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Forum Discussion
How to force a device to be connected to router and not satellite?
The main Orbi router is in my office and my media room is next to it on the second floor. I have a Chromecast that always connects to the satellite on the first floor. This results in buffering if I c...
GaryInEdmond wrote:The problem with this is, if the satellite signal is only slightly better than the main router, it will connect to the satellite. Unless you are gaming, this is probaly not a big deal. If you are gaming, and your ping doubles because you are connected to the satellite instead of the main router, your gaming performance actually drops. The amplifi HD does this be connecting automatically to the main router unless the signal drops below a certain threshold. It will then connect to the satellite. I hope and pray that netgear adopts a similar approach to their router software.
Don't assume your ping will double on the satellite. My PS4 is hardwired into my satellite and I get 3ms RTT.
Rodney
In my testing, the ping goes from an average of 10 ms when connected to the main router to 22 ms when connected to the satellite. That's not a huge difference but it's enough that I want to be able to steer my connection to the main router when I know the connection is still very good, though not as strong as the satellite. I would imagine tapping into the satellites ethernet port would reduce the ping considerably but I personally do not have that option.
LOTS of variables here. When measuring ping, ensure that:
- The client issuing the ping/echo request is hardwired into the network - i.e. either the Orbi router or (if in AP mode) the upstream router/switch
- Don't trust an "Internet ping" - you can't control a thing beyond your local network. Measure pings _inside_ the network, and not from a gaming device or the like - use a Windows/Mac/Linux/whatever machine connected as indicated above and use it to manually ping the endpoint device on the other side of the satellite
- In my experience, some devices (nVidia Shield TV, I'm looking at you) perform _horribly_ in terms of latency on a wireless connection and effectively must be hardwired for any sort of gaming experience
The actual latency, as measured between the router and the gateway (which is the added latency to any satellite connection), averages ~3ms on my network, as indicated. It's higher than zero, and there is a bit of unavoidable jitter, so it's not perfect, but well within any tolerances for online gaming.
Rodney
Rodney