Help spreading Google WiFi pucks through the house for better wifi

Forums › LAN (ethernet/Wifi/routers/Bluetooth) › Help spreading Google WiFi pucks through the house for better wifi

rodrigolinsr

6 posts

Wannabe Geek

#278433 15-Oct-2020 11:06

Hello everybody,

This is my first post on GeekZone 🙂

I've lived for 4 years here in New Zealand in an apartment far north here in Auckland, Whangaparaoa, and never had access to Fibre internet there. I just moved into a house that is like 1km away from the apartment where it has support for Fibre! Then I hired the Ultrafast Fibre 900/400 with 2degrees, and they are about to install it here in the next couple of days.

The only problem now is that I don't think I'll get advantage of most of this speed if I don't setup my network correctly. The house I'm living in is a 2 storey house, and to make things worse, all the bedrooms (and my office) are upstair, while the Fibre OTN box and the router are located downstairs in the living room. Here's the floor plan for the house:

I have 3 Google WiFi points available to distribute through the house. I'm keen to buy one more if it'd make a difference. Do you guys have recommendations on where I would put them? I'll definitely need to plug one of them directly into the router, which will leave me with just 2 available to put upstairs 😓. Would you guys recommend another setup (which would not be that expensive)?

Thanks in advance for all the help I might get! Cheers!

Dulouz

883 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2585878 15-Oct-2020 12:24

I had a similar situation. I have 4 google wifi for a large house. What I did was just use trial and error and test the connection strength using the Google app. It a bit of fine-tuning but got there in the end.

Amanon

rodrigolinsr

6 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2585885 15-Oct-2020 12:42

Dulouz:

I had a similar situation. I have 4 google wifi for a large house. What I did was just use trial and error and test the connection strength using the Google app. It a bit of fine-tuning but got there in the end.

Yeah, I think that's what I'll need to do in the end. I'll need to buy another one to have 3 here upstairs, due too many walls blocking the signal. I did a quick test leaving just one in the living room plugged in and came here upstairs to the master bedroom, the signal strength is not that bad. The only problem is how much bandwidth they'll use to propagate the mesh network.

Thanks a lot for your feedback!

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#2585891 15-Oct-2020 12:47

Do you have data outlets in the house? If you do you're crazy to be using a mesh solution and should opt for a proper cabled AP solution which will be vastly superior.

rodrigolinsr

6 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2585892 15-Oct-2020 12:52

sbiddle:

Do you have data outlets in the house? If you do you're crazy to be using a mesh solution and should opt for a proper cabled AP solution which will be vastly superior.

Unfortunately no, this house was built in the early 2000's and don't have any data outlets. If I knew how to properly pass cables through, I could try and use the TV antena outlets to pass some ethernet cables through them (I don't watch freeview TV at all) and have a proper cabled solution for upstairs.

cyril7

9058 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2585913 15-Oct-2020 13:18

Hi, so firstly the signal strength reading in you post above indicates around -53dBm in the 5GHz band, this is a very good signal, not sure what the issue with that is.

As for backhauling them via a wired network, definitely recommend that as you will get your 5GHz bandwidth back for AP to client traffic. What is there in the way of phone points in the house, a house built in 2000 is very likely to have phone cabling that is infact capable of passing ethernet traffic.

Cyril

Edit, also if you want to continue to work with Google WiFi you can get away with not using the ISPs router as if you do you will end up double nat'ing , which is not ideal, this can be circumvented by using a small managed switch which costs around $45

Tinkerisk

4227 posts

Uber Geek

#2585914 15-Oct-2020 13:27

@rodigolinsr Maybe you can make use of THIS?

- NET: FTTH, OPNsense, 10G backbone, GWN APs, ipPBX
- SRV: 12 RU HA server cluster, 0.1 PB storage on premise
- IoT: thread, zigbee, tasmota, BidCoS, LoRa, WX suite, IR
- 3D: two 3D printers, 3D scanner, CNC router, laser cutter

rodrigolinsr

6 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2586130 16-Oct-2020 07:53

cyril7:

Hi, so firstly the signal strength reading in you post above indicates around -53dBm in the 5GHz band, this is a very good signal, not sure what the issue with that is.

As for backhauling them via a wired network, definitely recommend that as you will get your 5GHz bandwidth back for AP to client traffic. What is there in the way of phone points in the house, a house built in 2000 is very likely to have phone cabling that is infact capable of passing ethernet traffic.

Cyril

Edit, also if you want to continue to work with Google WiFi you can get away with not using the ISPs router as if you do you will end up double nat'ing , which is not ideal, this can be circumvented by using a small managed switch which costs around $45

I asked the Fibre guy when he was here installing yesterday and he said the internet would only work with the 2degrees FritzBox router, that is kind of attached to it somehow (I'm assuming is by the MAC address of the router).

How would I be able to connect the OTN directly into my Google WiFi router? Thanks in advance!

Samsung

Shop now on Samsung phones, tablets, TVs and more (affiliate link).

rodrigolinsr

6 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2586131 16-Oct-2020 07:55

Tinkerisk:

@rodigolinsr Maybe you can make use of THIS?

Yeah, I saw that as an option, but I couldn't find it here in New Zealand for sale and to ship it from the US would be quite expensive.

Also, I don't have coaxial plugs into my office, which would be the place I wanted most my gigabit internet. It'd only be available at my master bedroom.

cyril7

9058 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2586135 16-Oct-2020 08:07

Hi, firstly did you see my comments regarding your phone cabling, a house built in 2000 is very likely to have cat5e for phones, and if so this can be re configured to distribute ethernet, it may require a few small switches to acheive this as phone cabling is normally wired in a single line from one point to another, not as a star arrangement, but as I say can be worked around. So are there phone sockets in places you want ethernet and if so unscrew a few of the face plates and take a photo so we can see what type of cable it is.

As for the router side, I dont believe it is true that you must use the Fritz, I very much doubt that its MAC locked, however others will be able to confirm that. If you are using the fritz to get a phone line from 2deg then you might have an issue, but again probably not in surmountable, just might mean the fritz is sitting downstream of the Google WiFi just to act as a phone ATA.

To use the Google WiFi (assuming its the original GW not the newer nest) then you will need a small managed switch like this and configure it to drop the vlan tag for you, the switch can also be used to create a number of lan ports for you to expand the network around the house, if you want more than the two lan ports this will provide (three are used to sort the WAN and return the lan) then you can get an 8 port model for $84. If its the newer nest product then it supports the vlan on the wan so no switch required, however the remote "points" of the nest kits dont have wired ports to support wired backhaul.

Cyril

rodrigolinsr

6 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2586184 16-Oct-2020 10:22

cyril7:

Hi, firstly did you see my comments regarding your phone cabling, a house built in 2000 is very likely to have cat5e for phones, and if so this can be re configured to distribute ethernet, it may require a few small switches to acheive this as phone cabling is normally wired in a single line from one point to another, not as a star arrangement, but as I say can be worked around. So are there phone sockets in places you want ethernet and if so unscrew a few of the face plates and take a photo so we can see what type of cable it is.

As for the router side, I dont believe it is true that you must use the Fritz, I very much doubt that its MAC locked, however others will be able to confirm that. If you are using the fritz to get a phone line from 2deg then you might have an issue, but again probably not in surmountable, just might mean the fritz is sitting downstream of the Google WiFi just to act as a phone ATA.

To use the Google WiFi (assuming its the original GW not the newer nest) then you will need a small managed switch like this and configure it to drop the vlan tag for you, the switch can also be used to create a number of lan ports for you to expand the network around the house, if you want more than the two lan ports this will provide (three are used to sort the WAN and return the lan) then you can get an 8 port model for $84. If its the newer nest product then it supports the vlan on the wan so no switch required, however the remote "points" of the nest kits dont have wired ports to support wired backhaul.

Cyril

Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot to reply to the comment about phone cabling. I'll open some of them and take a look on what's inside.

And thanks for all the info on the switch, it's really helpful! And if I plug the fibre modem straight into the google wifi system I might get better speeds 🤞

By the way, do you know something about Powerline adaptors? If I could get a pair of those 1 or 2 gigabits ones just to check if I could get at least something around 300 mbps upstairs in my office I'd be very happy! I don't know how's the return policy at Noel Leeming or PB Tech, but it's another option I'm considering.

Cheers!

cyril7

9058 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2586189 16-Oct-2020 10:43

Hi, the Google WiFi (GW) will not perform as well as the Fritz on speeds, however unless you are on a Gig 950/450 plan you will not notice, ie the GW will do 250+Mb/s on the WAN without issues, but not full Gig.

What going just via the GW will achieve is it will remove double NAT, and if you are on CG-NAT with 2D (which is there default) then you infact have triple NAT, the less NATs you have the better. Unfortunately the GW cannot be operated as just a basic route it only supports NAT, you can bridge it, but then you loose its ability to roam nicely and band steer, also if you bridge the GW you will need to set each up as an independant AP point as if individual networks, so end story is use it as the only router is the best solution.

As for powerline devices, personally I recommend you avoid them, their performance can change dramatically as 50Hz load changes within your home, that said some folk have had good success, however if you can use the existing phone cabling then that is the best option by any concideration.

Cyril

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#2586677 17-Oct-2020 16:46

Just be aware that Google WiFi is IMHO a pretty poor product offering and it's certainly not something I'd ever recommend for people if they did want a mesh solution. The newer Google Nest WiFi does eliminates some of the shortcomings however by at least offering VLAN tagging.

cyril7

9058 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2586685 17-Oct-2020 17:14

sbiddle:
Just be aware that Google WiFi is IMHO a pretty poor product offering and it's certainly not something I'd ever recommend for people if they did want a mesh solution. The newer Google Nest WiFi does eliminates some of the shortcomings however by at least offering VLAN tagging.

Hi having now sorted a number of folk with GW issues I agree with Steve.

Cyril

cyril7

9058 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2586686 17-Oct-2020 17:14

sbiddle:
Just be aware that Google WiFi is IMHO a pretty poor product offering and it's certainly not something I'd ever recommend for people if they did want a mesh solution. The newer Google Nest WiFi does eliminates some of the shortcomings however by at least offering VLAN tagging.

Hi having now sorted a number of folk with GW issues I agree with Steve.

Cyril