Tag: wifi

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Whole House Wifi

This is a term that I hear occasionally but what does it really mean? It usually refers to a system that covers your entire house with wifi. The trouble with most routers is that they are only in one location in your house and sometimes that location is in the corner in your basement. Most routers are not in the middle of the house where they could give you the most coverage and even if they are in the right place they probably don’t have the range to reach everywhere in the house.


So how do you cover your entire house with wifi? By using a Mesh Wifi System. This is a system of pods that are strategically placed around your house to cover all areas. The brand I use most even says you can “paint your home in WIFI.” People used to use wifi extenders to do this, but an extender usually creates a new network instead of expanding your current network, so you have to connect to a different network in certain areas of your house. Extenders also don’t come with a phone app, so it is difficult to tell if they are really working or not. Mesh systems only broadcast one signal, but you seamlessly connect to the nearest pod.


The great thing about these mesh systems is that you don’t need to rewire your house to connect all of these pods. They only need to be plugged into an electric outlet and they also need to be in the range of another pod. By using a few pods, you can cover all areas and all floors in even very large homes. Many mesh systems can even reach outside onto outdoor living spaces with special pods that are made for outdoor use and are weather resistant. You don’t even have to know how large the range of each pod is because there is an app that you put on a cell phone that helps set them up.


After fighting with some dead zones in my house for years I recently added a mesh system. I had been putting it off because I was concerned that I might need to reprogram all of my smart devices after changing my network. I was very careful to name the new network the same as my old network and make the password exactly the same. When I turned on the new network all of my devices connected to it automatically except for one printer so it didn’t take long to get everything working.


This not only improved the coverage of wifi in my house it also gave me much higher speed. I was previously using the wifi from my Comcast modem and those don’t have a lot of wifi coverage or speed once you get a few feet away.


There are many brands of mesh wifi systems. I have installed expensive systems and inexpensive systems. I know what works and what is junk. Just because a system is expensive doesn’t mean it works well. If you are considering a mesh wifi system I can help you find the right one for your home. Here is a video where I talk about these systems:

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Why do I have two different wifi connections?

I was at a customer recently and they had a router that broadcasts both the 2.4 GHz and 5.0 GHz frequencies. The router had been set up with the 5.0 being named for their company and the 2.4 was named guest. Each had a different password. They also told me that their printer could not see their wifi but could see their guest network. Even though the printer was on the guest network one of the computers on their network could print to it.


They had recently switched to a new internet service provider and the new company just shipped them a new modem/router and gave them basic instructions on how to get it online. When they saw that there were two frequencies, they assumed it was two separate networks, so they named the 2.4 to guest because they figured the higher number was the better network for their business.


Based on this interaction and the many questions I have received about this I decided to completely explain the difference and how to best use your wifi if you have both frequencies. Th first thing to know is that they are not two separate networks but two different connections to the same network. It is kind of like taking a winding road or a straight road that both take you to the same place.


A 2.4 GHz connection travels farther at lower speeds, while 5 GHz frequencies provide faster speeds at shorter range. So, in your home or office it is helpful to have both. In many home situations the 5.0 GHz connection is used for gaming since these computers and consoles are usually stationary and probably set up near the router. If that is the case the 5.0 GHz connection will be faster which is needed for gaming. But if your gaming machine is not close to your router you might want to use the 2.4 GHz connection to ensure you won’t drop the signal.


When setting up the wifi on phones and laptops I usually tell people to connect to both networks and save the password on each so that as they move around their home or office, they will get the strongest signal at the time and place where they currently are. If you use your wifi on a patio or in your yard you will most likely want to use the 2.4GHz for this since it travels farther.


Now let’s address why their printer didn’t show up on their 5.0 GHz network. Many older components and also many smart devices only see the 2.4 GHz networks. Since these devices don’t need the higher speed and are always stationary, they don’t add the 5.0 GHz capability which probably saves them a few dollars per unit when they are manufactured. Hopefully they pass some of this onto the consumer.


Last year I was setting up a mesh wifi system for a church and they had a number of thermostats throughout that were all managed by a phone app, so they needed to connect to the wifi. While I was setting up their router and mesh system there was a setting that allowed me to combine both the 2.4 GHz and the 5.0 GHz into a single connection. I thought that might avoid confusion in the church about which one to connect to but the combined signal with both frequencies could not be seen by those thermostats, so I had to go back and remove that setting and list both frequencies separately.


I mentioned guest networks in the first paragraph but didn’t really explain them. A true guest network is just a tunnel out to the internet. When someone connects to your guest network, they cannot see your computers or printers. Usually, they can’t even see other computers that are connected to the guest network. This is very important for companies, so their computers are not compromised by hackers through their guest network. Most routers come with a guest network that can be turned on to keep guests’ connections walled off from your network.


If you are not sure if your guest network is separate from your main network or if you need any other help with your wifi network, let me know. I have helped many individuals and companies fix their networks by adding guest networks and expanding the networks with mesh wifi systems.

Think you will understand better if you watch a video? Here is a video version.