How To Powerline with AC wifi?

[ewwatson]

I have a ASUS (RT-AC68U) Wireless-AC1900 Dual-Band Gigabit Router upstairs. I'm using the 5GHz 802.11AC channel. I need to get this 5GHz AC wifi downstairs with a AP router or other. I have no ethernet wiring in the home. So power line adapter is my best bet. But the power line adapter seems to be my choke point. Because I cant find one with AC wifi tech only the old version of wifi. n or whatever it is. Other than hard wiring a AP downstairs is there any other way to get 802.11AC wifi access point downstairs as well?

Currently I'm using this as my downstairs access point ... TP-LINK TL-WPA4220KIT ADVANCED 300Mbps Universal WiFi Range Extender, Repeater, AV500 Powerline Edition.

 

[azazel1024]

Yeah, use a powerline adapter and plug that in to a router in access point mode.

That said, keep in mind if it is "downstairs", odds are excellent that even the best of the best powerline adapter is only going to net you maybe 150Mbps of physical throughput to the access point.

If you want much more than that, you'll need to run ethernet.

 

[zakoh]

Note that there is a good chance than powerline will not keep up with the AC speeds. That is, the powerline _may_ be the choke point between the two AC access points. I just installed a pair of Netgear PLP1200 about 25 feet away from each other in a relatively new house. I did some speed testing, and I am getting a solid 50-60Mbps speed between these two. However, even wireless N300 can match that speed at the same distance in my house, and AC will be even faster. It's not a big problem for me because I use this powerline link to connect my modem, which is in a corner of the house, to a more centrally located wireless access point. Since my internet uplink is 20Mbps or less, these powerline adapters are fine for me.

But my situation is all on the same floor, but who knows about different floors. 5GHz seems to travel poorly between floors in my house, so a powerline link to the second floor would help. I just doubt this link will be the same speed you can achieve between an ac client and a wireless router on the same floor (from close distance at least).

 

[thiggins]

As with wireless, you may need to do some experimentation to get best performance from powerline. Those adapters should deliver at least 100 Mbps.

Remove wall-wart power adapters in the vicinity. Plug directly into wall. Don't plug anything else into the same outlet and make sure no AFCI breakers are protecting either outlet.

 

[azazel1024]

As with wireless, you may need to do some experimentation to get best performance from powerline. Those adapters should deliver at least 100 Mbps.

Remove wall-wart power adapters in the vicinity. Plug directly into wall. Don't plug anything else into the same outlet and make sure no AFCI breakers are protecting either outlet.

At least with newer construction that is increasingly hard as AFCI breakers are mandated by newer versions of the electrical code. So most houses from the late 1990s on have AFCI breakers for bedrooms (which often include offices). Some of them aren't the "bad type" of AFCI breaker, but a lot of them are.

 

[thiggins]

At least with newer construction that is increasingly hard as AFCI breakers are mandated by newer versions of the electrical code. So most houses from the late 1990s on have AFCI breakers for bedrooms (which often include offices). Some of them aren't the "bad type" of AFCI breaker, but a lot of them are.

That's correct. Not all will kill powerline signals. But people should be aware that some brands can. And no, I don't know what the good ones are. I know the Murray MP-AT's I have are in the "bad" category.

 

[stevech]

My house isn't unusual for 80's construction where the cheap-a** builder put ONE GFI outlet in the garage and ran ROMEX off of that to all outlets in wet areas and to the outlets on the patio. Once, rain got into the patio outlet and tripped the GFI. It took me a long time to find that.

 

[stevech]

.... Since my internet uplink is 20Mbps or less, these powerline adapters are fine for me.

Did you mean the Internet downlink (ISP to you) speed is 20Mbps or less?

My downlink is 56Mbps, uplink is 5Mbps. My MoCa link to TV area is 70Mbps net yield of all overhead.

 

[zakoh]

Did you mean the Internet downlink (ISP to you) speed is 20Mbps or less?

My downlink is 56Mbps, uplink is 5Mbps. My MoCa link to TV area is 70Mbps net yield of all overhead.

Yes, that's what I meant.. net tests show about 20mbps/1.5mbps up/down.

 

[Khoa Nguyen]

i'm having the same configuration, asus ac68R as the main router in my office and a wpa44220 kit to extend internet to the 2nd floor. My ISP plan gives 45Mbps and i'm having no problem getting that through the eithernet port of the adapter but wifi i'm only getting 25 at most. The wifi configuration is N-only, 40Mhz, channel 3(most opened in my area). I'm not sure if my area is bad for wifi since the wifi analyzer picks up atleast 10 other wifi from the neighbors.

 

[stevech]

10 other neighboring SSIDs is no issue. The question is always: How BUSY is an SSID that's within 3 channels of your chosen channel? If too busy, you'll be competing for air time. And busyness varies a lot by the neighbors' habits.

If you suspect a too-busy channel, change yours to either 1, 6 or 11 as a rule, in 2.4GHz.

 

[sfx2000]

10 other neighboring SSIDs is no issue. The question is always: How BUSY is an SSID that's within 3 channels of your chosen channel? If too busy, you'll be competing for air time. And busyness varies a lot by the neighbors' habits.

If you suspect a too-busy channel, change yours to either 1, 6 or 11 as a rule, in 2.4GHz.

Yep, completely agree... and one more point to consider - one only needs about 20dB above the overlapping BSS (neighbor's AP and clients) before they're a real problem - below that, they're in the noise floor...

 

[azazel1024]

Yep, completely agree... and one more point to consider - one only needs about 20dB above the overlapping BSS (neighbor's AP and clients) before they're a real problem - below that, they're in the noise floor...

But keep in mind, that 20dB needs to be above the minimum signal strength you need/want/experience from your network. If you have -35dBm 5ft from your router and your neighbor's BSS is -65dBm, you are good. However, if you wander to the edge of your apartment/house/condo/tent and your BSS is now -58dBm and your neighbor's is -52dBm, they are going to over power your wifi network (well, if co-channel). Probably a more like set of numbers would be more like -35dBm for your's near your router and -70dBm nearer the edge of your house and a neighbors might be -70dBm near your router and -75dBm far from your router or something along those lines.

I am lucky that the worst I see in my house is about -85dBm for a neighbors network and -55dBm for my network at the "worst" locations. Of course mine is somewhat weaker than that in the worst spots in my house, but my neighbors' networks are even weaker than 85dBm there. Advantages of living >100ft from my closest neighbor.

 

[sfx2000]

Always take measurements from where the clients are, not where the AP is first - then double check at the AP location.

11n tightenup the co-channel/adjacent channel noise rejection specs quite a bit compared to earlier versions of the 802.11 specifications..