Working through Wi-Fi Woes

Here’s a paraphrasing of the most common call TechStreamlined receives for residential tech support:

We contacted our Internet service provider (ISP) because we thought our Internet surfing felt slow.

Tech Support at our ISP ran checks, and unsurprisingly responded with, “Everything looks good on our side. What you need is a higher speed (and higher cost) package.”

Web-surfing sometimes does feel faster now, but only in certain places in the house. There are still lots of areas in the house where things don’t work well or won’t connect at all.

Our ISP next suggested we purchase and install their (expensive) Wi-Fi boosters, which we did. Now we have 4 bars of Wi-Fi everywhere in the house, but it feels like those boosters actually made things worse!

Regarding your ISP’s upsell of higher speed, please read another of my posts, “The Need for Internet Speed?” to understand why you may already be paying for more Internet bandwidth (“speed”) than you need.

Your ISP's findings of, "Good on our side!" makes sense. The idea of “boosters” is probably the right track.

The likely problem is your Wi-Fi is underperforming because the “Wi-Fi coverage-blanket” is threadbare and full of holes.

Here are a few thoughts to consider when trying to improve your Wi-Fi experience:

• Implement a “mesh” Wi-Fi system.

  Mesh is not the same as "extenders" - it's much better.

  
  

  • Eero’s mesh Wi-Fi systems* have been reliable performers over the past few years, in my experience, and I (will) have another blog post articulating why I recommend these for residential clients.

  • Don’t use the “booster” pods sold by your ISP. Hopefully you're reading this in time to cancel or return any ISP pods you’ve already purchased.

    
    

• Optimize the configuration on the device provided by your ISP.

  Some of the default settings can negatively affect performance if not adjusted to co-exist with a 3rd-party Wi-Fi system.

  
  

  • Turn off the Wi-Fi radios in the ISP’s device if you can - there’s usually an option for this in the gateways user-interface.

  • Switch the ISP’s gateway device to operate in “Bridge Mode” if possible (assuming your mesh system provides functionality of a firewall).

  • At the very least, ensure the Wi-Fi network name (aka “SSID”) set in the ISP device is not the same as the SSID used in your mesh system.
    

• Be deliberate in placement of the Wi-Fi system's satellite antennae.

  The objective in placement of the antennae is to foster the best signal between the antenna as possible. The mesh antennae need a good signal radiating between them so the data can "leapfrog" its way out to the Internet and back. Be willing to sacrifice a reception-bar on your devices for the sake of improving the reception-bars between the mesh antennae.

  
  

  • Don't put the satellite antennae at the locations in the house where you've been needing better Internet performance.

    • Instead, find a spot just over half way between that location and the location of another satellite antenna.

  • Don’t put the Wi-Fi antennae where the line-of-sight between them includes stairs.

  • Don’t put any of the antennae directly above each other if you’re placing them on different floors of your home.

  • Don't put any of the antennae anywhere near a microwave!

  
  

• And this earlier point is important enough to repeat and rephrase:
  

  • The SSID (network name) used in your mesh system must not match the SSID coming from the ISP’s device. An ISP device with a matching SSID will not function as another antenna contributing to performance of the mesh system, it will instead attract devices away from the good, mesh Wi-Fi system!

There are a myriad of other factors to consider when implementing a Wi-Fi system and deciding on optimal locations for a mesh system’s satellites.

Every environment is different, and the behavior of your devices on Wi-Fi can sometimes feel like a spontaneous change suddenly made things worse.

If you’ve followed these guidelines and are still looking to streamline your Wi-Fi experience, reach out to Ari at TechStreamlined is Chicagoland’s Wi-Fi Whisperer!

*NOTE: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.