wireless bridges to pair up with Netgear WNDR 3700?

[x509]

I bought this wireless router about a year+ ago, and it's just great. It's attached to the cable modem "downstairs" and right now it supports 2 smartphones wirelessly plus an ancient wired cable to an "upstairs" home office.

I'd like to improve overall performance with a wireless bridge to a gigabit hub in the upstairs office. I'd also like to add a second wireless bridge so I can stream movies to a box that would be attached to my TV, which does not have built-in wireless access.

What ca you guys suggest that would give me maximum performance? Trendnet seems to have some interesting wireless bridges, but in the past I had a Trendnet wireless router with really, reallly bad software.

 

[adam30k]

What about the performance do you want to improve? Wired is the fastest speed, I wouldn't call it ancient. A gigabit hub won't help you if it's running over wireless to the router. Wireless is slower. Also, a wireless bridge will be slower for devices then connecting directly to the wireless router or if range is an issue connecting to a second access point which is then WIRED into the router.

 

[SpaceHonkey]

Ditching a lan cable for wireless to go faster = fail.

Also remember when you add all these wireless bridges that the more wireless devices you have talking simultaneously, you have less overall bandwidth for any single station. Wifi is just like a hub, not a switch (one giant contention domain).

 

[x509]

What about the performance do you want to improve? Wired is the fastest speed, I wouldn't call it ancient. A gigabit hub won't help you if it's running over wireless to the router. Wireless is slower. Also, a wireless bridge will be slower for devices then connecting directly to the wireless router or if range is an issue connecting to a second access point which is then WIRED into the router.

I want to improve performance end-to-end from the cable modem to various systems, all running Windows.

You guys might laugh, but I installed 10Base 2 "thin" coax in the walls of my house 20 years ago when we were doing a remodel. That is limited to 10 mbit/second. So I've have a LAN in operation for 20 years. But my ISP now gives me a download speed of about 20 mbit/second into the cable modem. Most of my systems "upstairs" are connected to the cable modem "downstairs" via this now-ancient 10Base 2 coax.

The Gigabit switch is still useful to transfer files between the various systems in the upstairs home office and to send files to the printer also in the home office.

 

[x509]

Ditching a lan cable for wireless to go faster = fail.

Also remember when you add all these wireless bridges that the more wireless devices you have talking simultaneously, you have less overall bandwidth for any single station. Wifi is just like a hub, not a switch (one giant contention domain).

Understood, but it's not likely that we would be downloading big files to various windows systems at the same time that we are streaming a movie to a TV, or to two TVs.

 

[adam30k]

I want to improve performance end-to-end from the cable modem to various systems, all running Windows.

You guys might laugh, but I installed 10Base 2 "thin" coax in the walls of my house 20 years ago when we were doing a remodel. That is limited to 10 mbit/second. So I've have a LAN in operation for 20 years. But my ISP now gives me a download speed of about 20 mbit/second into the cable modem. Most of my systems "upstairs" are connected to the cable modem "downstairs" via this now-ancient 10Base 2 coax.

The Gigabit switch is still useful to transfer files between the various systems in the upstairs home office and to send files to the printer also in the home office.

Okay so that explains why you called the network ancient. If all the devices in the office are wired into a gigabit switch then yes they'll all benefit from it. I would try to wire an access point into your router instead of using a bridge but that will depend on the building. As for reviews there's a router thread here on [H] or I just look for the best reviewed products at Newegg. A lot of people here use UniFi in their homes too.

 

[x509]

Okay so that explains why you called the network ancient. If all the devices in the office are wired into a gigabit switch then yes they'll all benefit from it. I would try to wire an access point into your router instead of using a bridge but that will depend on the building. As for reviews there's a router thread here on [H] or I just look for the best reviewed products at Newegg. A lot of people here use UniFi in their homes too.

Thanks for the reply.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding something, because I'm relatively new to wireless networking.

My router is a combination wired/wireless device. I'm using the wired part to connect a system that is "downstairs" right next to the router. And, I connect my ancient 10Base2 "backbone" to the wired part.

In my home office "upstairs," I'm wanting to replace the 10Base2 connection to the local gigabit hub with a wireless bridge.

Is this explanation clear? Am I understanding the technical points correctly?

I checked out the UniFi website, and it appears that I would want the AirWire product. I checked out pricing and it's about $135-$145, before shippng and tax. For that price, less, actually, I could get another NetGear WNDR 3700. I was hoping for something less expensive!

 

[adam30k]

UniFi is actually one of the products from Ubiquiti but yeah there may be a few different products that would work for you. If you want to buy a bridge I would get one from Ubi then one from another company. Is your coax stapled inside your walls? If it's not you could actually use it to pull an CAT5E or CAT6 line through your wall. Wired since bridges are usually much slower then normal wifi.

Just to be clear is this what your network looks like..

 

[x509]

UniFi is actually one of the products from Ubiquiti but yeah there may be a few different products that would work for you. If you want to buy a bridge I would get one from Ubi then one from another company. Is your coax stapled inside your walls? If it's not you could actually use it to pull an CAT5E or CAT6 line through your wall. Wired since bridges are usually much slower then normal wifi.

adam30k,

I once thought that I could use the coax as the "pull cord" to get CAT5E or even CAT6, plus fiber. But when I put the coax in back 20 years ago, I wasn't thinking ahead. I should have put in a plastic pipe raceway between floors, but I didn't.

I'm not sure that the coax is actually stapled in but it does take some twists and turns to route around joists, closet frames, etc. Maybe at some point, I'll screw up the courage to try, using some very good lubricants, but only after I have a fallback in place, namely wireless.

At each end of the coax, I have a hub that has both RJ-45 and coax connectors. These boxes are very old, and I had to replace them at least twice now, with stuff I can find only on eBay. Honestly if one of these boxes failed again, I'm not even sure that could find a replacement.

 

[adam30k]

You could always try pulling just to see what would happen. Try it without ends/plugs on the ethernet or coax cable so they are less likely to snag on something. Then again you'll need to then learn how to terminate cat5e/cat6 although that's not that hard.

Other then that you could look at some of the wireless bridge hardware. You are better off with something like Airwire rather then a wireless repeater, which will be slow to run through.

 

[x509]

You could always try pulling just to see what would happen. Try it without ends/plugs on the ethernet or coax cable so they are less likely to snag on something. Then again you'll need to then learn how to terminate cat5e/cat6 although that's not that hard.

My reluctance to do this right away is partly that I would want to build a mini wiring-closet near the cable modem, and I would need to think through a bunch of issues, including how many CAT5Es to each location, how many fiber cables, etc. I would run phone services over one CAT5E and data over the other. Not sure about how many fiber cables, and I do know that fiber termination isn't as simple as a crimp tool for CAT 5E. So this rapidly becomes a "project."

Other then that you could look at some of the wireless bridge hardware. You are better off with something like Airwire rather then a wireless repeater, which will be slow to run through.

For the price of an Airwire, or maybe even a bit less, I can pick up another NetGear WNDR 3700 and just run it in bridge mode. Would that be as slow as a run of the mill bridge?