how to effectively use switches, router/APs

[twin_chocolate]

I have home and several finished garages sprawling across my property. Most of the bldgs have metal siding. The house is lath/plaster.

The existing network inside the ISP modem/router is wired switches to connect (by wire) the multiple router/APs. All the switches are gigabit rated. After the modem/router (NetGear N450-100NAS, I have a mix of Cisco E2500 & TPLINK TL-WR1043ND. The TPLINKs are spec'd faster, so I have them in the zones with the most large graphic/video use.

My problem is that half my network is showing (speedtest.net) substantially lower speeds than the other. I do have a TPLINK in each "half".

I wish I knew how to upload a diagram, that would make it more clear.

I'm thinking I need to understand how the components work so I can effectively modify the configuration or relocate devices or upgrade components or ??

typical usage is 1-4 wifi devices per AP, though seldom more than 10 at any given time

 

[bill001g]

There is so much in this thread I will just make some general comments. 5g in general is more affected by things that 2.4g. When you start worrying about how much water vapor is in the air you will go nuts trying to figure this stuff out. Just walking around a room changes the wave patterns and the signal levels so you have to avoid getting too deep into the details. The walls in your house make much more difference.

It appears you have spent a lot of time looking at wifi monitors and mapping channels. It is good you know that now but the bad news is it means very little when it comes actual utilization.

The things you see on those charts are the broadcasts by the devices of their SSID. These broadcast message are very small ans use little bandwidth.

The main thing you can not tell is for example if the roku is actual actively say streaming video or if it is sitting idle. There is no way to tell if those ssid you see in your graphs are running 100 active devices or none. This is where knowing what your network is actually doing is as important as these tools.

Of course you can not tell what the neighbors devices are doing. There are people like me who configure their AP to put out 50 different SSID in the hopes of scarring off people who will think that channel is over used when I am really only using of them and the rest are dummy.

Mostly you are going to have to try your best and then test to see if it actually performs the way you think.

 

[twin_chocolate]

There is so much in this thread I will just make some general comments. 5g in general is more affected by things that 2.4g. When you start worrying about how much water vapor is in the air you will go nuts trying to figure this stuff out. Just walking around a room changes the wave patterns and the signal levels so you have to avoid getting too deep into the details. The walls in your house make much more difference.

It appears you have spent a lot of time looking at wifi monitors and mapping channels. It is good you know that now but the bad news is it means very little when it comes actual utilization.

The things you see on those charts are the broadcasts by the devices of their SSID. These broadcast message are very small ans use little bandwidth.

The main thing you can not tell is for example if the roku is actual actively say streaming video or if it is sitting idle. There is no way to tell if those ssid you see in your graphs are running 100 active devices or none. This is where knowing what your network is actually doing is as important as these tools.

Of course you can not tell what the neighbors devices are doing. There are people like me who configure their AP to put out 50 different SSID in the hopes of scarring off people who will think that channel is over used when I am really only using of them and the rest are dummy.

Mostly you are going to have to try your best and then test to see if it actually performs the way you think.

This helps. Thanks!

 

[The Paladin]

if the HOME-1084 downlink 9.49 9.52 9.69 Mbps uplink 10.05 9.93 10.46 Mbps is the bottleneck, then change it, seemingly it isn't capable to handle the amount of traffic that area is requiring. (from what I read) you have to remember as mentioned earlier, older routers have a smaller amount of "capable link up before saturation and loss of performance, so a N300 like you have with (say 10 connections to it) will perform far more poorly than a N900 or 1200ac router will, why,? processor power, number of antennas as make it plausible for the router to sort of act "like a switch" managing in and out much better.

I would grab another router like a N900 or newer and wire it up instead of the N300 and see if the problem is solved, if not, then you can always return it after you reset to factory settings.

also you mentioned attic, you would be better off to poke a hole in your ceiling and mounting that router INSIDE the building on the ceiling rather than the attic, especially if the furnace and such devices are up there? why. interferences by power lines (electrical wiring) and furnaces are terrible, with insolation and the layer of sheetrock your router will also need to penetrate before it makes a Wi-Fi connection with anything.

 

[twin_chocolate]

well I swapped routers ... placing one of the E2500 in place of the under-performing HOME-1084 & rotating HOME-1084 onto the bench. Since the E2500 is now unresponsive, I braved the wilds of SHOPPING the day after Black Friday to get a replacement patch cord. Since I had then run out of daylight, the real proof will be replacing the cable in the morning, but testing HOME-1084 in a different location, it is working fine. So the cable and only the cable is bad.

Of course the whole system was under-performing when I was colliding with my own wifi networks because I didn't know to move them to different channels!

After I swap that cable I'll re-test the various nodes, but at this point I'm hopeful that this will fix things until more speed or band-width is needed.

Yup, swapping out that cable brought the remaining router in my intranet up to speeds consistent with hardware capabilties.

HOME-1060 @ H2-N 29.07 12.69
HOME-1060-5 36.85 12.15
Cisco57078 @ Craft 26.32 12.36

 

[twin_chocolate]

if the HOME-1084 downlink 9.49 9.52 9.69 Mbps uplink 10.05 9.93 10.46 Mbps is the bottleneck, then change it, seemingly it isn't capable to handle the amount of traffic that area is requiring. (from what I read) you have to remember as mentioned earlier, older routers have a smaller amount of "capable link up before saturation and loss of performance, so a N300 like you have with (say 10 connections to it) will perform far more poorly than a N900 or 1200ac router will, why,? processor power, number of antennas as make it plausible for the router to sort of act "like a switch" managing in and out much better.

I would grab another router like a N900 or newer and wire it up instead of the N300 and see if the problem is solved, if not, then you can always return it after you reset to factory settings.

...

The speeds I cited were with ONLY my phone on the router, and ONLY running Ookla speed test.

Hence my conclusion that either that cable or that router (or both) were toast. Moved the HOME-1084 router to the house, and now it is running at speeds over 25 Mbps/12 Mbps.

I have some questions about shopping for upgrade hardware - thinking I ought to start a new thread for that -- this one is rather lengthy!

as to network load -- four (Android) smart phones, 6 (win7, win8) laptops, an iPad, and 1 Roku -- plus guests -- we just use them for different things in the various workzones when we are working on different projects, hence all the routers. I have observed as many as 3 download streaming video, but 1 or 2 is more usual. The "need for speed" is driven by the need to upload and download GIGANTIC PhotoShop files. I have spent better than 14 hours a day for over 20 days simply uploading files. We also cooperate, and when heavy net-traffic is in progress, that router is dedicated to the person working that task.

HOME-1084 speedtest after relocation to CBN:
89.25 87.75 Mbps downlink, 12.62 12.14 Mbps uplink

I see no reason to bother with factory reset and re-input of all information

 

[twin_chocolate]

...

also you mentioned attic, you would be better off to poke a hole in your ceiling and mounting that router INSIDE the building on the ceiling rather than the attic, especially if the furnace and such devices are up there? why. interferences by power lines (electrical wiring) and furnaces are terrible, with insolation and the layer of sheetrock your router will also need to penetrate before it makes a Wi-Fi connection with anything.

Oh trust me, I know that. That isn't exactly the geometry going on here.

(a) I'm an electromagnetic scattering specialist. wave scattering, radar, EMC/EMI, and antenna arrays.... That's the easy part for me - the hard part is figuring out what the terminology and "black boxes" involved in managing an intranet do.

(b) The house is a log cabin, so poking holes thru12-13" logs just isn't going to happen (and they don't transmit radar really well). Lath and plaster also suck. Metal siding sucks worse.

(c) I have a building-firewall that I can't poke a hole through without a conversation with the fire marshall

(d) the other workspaces have no-attic ceilings

(e) no furnaces -- fireplaces and ductless splits only : no ductwork nor anywhere to put any.

(f) fortunately I can use antenna array patterns and diffraction and traveling waves to assist the location choices for my routers, or no doubt I'd have more trouble. LOL

each router is carefully positioned with scattering, cavity reflection, wall/ceiling geometry materials, apertures considered ... and fine tuned empirically.

 

[twin_chocolate]

SOLUTION/CONCLUSION : RESOLUTION/SUMMARY, NEXT STEPS, FUTURE UPGRADES

* most symtomology cleared up by use of Wifi Analyzer to understand & correct "radio clutter" (The Paladin) in my vicinity
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps.html#20401638
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps.html#20403497
separate SSID for 5 GHz wifi channels & migration of 5 GHz capable devices to that band also helps.

* outstanding recommendation to flatten my intranet to a single subnet (Kanewolf) is pending scheduling
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps.html#20403015
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps.html#20403289

* no vendor firmware updates available for the TL-WR1043ND routers

* all the E2500 routers operating with distinct 5 GHz band SSIDs, and capable client devices encouraged to migrate to 5 GHz.

* after AP channel adjustments & switch re-location to reduce cable lengths, one AP
continues to perform poorly compared to anticipated hardware capability - suggesting that either this specific router
or its patch cable is bad
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps.html#20409342
rotation of existing router/APs shows that the cable is bad, the router itself is performing to hardware capability
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps/page-2.html#20416030
replacing the cable brought the remaining low-performing router up to reasonable-for-hardware speeds.

* outstanding empirical trials (bill001g) to determine whether Roku on 5 GHz band or high-throughput users on 5 GHz band
actually works better.
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps/page-2.html#20410696

* updated network diagram RevC, showing routers controlled (or semi-controlled) by me, work zones, channel assignments


* anticipated through-put load: for entire intranet, 0-6 laptops, 0-3 typically 1-2 (off at night) streaming video, 3 resident plus
various guests smartphones. Upload and download of graphic files often in the half-GByte size range, typically only 1-2 users
at a time. Sufficient routers exist to have the RF portions of the network dedicated (single user) at the time of large file transfer.

* I will start a new thread to consider hardware upgrade alternatives & timing.
Possibly after revisiting the Fire Code issues involved in bringing the routers through the firewall and into the work zones.
Anticipate replacing the two
TL-WR1043ND with something faster/multi-band - suggestions especially regarding what to consider?
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3572005/effectively-switches-router-aps.html#20406688

all of this will assist me in selecting appropriate hardware & timing for future upgrades.


-- thank you all