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I have a L-shaped house with an ASUS router in one end. My problem is that the wifi strength is quite bad in the other end of the house and sometimes even non-existing.

I have a extender/access point (Asus RP-AC52) that I think will solve my problems, I'm not quite sure how to configure it though.

My options are:

  1. Use it as an wireless extender.
  2. Use it as an access point in the other end of the house (a wire is available)

The problem this nr 1 is that it seems to still be too far away. The wifi is still unreliable in the other end of the house.

Options nr 2 seems like the best, but I'm wondering how it works when connected to a wifi router? Can they have the same ssid? Does the access point have it's own dhcp? Can the clients switch network seamlessly?

Thanks!

Joakim
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3 Answers3

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I felt the need to post an answer too to clear out the small inaccuracies from the other answer. (sorry, not meant to be rude)

You mention two choices.

  1. Use it as extender
  2. Use it as separate accesspoint.

Both solutions have their pro's and cons. Lets list those first.

Use it as an extender

When you setup the device as extender, you will repeat the signal that comes into the device.

The pro is that this allows you to roam through the entire network without losing connection.

The con is that you get less speed as bandwidth is reserved for the connection to the other access point it extends.

Use it as a separate accesspoint

When you setup the device as new accesspoint, a new wifi point is added to the network that devices can connect to.

The pro is that it reduces load on the other wifi points and gets better coverage because the signal is stronger. Also because you run a network cable to that point, speeds get near the max it can be for the entire wifi.

The con is that you will not automatically switch to this wifi which can give weird issues and may appear to not work. This also will give you small dropouts when it switches.

Which is better?

Although the con for the access point is a big one, it still is a better trade off when done correctly.

Keep in mind that even if you use the same SSID and password for both networks, your wifi will still see them as two and will stay connected to the same wifi point until the signal is so weak it disconnects, in which case it automatically switches over to the other network. This unfortunately does mean that you still get slow speeds when you are far away from the first wifi point and still barely in range.

Because both wifi's have the same SSID, you cannot switch yourself manually. It is this exact reason why you want to avoid naming both wifi devices with the same SSID. Give both a different SSID, so you can switch yourself when you want to, or even better, choose to not connect to one of the two networks at all, so you are always connected to either, and choose the one where you need to have wifi coverage the most.

With this in mind, it can be a big win to choose the location of the second accesspoint carefully, so you can make that your main wifi point without connecting to the other and only use the other device in those rare cases when you need it.

You configure this by linking a cable between a LAN port from both the router AND the device that becomes the Access Point. You will want to turn off DHCP though. Let the main device handle that. In the configuration you will have to specify something for the WAN port, it doesn't really matter what this is as long as it is something arbitrary and non-existent, preferably still in the same network range, but not inside the subnet.

By this I mean... Say, you have your network setup as 192.168.10.x, then you will want to put the WAN to 192.168.y.x where y is any number other than 10.

Also, make sure the LAN ipaddress of the Access point is static and set to any number inside the range of the network, but outside of the DHCP range on a free address, so you can manage the device whenever you need to.

Bas
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Extenders connect to the router via wifi, which is slower and less reliable than connecting via ethernet, but access points connected via ethernet require running a cable. Both also offer a different kind of flexibility: an access point can be anywhere, but only if there is a cable there. An extender must be in range of both the main wifi network broadcast by your router, and any device that wants to connect to the network.

In your L-shaped house with a router in one arm of the L, the approximate best place for an extender is at the junction between the two arms of the L, and the approximate best place for an access point is in the other arm of the L. You would want to test this, but if you already have a cable installed, it's a no-brainer to use an access point in my opinion.

The other answers are not correct that your devices will not automatically swap between networks, though. The decision as to whether to name the networks from different access points the same thing (use the same credentials if you do this) or name them different things is up to you, and you should test both modes with your devices. Using one network name does keep things simpler.

There is no part of the Wifi standards that deals with when and how to swap between access points using the same SSID (network name) or networks with different name that the device is allowed to connect to automatically. It's completely at your device's discretion which networks and access points to choose, and when to scan for a potentially-better network and swap the connection. These days most devices are pretty smart about swapping network when there is a better option, but you can always test with your specific devices and see which option works best.

This concept of having overlapping signals using the same or different SSIDs, and how your device will choose which one to connect to, is also completely different to mesh networking. Mesh networking is more to do with how the access points themselves connect to one another using wireless or wired connections, and how they negotiate those connections. The principle of mesh networking is that the access points themselves are not hierarchical or pre-configured and they will figure out for themselves how to connect together for the best result.

But from the perspective of your device looking at the networks and access points that are offering it a place to connect to the internet, these details are irrelevant and do not usually form part of its decision about which network or access point to connect to.

If your device is in access point mode, it should disable its own DHCP and allow the router's DHCP to take precedence, but if this doesn't happen, you should disable the access point's DHCP in the settings.

Mike Stanley
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You are best to make it an access point (not extender) since you have a wire (Ethernet).

Extenders drop bandwidth significantly (Wireless calls home causing double traffic). I do not use Extenders.

Access Point: Hook it up as follows:

  1. LAN port on access point to network.
  2. Give the access point a static IP on your network.
  3. Turn DHCP OFF on access point.

Which is better: Ethernet connected Access Point wins hands down. Better signal strength, better reliability

You can give the access point the same SSID as your main network. That does not make it a mesh so roaming will not be automatic but still workable.

You need a Ubiquiti or like device to make a mesh.