For some context, there are
- 4 pink cables. These are all CAT 5E cables, with RJ45 jacks. The four are named: DEMARC, Family Room, Room Room, & Master Bedroom.
- 4 white cables. These are all coaxial cables (with the copper wire protruding). The four are also named: DEMARC, Family Room, Game Room, & Master Bedroom.
Currently, the ‘DEMARC coaxial cable’ is connected to the ‘Family Room coaxial cable’ and the combo router (NETGEAR router + modem) in the Family Room is connected on the other end using another coaxial cable running from the wall to the combo router (which is on the first floor).
There is good internet connection on the first floor, but it utterly sucks on the second floor.
I got a WiFi extender and I put it half way between the first floor and second floor, but it’s useless. It doesn’t help at all. The speed on the first floor for the 5GHz WiFi is about 400 gbps, but by the time it gets to the stairs, it about 20gbps.
I plan to utilize the wired connection for max. network. What’s the best way to optimize this? I did some research on how a networking switch would help here, but I’m not sure where to put the combo router to optimize it - the aim is such that there’ll still be good network on the first floor for visitors and good network on the second floor as well (for gaming & WFH).
Be happy for those pink cables.
Right now, you got your modem/router in the Family Room, and it’s doing well covering the first floor. You also have a CAT5e Family Room pink cables there too. Logically it should be right next to your router.
All you need to do is plug one of your 4 LAN ports on your router into the Family Room CAT5e. This connection then leads back into your wiring cabinet (the picture you provided).
Second, buy a small switch, and install it into that cabinet. A 5 port or 8 port switch will do, as you only have a few pink cables. Then plug in the CAT5e from the Family Room, Room Room, and Master Bedroom into that switch. You can leave the Demarc cable unplugged, because that cable probably goes outside.
Having gotten this far, your Room Room and Master Bedroom Ethernet ports (RJ45) are now active and are a part of your network and have Internet flowing in their veins.
So you can now attach other switches to these active Ethernet ports and connect wired devices to them. You can also connect an Access Point (or two!) to these connections to give you a new source for WiFi coverage. If you give this Access Point the same WiFi SSID and password as your current Netgear, then devices can potentially “roam” between them when moving from one floor to another.
Hopefully the Master Bedroom or Room Room is upstairs, and can thus cover the second floor.
Instead of buying a separate switch and Access Point for your new connection, sometimes it’s simpler to just buy another router and set it into “Access Point Mode”, which is like a switch and WiFi Access Point combined into one. Any router can do this. This sub favors buying a separate switch and dedicated Access Point, but for a simple setup, I don’t mind just getting a second router and using that instead.
So you need some Ethernet cables, at least one switch for the cabinet, maybe one or two switches for the other rooms, maybe one or two dedicated Access Points for new WiFi, OR maybe one or two additional routers set to “Access Point Mode” to act as both a switch and an Access Point.
I just read ‘Room Room’ and realized I made a mistake.😂 it should be ‘Game Room’. My bad!
This is super helpful.
For the second router that I can put upstairs and set as ‘Access Point’, should I expect it to have the exact same speed as the router downstairs after connecting it using the Ethernet cable, or would it drop in any way?
Good reply! One detail I’d add:
This is true, but some devices are very bad at giving up a negotiated link, so you might end up with bad performance because your device is trying to not to the AP that was the closest when you brought the network up, but you then walked to the other floor. So you may (depending on your devices) need to force your WiFi to reassociate (usually disconnecting and reconnecting to WiFi does this) if you’re roaming from one AP to the other frequently.
There are fancier setups where you have multiple APs and a central controller; the advantage of these systems is the controller can decide that you’re talking to the “wrong” AP and force you to disassociate. I don’t personally know many people who have bothered with something this complex in their home, but it’s quite common if you’re trying to setup WiFi for a campus.