Really slow internet in observatory

[tooth_dr]

I’m getting 4-5mb now via the tplink despite changing nowt. 

[tooth_dr]

This is a test I just done there now.  I feel this is more than adequate 

[wxsatuser]

Our Smart hub easily reaches the obsy 40feet down the garden.
The hub has to pass the wifi from the other side of the house through the kitchen and an outside wall, so not to bad.
The Hub 5 could'nt do this and I had an extender on the outside kitchen wall that was no good at all.

[Anne S]

I use one of the Bt range extenders based in the observatory. It sits in an extension lead on a windowsill. Before that I had a problem with internet in the observatory. The smarthub in in the hall which means the signal has several solid walls to go through.

Before the fibre upgrade my home Hub was on the landing  internal walls are plasterboard and I didn't have any issues.

 

[Rob Sellent]

We have fibre-optic internet and a house of around 300m² and a garden of just over 150m² . Needless to say, there were areas where the wi-fi range slowed significantly. A few weeks back I purchased a tp-link 300Mbs range extender and it works. All rooms seem to be serviced, there is no interference and for my wife's use and my own there is a decent wifi speed so we can work without frustration. 

[skybadger]

Rob, can you post the model link please ?

 

[stash_old]

If you can Wire the Obsys to your home system - you have 100m to play with before any real degradation - and thats without an extra switch/hub which would extend the distance again.

No Wifi set up can compete with 1gb wired Ethernet and that's not to mention the inherent Wifi Latency delay.

Its also the cheapest ,least troublesome and simplest method - 100m outside grade good quality around £50inc vat. If you cant do to the RJ45 ends and your holes thru obstacles are big enough most places will put on the ends for you. Having said that the RJ45kit (crimper etc) are around £15 and its not hard to do- or phone a friend !  In your obsys a simple 8 port TP-Link 1gb hub is less then £20.

HOWEVER this is only true if your Internet at the Router is faster than the speeds you are quoting (FTTP should be by miles 😞 ) or you haven't 12 kids all online gaming at the same time 🙂

[Rob Sellent]

2 hours ago, skybadger said:

Rob, can you post the model link please ?

Almost identical to this one  I went to a local computer shop and explained the house set up and general internet usage (there are only two of us at home and neither of us are online gamers etc) and was recommended the tp-link 300. However, there are many different types of tp-link range extenders with differing types of power, so it's probably best to pop along to your local store and explain to them your own circumstamces etc, so they can advise you which one is best . Even if the store doesn't have the one you need, they can get you in the right ball park to then order online, for example. On a side note, it wasn't necessary in my own case, but you can also have more than one ranger dotted around the abode all linked to the same router.

Hope this helped

[AstroPhil]

I use one of these: Netgear range extender

A cable will always trump wireless, especially with regards to latency and interference, but one of these can either bridge the wifi from the BT-supplied (or the ISP of your choice) hub to a point close to your end point (window facing the garden/Obsy?) Or plug it into a port via a cat5 cable and likewise place it as close as you can to the observatory. I use it in bridge mode and it is fine. You can also select either the 5GHz or 2GHz bands (or both). The 5GHz band is newer, has a higher theoretical bandwidth, and is a less congested band for interference. But it's easier to block (smaller wavelength)... 

[discardedastro]

On 20/08/2019 at 22:42, StarryEyed said:

get a WiFi extender and stick it high up in the loft. One that will connect to your existing WiFi and extend it. Put this one directly over your access point in the house but with no obvious metal obstructions. Go in the garden and find a quite channel not the same as your existing AP.  fix your extender to this channel. I get a WiFi connection 50m from the house. Irrespective of all the neighbours WiFi. In the garden garage and front of the house. I full bandwidth connections. Only use this for connections outside keep it free for that purpose alone.

Netgear do some nice and cheap ones.

Directly over the existing antenna is likely to be one of the worst places to put it - omnidirectional antenna (as featured in nearly all home routers) radiate as a "doughnut", with a null above and below, so directly above is likely to have poor coverage and provide poor signal. Putting additional access points (not extenders, dual radio devices aka mesh access points) within the home closer to the weak spot is the way to go. I've tested probably 10 or so different routers for $work as well as mesh devices with proper test kit in a variety of homes and that's a very consistent finding.

But the right answer is always run a cable 🙂

Edited August 23, 2019 by discardedastro

[Rusted]

For those of us still enjoying this newfangled wireless "thingy" I have discovered the orientation of my laptop matters.

End-on to the distant router seems to be favourite for maximum speed on the Ookla straights.

GM

[Waldemar]

2 hours ago, Rusted said:

For those of us still enjoying this newfangled wireless "thingy" I have discovered the orientation of my laptop matters.

End-on to the distant router seems to be favourite for maximum speed on the Ookla straights.

GM

That shows how critical and unreliable wifi is... For me only wired connections, even if it were only for health reasons...

[Rusted]

43 minutes ago, Waldemar said:

That shows how critical and unreliable wifi is... For me only wired connections, even if it were only for health reasons...

I'll wear a tinfoil pirate hat. Just to be on the safe side.

[discardedastro]

TBH, for cases where it's "just marginal" and a cable isn't an option I'd first reach for a decent external USB WiFi dongle and a (quality) USB extension lead. You can leave that in situ in your obsy where you've got better reception and just plug into it as you would your scope. https://amzn.to/320i95f and https://amzn.to/2NskUIq are both good ones I've used for this purpose before - the Alfa is particularly good as it has a socket built in, so you can just use a straight USB cable instead of an extender - one less thing to go wrong.

[StarryEyed]

13 hours ago, discardedastro said:

Directly over the existing antenna is likely to be one of the worst places to put it - omnidirectional antenna (as featured in nearly all home routers) radiate as a "doughnut", with a null above and below, so directly above is likely to have poor coverage and provide poor signal. Putting additional access points (not extenders, dual radio devices aka mesh access points) within the home closer to the weak spot is the way to go. I've tested probably 10 or so different routers for $work as well as mesh devices with proper test kit in a variety of homes and that's a very consistent finding.

But the right answer is always run a cable 🙂

Not so horizontally polarised antennas pick up less noise less interference from other broadcast and are directional. You get better signal to noise ratios and better signal strength,  coupled with beam forming or multipath give better results than vertically polarised antennas. This is why antennas on your routers allow you to rotate them. All my antennas are horizontal which why I get great coverage even up and down the street on 5Ghz.

[discardedastro]

1 minute ago, StarryEyed said:

Not so horizontally polarised antennas pick up less noise less interference from other broadcast and are directional. You get better signal to noise ratios and better signal strength,  coupled with beam forming or multipath give better results than vertically polarised antennas. This is why antennas on your routers allow you to rotate them. All my antennas are horizontal which why I get great coverage even up and down the street on 5Ghz.

You can, in some scenarios, get better performance - but routers with external, directional antennas are pretty unusual from a "typical home router" perspective (and almost all of the ones you can buy in PC World and so on are actually omnis, even if they "look" directional - it's a nice marketing trick, making the plastic housing look like it's directional). Most home routers, especially those provided by ISPs, use either omnidirectional antenna or a mix of polarised omni antennas (much more common these days with MIMO), but the overall resultant signal coverage still typically provides a null above the router. I've demonstrated that through measurements on several versions of the VM, BT, and other home routers.

WiFi is really hard, especially 5GHz, to make meaningful antenna design/alignment designs around - the best bet is to get decent modern kit which has good RF design and preamps, as well as a solid chipset to do beamforming, and hope for the best. The Ubiquiti stuff is good on that front, as is some of the higher-end Netgear and Linksys kit. The BT hub in particular is actually very good, too.

[tooth_dr]

Just to wrap this up, I ran a cable to my house underground in an existing duct and brought it straight in beside a socket. I then connected this directly to a powerline adapter. This was a compromise as my wife didn’t want a cable run through the house into the router. I still get over 10 mps and it never drops out so I’m delighted.  Thanks for all the input. 

Edited December 27, 2019 by tooth_dr