Making use of a second router to extend....

[promark51]

Hello......just would like to say that I love this website....lots of great information and I literally spend hours researching and investigating.....thanks so much for letting me be a part of it.

My question: I would like to extend the wireless range in my home with an unused Linksys WRT54GS. My primary router is the DLink DIR-655. I have spent hours and hours to get this to work but for some reason I cannot get it to work.

Physically, I have the DIR-555 on the second floor of the home at the very west side of the house where it is connected to the modem/internet. I ran cat 5E up through the attic in order to connect the unused WRT54GS at the very east side of the home, mounted up in the attack (I have many "dead spots" on the east side of the home).

I have setup the linksys router with DHCP off, matched the values of the default SSID, Wireless mode, the security mode and the passphrase with the DLink, assigned different channels for both routers and changed the linksys mode from gateway to router. I have them connect from LAN port to LAN port, the WAN port is not being used on the linksys.

In terms of the ip addresses, the Dlink ip is 192.168.0.1 and the linksys ip is 192.168.1.1....from what I have read, the second router has to be in the same range as the primary but an unused address....so I have tried to change the ip of the linksys to 192.168.0.4 or 5 or 6 etc.....but the router will not accept the ip, the router just freezes up and I have to do a hard reset to reconnect back to it for configuration. Could this be the source of my problems.

Now, before I physically mounted the linksys up in the attic at the other end of the house, I tested the setup within a few feet of the primary router with the above mentioned settings and I was able to connect to the linksys wirelessly with a laptop. (I knew this as I gave the primary and secondary routers different SSID values so that I could distinguish which was which.) BUT, as soon as I move the Linksys up to its permanent home up in the attic, I can detect the linksys router with different devices (laptop, ipad, etc,) but can never connect. I took the laptop upstairs in the attic thinking that maybe the building or structure was interefering, but still couldn't connect within feet of the linksys. What am I doing wrong? Why was I able to connect next to the primary router, but not up in the attic.

This lead me to believe that the CAT5e connectors were spliced in incorrectly but I have double and triple checked the connections and re-done them several times (I am using the standard T568-A pairings)....still no connections.

Is what I am proposing to do not possible with a Dlink and Linksys router? If not, why did it work as mentioned above? Is it the length of the cat5E cable? (roughly 50-60).

I am at my whits end trying to figure this out but I just can't justify purchasing a labeled AP/BRIDGE/REPEATER when I have this perfectly good router that I could make use of.

I have hear of the DD WRT firmware for the Linksys.....is this something I should look into?

Any help would be appreciated, thanks for taking the time to read the lengthy post and I look forward to your insight into this.

 

[Emerald]

when you change the LAN IP of the Linksys it will seem as if it freezes since you computer is not able to communicate to the router anymore due to the different IP scheme.

once you have changed the IP of the router you will have to change the IP of the computer to the new IP scheme of the Linksys.

for testing purposes hard reset the Linksys router, leave the DHCP enabled, and setup the wireless. Then connect the network cable that you pulled to the WAN port of the Linksys.

You should be able to connect to the Linksys and be able to PING 192.168.1.1

log into the Linksys and check the Status to see if the WAN port has a IP of 192.168.0.xxx

usually for networking T568-B pairing is used; however, T568-A pairing, which is commonly used for telephone, should work. The main thing is that wires are on the same Pin of the connector.


regarding DD-WRT firmware it works great. It will give you the option to wirelessly connect the Linksys to the D-Link.

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Repeater_Bridge

 

[promark51]

Emerald, thanks for the response.

What I meant by the freezing is that when I attempt to change the address and I try to re-enter the configuration page with the new ip address, the router will not respond at all.........it seems that it wont let me change the ip address range....this was attempted several times. I have to reset the router to re-enter the configuration menus which obviously defaults to 192.168.1.1.

Question if the dlink ip address is 192.168.0.1 and the linksys by default is 192.168.1.1....do I have to go any further than that? Or does the linksys have to be within the range of the dlink (192.168.0.X)?

I heard that the DD-WRT firmware would do that......makes me wonder why I put all that work into running that cat5 up in the attic.

I will try what you suggested and chime back in.

Thanks again.

 

[Emerald]

the two routers need to be on the same IP scheme if you intent to share files between computers.