure, changing the name and using a MAC filter. How are the homeplugs for security (never having used one)? Would it be possible for example for a neighbour to use your internet connection?

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

ive been using Homeplug for difficult installations since 2005 with very good success. Ive just given up on wireless for my daughter in the room above the router and even thats poor but ive gone hardwired as I had cable handy lol

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

The ones I use have a facility to use internal device encryption.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Sounds interesting! Do you have any details on how you did this?

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Yep, I was actually helped by other members on this forum. :)

Flashing Linksys WRT54Gv5 router

What model is your router?

Have a look at this site:
DD-WRT

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

OK, due to my lack of dedicated sockets I think I'm going to have to go with the wireless approach rather than Homeplug. I'll try the Linksys WRT54GS and see how it goes - if I can't get a decent signal upstairs I'll try the DD-WRT thing....

Thanks for all the info everyone (and please feel free to provide some more if you think it necessary! :D)

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Any wireless will work "down the street" if it dosent have many walls to go through.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

You obviously have something against Wireless?

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

An alternative to polluting your living environment with strong radiowaves,
is to get two cheap WRT54G's off ebay. Flash them with 3rd party firmware eg dd-wrt (This is easier with the older models but doable with new ones)
-
then set them up using WDS (ie they both extend the same network).
Then you can have a low strength signal that is closer to the shape of your house rather than having an over-strong signal flooding one room in an effort to trickle upstairs.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

I think my living environment is already polluted with radio waves....when I switched on the wireless on my laptop the other day it found 4 wireless networks in range! :D (Two of them were unsecured as well!)

D'you mean have one downstairs connected to the cable modem and then the other upstairs to boost the signal?

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Yes and no, i have found it to be unreliable anywhere there are (thick) walls involved, fine otherwise.

Siliceanddice is talking about a big house - i think he will run into problems.

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Yup. More strictly it extends the wireless network.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireles...ibution_System

The dd-wrt firmware has WDS capability.

A cheap 2nd hand wrt54G on each floor, directly above each other, on a low power setting should give you good coverage over the whole house.

Doing this also allows you to plug your wired equipment (printservers, Xbox etc) into a WRT54G which is then connected wirelessly.

Lordy

Re: Best wireless router for 3 story house...?
 

Strange, ive found homeplugs to be unreliable, mainly because i do use surge protectors.

I always buy netgear when it comes to wireless routers, cange a few settings from the default ones, change the IP onto a different netblock (i normally move to 10.10.10.x

Securty isnt a problem, and distance ive never had a problem with, people that do have distance problems tend to of poistioned the routers in a bad place.

you always want to be as close to central to the area you want to cover as possiable. Thick walls can easily be overcome just by upgrading the antenna, you can actually get 4mile antennas for most netgear routers, and if that isnt enugh for you, then you could be looking at your own radio tower.