Best solution for old house with large stone walls

Question

NETGEAR EX7500-100UKS Nighthawk Mesh X4S Wall-Plug Tri-Band WiFi Range Extender.

I have a large old house with 3ft thick stone walls. The wi-fi signal from the router is quite powerful and extends well through one half of the house up and down but it is weak or non-existent through the other half. I've just bought the above Range Extender in the hope of extending the signal but it makes little or no difference. I can't find a point, halfway or into the weak area, where it can pick up and broadcast the signal. I've tried various permutations but nothing seems to work so I think I am going to have to give up on this new piece of kit and return it. Can anyone recommend another method of extending my wi-fi signal?

I can't afford to wire the house for ethernet. Can anyone recommend powerplug wi-fi extenders or repeaters that will solve my problem? I would prefer seamless roaming with one wi-fi name and one password if possible. Thanks

TheEther · Answer

Some people will recommend Powerline, though it's not my cup of tea.
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Does your house have coax (as in the wire used for cable TV)? It's a reasonable substitute for Ethernet. You'll need to get MoCA adapters.&nbsp; You can put a Wi-Fi Access Point (AP) at the other end.&nbsp; It would look something like this:
router--[Ethernet]--MoCA---[coax]---MoCA---[Ethernet]---AP

Jazzer52 · Answer

Thanks for your reply.We only have a short coaxial run from a satellite dish through the wall to the TV set up. It doesn't run through the house unfortunately. I think I'm looking for a powerline set up but I'm unsure which models will work best.

TheEther · Answer

I would take the advertised speeds of each model with a grain of salt. Real world speeds will be nowhere near them.

Just pick a model with the features you need. Some models come with a built-in Wi-Fi Access Point. Or you could get a model without one and install your own. An external Access Point is likely to have better antennas.

Jazzer52 · Answer

Thanks for your reply.&nbsp;I have bought a NETGEAR EX6120 and a EX6130 to extend signal to the wi-fi black spots. Both extenders are linked to the router and up and working but I am disappointed by the range. I'm not so much bothered about speed for the black spots because those areas only need email and browser access but I would like greater range. Will I achieve greater range if I enable the FastLane Technology using either 2.4GHz or 5GHz rather than both bands at the same time with the Basic mode? If so which FastLane option would give the greater range?&nbsp;If range is still limited would I be better changing to Access Point rather than Range Extender?&nbsp;Thanks

TheEther · Answer

I would not expect FastLane to have any effect on range.  An Access Point may not necessarily have better range, either, though it should be faster.What kind of walls do you have?  Concrete?  Brick?  Plaster?  Or drywall?  Wi-Fi cannot penetrate the first 3 very well.

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Best solution for old house with large stone walls

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