Advice on dual band repeater

[jtp10181]

Ok, little background. I know what I am doing, and very technical. I have a networking degree if that says anything.

Have an Asus Ac56r router and love it.

Building I live in is very over saturated with 2.4 ghz. About 20ft from the router through 2 walls I can barely get 1mpbs at peak hours. Get up to around 8 Mbps I think when everyone else is at work and school. Already tried all the usual tricks with channels and router settings. This is as good as it gets.

I have everything switched to the 5ghz band which works awesome, except two devices that are only 2.4ghz

I want to setup a repeater that will talk to the main router only on 5ghz but then broadcast two different unique SSIDs, one for each band. It will be very close to the two 2.4ghz clients (chrome casts).

I have not found any wifi extenders that will do this, so I think I need a second router.

I think this could be done with the ASUS firmware if configured right. I am thinking about getting a small router I can wall mount in one of the bedrooms so it's out of the way.

Looking for advice or suggestions please.

I know I will sacrifice bandwidth with a repeater but the 5ghz has plenty of speed to work with, if I can even pull 10mbps consistently it will be plenty.

Maybe it would just be cheaper to ditch the chrome casts and upgrade to something that can do 5ghz....

I still need a repeater to get the 5ghz to the far ends of my place but I have a cheap linksys that works decent for that, just wish I could change the SSID and channel on the repeated network, it only lets you mirror it with almost no settings.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[thiggins]

Look at the NETGEAR EX6150 or EX6200
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...ar-ex6150-ac1200-wifi-range-extender-reviewed
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...c1200-high-power-wifi-range-extender-reviewed

Just remember that clients using the radio you use for backhaul (5 GHz) will get a 50% throughput reduction due to retransmission.

 

[Trip]

If at all possible, cable. Else, powerline or MoCa. Last resort, repeater, and if so, I always try and make radios/firmwares as identical as possible. If you're open to loading Tomato or DD-WRT, you could do another 56U and run WDS (I don't believe stock supports it). Not the optimal setup, but if there's absolutely no way you can wire, it might give you better results than a vanilla repeater.

 

[jtp10181]

Tim, thanks for the reply. Are you sure those two can do what I want? Using your lingo I would use the 5Ghz band as the BACKHAUL, all the time no matter what. But allow incoming connections on both bands (ideally with different SSIDs from the backhaul SSID)

I posted this question on the EX6100 on amazon and Netgear told me no on that one, but I honestly would trust you over some random netgear support person. Can the EX6100 do it also? That one is a lot less.

http://www.amazon.com/possible-tran...onnect/forum/Fx32D3U5VJ8TLL9/Tx2P0IOFYRTBAMZ/

 

[jtp10181]

Well I am going to be right next to a Best Buy tonight and their site says both of those are in stock and the same price as on Amazon so I will grab one. At least if it doesn't work how I want I can just take it right back to Best Buy and not deal with shipping it.

I hope it works good, that's more than I paid for my router, heh!

 

[Klueless]

Well I am going to be right next to a Best Buy tonight and their site says both of those are in stock and the same price as on Amazon so I will grab one. At least if it doesn't work how I want I can just take it right back to Best Buy and not deal with shipping it.

Kinda curious as to how you made out? If I recall right the 6100 does not support the backhaul (fastlane) and, if I recall right, while the 6150 does that would only leave you with with one radio (2.4Ghz) for clients?

 

[jtp10181]

I ended up getting a ex6200 so I could put it up on a shelf. It does exactly what I wanted. Connects to the router only on 5ghz but then broadcasts 2g and 5g.

Sent from my XT1080 using Tapatalk

 

[Klueless]

Connects to the router only on 5ghz but then broadcasts 2g and 5g.

Thank you. Exactly what I wanted to know. I don't think that was one of the options on my 6150, I fastlane to the router at 5 but it only broadcasts at 2.4 to clients. I'm almost tempted to go back and look closer but everything is working so well between buildings I'll probably just leave well enough alone.

Oh, wait, you didn't configure fastlane did you? Somewhere (and I missed it) you found that you can set only one radio to the router yet set up both radios for clients. Fastlane must be the "dummy is me" button to effect a similar configuration. I think I like what you did better than what the fastlane button does.

So when Chromecast connects at 2.4 you get fastlane performance but the flexibility (along with the penalty) of connecting at 5 when you wander in with your smart phone?

 

[jtp10181]

Yes I disabled the fastlane and essentially had it mirror the 5ghz, then I added the 2g and configured that standalone without telling it that it existed on the original router. So yes the 2.4ghz would get fastlane performance. I can still pull my max Internet speed from the 5ghz in the furthest room at 60mbps on the 5ghz too! So it worked out prefect.

Sent from my XT1080 using Tapatalk

 

[Klueless]

Yes I disabled the fastlane and essentially had it mirror the 5ghz, then I added the 2g and configured that standalone without telling it that it existed on the original router. So yes the 2.4ghz would get fastlane performance. I can still pull my max Internet speed from the 5ghz in the furthest room at 60mbps on the 5ghz too! So it worked out prefect.

Thank you, you were very helpful.