Antenna placement

[Nas.CloudBusinessPortal]

On my rt-ax88u pro router…

The design of the router and placement of the antennas, is it crucial?

I have placed one router vertical with the two outside antennas printing up and the two interior antennas pointing down.

Any thoughts?

 

[L&LD]

Your statements are hard to follow (what does placing the 'router vertical' mean).

But Antennae placement does matter. This should be done after testing for the best Control Channel first.

For a single floor, all antennae, straight up, usually work best. With slight tilting possibly helping. The router's orientation, and height would help too (sometimes, mere inches/degrees can make a big difference in observed coverage and throughput).

For multiple floors, a 45-degree angle on one or two antennae may help give better coverage to other floors (to the detriment of the floor it's on).

Note that the area immediately underneath and immediately above a router is usually the worst coverage (with all antennae being vertical).

Control Channel Setup 2021

Control Channel Setup (more)

Tune your network for range and speed.

BYTE Articles - Dr Trevor Marshall

 

[mmjlmjl]

Best to align them with the direction of the receiving antennea, for hand held devices and laptops (antenna are usually in the screen) usually a ~45 degrees direction to all axis, for devices lying down horizontal for example.

In general, each antenna in a different direction from the others, for example for 3 antennea: one up or down, one ‘forward’ or ‘backwards’ and one to the left or right.

 

[Tech9]

Best to align them with the direction of the receiving antennea

Valid only in open spaces with no reflections.

 

[Justinh]

Which antenna broadcasts which band? What if different bands have different needs (orientation)?

 

[Tech9]

What if different bands have different needs (orientation)?

On this specific router model all antennas are dual-band dipoles with different gain on 2.4GHz and 5GHz. Whatever works best for both bands.

 

[sfx2000]

There's a lot of opinions on this, but general guidance would be to keep the antenna's aligned...

Look at your local cell towers - yep, they're lined up - not just for appearance, but for performance...

If you're wall mounted - two up/two down - that's basically the same as desktop with all pointing up...

 

[sfx2000]

Which antenna broadcasts which band?

they're shared across all bands...

 

[Nas.CloudBusinessPortal]

Your statements are hard to follow (what does placing the 'router vertical' mean).

But Antennae placement does matter. This should be done after testing for the best Control Channel first.

For a single floor, all antennae, straight up, usually work best. With slight tilting possibly helping. The router's orientation, and height would help too (sometimes, mere inches/degrees can make a big difference in observed coverage and throughput).

For multiple floors, a 45-degree angle on one or two antennae may help give better coverage to other floors (to the detriment of the floor it's on).

Note that the area immediately underneath and immediately above a router is usually the worst coverage (with all antennae being vertical).

Control Channel Setup 2021

Control Channel Setup (more)

Tune your network for range and speed.

BYTE Articles - Dr Trevor Marshall

The rt-ax88u is normally made to sit on the desk (horizontally).

I mounted mine on the wall (vertically) two antennas up and two antennas down.

 

[L&LD]

So many possible combinations here.

Pic?

 

[drinkingbird]

On my rt-ax88u pro router…

The design of the router and placement of the antennas, is it crucial?

I have placed one router vertical with the two outside antennas printing up and the two interior antennas pointing down.

Any thoughts?

As others have noted that is really not much different than all 4 facing up. Personally, I put the two outer ones at opposing 45 degree angles and the other 1 or 2 straight up. Has always worked well in my space, YMMV but that's a general recommendation I've seen from many manufacturers. You can't control the orientation of all your devices, reflections, etc and that covers more bases than having them all in the same plane. I wouldn't exceed 45 degrees (the old L shape doesn't apply anymore, that was from 802.11B and A days with antenna diversity). The antennas all work as a system.

 

[drinkingbird]

There's a lot of opinions on this, but general guidance would be to keep the antenna's aligned...

Look at your local cell towers - yep, they're lined up - not just for appearance, but for performance...

If you're wall mounted - two up/two down - that's basically the same as desktop with all pointing up...

Except on the cell towers half the antennas are typically vertically polarized and the other half horizontal or 45 degree.

 

[Tech9]

When the router is on the wall I would just make it look good. Antennas are low gain and the position makes little difference.

 

[Nas.CloudBusinessPortal]

Except on the cell towers half the antennas are typically vertically polarized and the other half horizontal or 45 degree.

I’m not using cellular towers.

 

[drinkingbird]

I’m not using cellular towers.

And that reply was not to you.

 

[Ceop]

[ASUS Wireless Router] How to improve reception of wireless(WiFi) signals(reduce wireless interference) | Official Support | ASUS Global

 

[Nas.CloudBusinessPortal]

So many possible combinations here.

Pic?

Don’t laugh.

 

[Piotrek]

Is it attached to the tv?
TV strongly blocks signal transmission...

 

[Nas.CloudBusinessPortal]

Is it attached to the tv?
TV strongly blocks signal transmission...

Yes… but that the only location I have for that room, there are four other AP in the house.

I can almost go 500 meters from my house.

 

[Piotrek]

Yes… but that the only location I have for that room, there are four other AP in the house.

It's hard to talk about the whole thing without knowing about the project, but it's better to place this one on or under or next to the TV.