Networking House Advice

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SeismicNG

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Nov 18, 2015
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Hi All,

We've just moved house (Bungalow w/ Loft Conversion) and have had to switch to Sky for our broadband as Virgin isn't available in our area. The Sky Hub's wireless is pretty poor imo and doesn't reach 1 of the bedrooms upstairs and is fairly weak as soon as your out of the lounge where it's installed. We're completely refurbishing inside so am looking at running some cables and installing a couple of additional routers/switches to make sure everywhere gets decent connection.


My plan is to have the following all connected with Cat6 cables;

Sky Hub (WiFi Off) will have 3 Wireless Routers connected to it.
1 in Lounge, 1 Upstairs Landing, 1 Outbuilding at end of garden (to be Man Cave later)

Wireless Router on the landing will then have 2 switches connected to it.
1 in each room and will have PCs, Consoles etc on them


I'm pretty handy with computers but have never tried to do anything to this extent networking wise. I had looked into Powerline but after testing I found connection speed to drop by more than half in certain rooms, so its unfortunately out the window.

Just wondering if anyone can see anything wrong with this setup or have any suggestions on how I could improve the layout. Also when it comes to the switches, would I be better off with managed or unmanaged?


Thanks

H
 
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bill001g

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Aug 9, 2012
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You want to run the remote wireless routers as AP and not routers. You need to select non overlapping wireless channels.

This is pretty much the design used in commercial installs with remote wireless connected to a central hub it should work well.

Pretty much if you don't know why you need a managed switch you do not need it. They have lots of feature if you are not going to use you are pretty much just wasting your money.
 
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kanewolf

kanewolf

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May 29, 2013
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Here is how I would architect it -- Single switch connected to Sky Hub. Switch is POE enabled. Use POE powered WIFI APs (not routers) -- Look at Ubiquiti UniFi. Add additional ethernet cables to rooms to connect switches for consoles etc. Don't limit yourself to a single cable to a room.
 
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SeismicNG

Reputable
Nov 18, 2015
2
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4,510
Thanks for the replies. I've already got a couple of wireless routers lying around that I can set to APs. Trying to keep the cost down as much as possible at the moment but like the look of the Unifi so might change to these later.

Wondering if it might be better to set the Sky Hub to Modem Only then use 1 of the better routers as the central hub. I'll then run the other 2 from the new router as APs.
 
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bill001g

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Aug 9, 2012
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It all depends if the wiring works out. Since the router needs a connection to the ISP and a connection to your central switch or aps if the router is the switch it tends to need to be near the wiring. The wiring rooms in most houses I have seen are in places like the back of a closet which is not optimum for wireless.
 
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