Question My Router selects 5 GHz instead of 2.4 GHz, why?

[very_452001]

Hello,

My router is TP-Link Archer AX20 v2 Router that is wi-fi 6 and dual band and my smart supposedly Ai device is also dual band and supports wi-fi 6 too. The frequencies are combined in a single SSID not separate according to my router settings.

The device is mounted on my wall outside meaning it is far away from my router. According to the smart Ai device via its app on my phone it reports Weak Signal when I see its connected to my Router via 5 GHz and Great Signal when I see its connected to my Router via 2.4Ghz.

I have issues on 5 Ghz for the device but no issues for 2.4 Ghz. The problem is I cannot choose which frequency band in the device app on my phone so why my router sometimes automatically nominates 5 GHz for a device that is far away from it? When it automatically selects 2.4 Ghz I have no issues with the device meaning I can connect to the device via its app but intermittently whenever the router feels like choosing 2.4 Ghz for it.

In my router how do I permanently set 2.4 Ghz for my device please?

Another unrelated question is lets say for example I have a PS5 console that I do online gaming via wireless wi-fi. My ISP speed is 250 Mbps. The router advertises its max speed 1000 Mbps. On both frequencies 2.4 ghz and 5 ghz frequencies the PS5 reports excellent signal with the same download and upload speeds. The question is will the online gaming performance be the same on both frequencies, no difference or will there be a difference in ping or whatever? And will the interference like turning a microwave on will affect online gaming in 2.4 ghz when channel is set to Auto in router settings?

Features of wifi 6 is available for both 2.4 ghz and 5 ghz?

Lastly does wi-fi 6 benefits battery powered devices more over mains powered devices or is it both the same?

Finally why the Real-time Rate shown in my Router settings measured in KB/s for my devices connected to it? What is the Ratio between KB/s and the ISP's 250 Mbps?

 

[KingLoki]

See page 14...
https://www.manua.ls/tp-link/archer-ax20/manual?p=104

You may need to disable Smart Connect

 

[very_452001]

See page 14...
https://www.manua.ls/tp-link/archer-ax20/manual?p=104

You may need to disable Smart Connect

Okay so I will get 2 SSID's if I do that?
Why cant the router decide for itself that the device is far away and permanently choose 2.4 GHz for it or are most routers are 'Dumb'?

So if I disable smart connect I have to manually connect the device to the router again via the now new available 2.4 GHz SSID?

 

[bill001g]

It is your end device not the router that decides which to connect to. Depends on the device but many you can force it to use 2.4 or 5 even with the same SSID.

You are always better off using different ssid. It depends on if you want to be in control or if you are lazy and just want the device to try to guess which is best.

Gaming on any wifi is going to get random lag spikes. Online games do not are about bandwidth, they only use about 1mbps so both the 2.4 and 5 radios are the same no matter what the maximum speed they can do. What you might do is set the 2.4 radio band to only use 20mhz channels (this is done on the router). Because their is less data being crammed into the same radio bandwidth data errors are less common. It really depends on how many neighbors you have and how active they are.

It will be trial and error to find out is 2.4 is better than 5 and what channels work the best. Unfortunately it can change minute to minute as some neighbors does somethings with their wifi.

If 2.4 work better for the game what you could then do is when you download new games or big updates switch to the 5 radio since it "should" have faster downloads.

Wifi 6 in general is smoke and mirrors. Because of all the restrictions on use 160mhz radio channels many end device do not support it. This is the key feature that makes wifi6 faster. The other feature that uses QAM1024 data encoding only really works in the same room. So without either of these feature wifi6 work pretty much the same as wifi5. Most people saw no big improvement. wifi6e is much better because there is lots of bandwidth and you can easily get 160mhz radio chanels on the 6ghz radio band.

A side node your microwave oven will not really interfere. Even thought he microwave puts out over 1000 times the power of a router the amount that is allowed to legally leave the microwave is only a tiny fraction of what a router can legally transmit at. It is surprising that you can see though the front glass and it pretty much blocks all that signal. Now if the microwave oven happens to be between your router and your pc the routers signal will be blocked by the chassis of microwave. Not a very likely thing to have happen but if you want to test is sometime set your cell phone to display the wifi power levels. Then put it in the microwave ( obviously you are not going to turn it on). You can look though the glass and you will likely see no wifi signals being detected on 2.4ghz.