What's the best way to setup my home connection?

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Vhiden
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What's the best way to setup my home connection?

Post by Vhiden »

Hello guys, thanks for your help beforehand.

I've finally managed to move my ISP Cable Modem to my room to experience low and estable ping. In consequence, I've made the rest of my house WiFi connection worst.

To make up for that, I set up a TP Link W940N in bridge mode with the Cable Modem to generate a new SSID broadcast with more range (DHCP disabled, no ethernet cable, all Wireless), aditionally I set up a TP Link WA850RE to expand this network. The thing is, the connection is pretty unstable and works whenever it wants. My ethernet connection became pretty unstable and for times it only loads Google Searches.

I'm really unexperienced when it comes to networking, so I probably messed something up. I don't even know how DHCP works and I think that has something to do with the issue.

What's the best way to setup this connection, given I have the following devices available:

ISP Cable Modem Model: F@ST 3890TP Link W940N Router (With Repeater and Bridge capabilities)TP Link WA850RE Repeater

Should I just set all up to repeat the ISP Cable Modem Wifi Network ?
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Philip
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Post by Philip »

DHCP should be provided by only one device on the LAN, in your case the cable modem/gateway.

The TP Link repeater should be in repeater mode (same as "RE", "range extender" mode), repeating the Cable modem's WiFi network.

In general, repeaters half the signal and introduce more noise on the network, as they have to communicate with two devices at the same time, it is better to use a wireless access point (ethernet cable on one side to the cable modem, WiFi to clients only). Still, with your devices the best way to set it up should be with the TP Link in repeater mode, at a location where the cable modem WiFi starts to become a bit weaker, but not too weak. Location is important, ideally only distant devices will use it.

To fine-tune the WiFi on the Cable modem side, you should probably choose 20MHz narrow channels (not 40MHz wide or higher) if there is that setting available. It should be set with WPA2-PSK (or WPA) wireless security.

I hope this helps
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Vhiden
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Post by Vhiden »

Yes, I have the option to set 20MHz, I will set that up on my ISP router

I will do that then, is it better to use TP Link W940N in Repeater mode or TP Link WA850RE Repeater for expanding the signal, or both?¡

I think both of them will bring more noise as you say an is a bit of an overkill.

Should I set the repeater to 20MHz too?
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Philip
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Post by Philip »

They would probably work similarly as far as performance if set as repeaters.
The repeater would be much easier to setup, as it has less options and a visual signal strength aid.
The router has the option to be set as an access point, this would be a more efficient mode than repeater, but require you to run an ethernet cable between the primary modem and that router.
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