2nd Wireless router as access point w/no physical connection between routers?

xer0615

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Jul 16, 2013
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I've been searching google for quite some time, and have browsed through the forum search results and have found several posts, but none of which contain relevant answers.


Long story short my NIC appears to be on its way out and rather than spend $20 on another, I thought I'd give setting up a network access point of sorts up.

It is my intention to use a wireless router I had lying around (Router B)as a network access point by receiving the wireless signal put out by my primary router (Router A) and using an Ethernet cable via one of the LAN ports to provide the PC which contains said failing NIC with a steady stream of delicious internet.

I have followed the instructions on several different guides ( http://www.geektonic.com/2007/06/how-to-setup-2nd-router-as-access-point.html for example; all were pretty much identical) and after the suggested changes have been made not only am I unable to connect to the internet, but windows fails to even identify the hardwired network. At this point I even lose access to the routers control panel and am forced to hard reset.

The instructions I followed so far were basically

Setting Router B within the same subnet mask( 255.255.255.)but outside of the IP range of Router A (ie A: 192.168.1.1 / B: 192.168.1.2)

DIsabling DHCP on Router B

Ensuring wireless security options were identical, that the SSID settings were identical as well as all frequency ranges.

Many of the guides also seem to be dependent on being able to physically connect both routers. Is it even possible to achieve what I am hoping for?

Router A is a NETGEAR WNDR3400, Router B is an Actiontec m1424-wr Rev D
 
Solution
That's to have the second router as an access point, so another point for devices to connect to.

You want a bridge, which is used to join two wired networks via WiFi. Many routers support this option, but not all.

xer0615

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Jul 16, 2013
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Router B does in fact have a Client Bridge option, and according to what I've read that is what is required to connect the access point via wifi and still act as a physical router-- is this information correct?
 

xer0615

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Jul 16, 2013
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Actually I may have spoken too soon.

I did have a LAN connection but it was horribly slow, and as it turned out windows had just finished an update. I performed the required restarts and now was not even able to connect via wifi. After disconnecting from the wireless network I was able to connect to the LAN, however I was not able to connect to the internet from here either.

From there I simply powered off the 2nd router and now am connected to the original wireless connection.

Will I have to change my router settings to a fixed static ip?

Any idea what this could possibly be the cause of?

After I updated this post I decided to switch it back on and see what occurs-- accordign to speedtest.net I am getting good speeds up and down with this wired connection (moved the receiver to an area with far less obstruction)

I am going to keep an eye on it, I can only guess tha the inconsistency may be caused some sort of conflict in one of the settings between the two routers or even Router B and my PC..
 

xer0615

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Jul 16, 2013
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Actually, once I noticed I could not connect I did unplug Router B and was able to connect to Router A's wifi signal and connect. Shortly thereafter I decided to turn ROuter B back on and after a couple moments it did indeed connect.

Steam Downloads are going at a steady 1.9 Mb/s

As stated in my previous update, i feel the inconsistency may be caused by some conflicting settings between router a and router b or router b and w7