Wi-Fi extenders- any experts?

[ShandyQuaffer]

My internet is very fast downstairs but not great at the top of the house, so I’m trying to work out how to improve the Wi-Fi. We live in a 3 storey Victorian brick terrace.

Can anyone suggest something that will improve the Wi-Fi at the top of the house, as that’s where I WFH? This area is not my forte so please explain it as to a dimwit.

Thank you.

I'm with BT. My broadband didn't extend upstairs and my house isn't enormous. I complained very loudly and they sent me an extender free which is in my dining room.. Has really helped!

We had various blind spots and put in a power line mesh. It was super simple to put in (connect to hub and position other units strategically to provide whole home coverage): TP-Link Deco P9 Whole Home Powerline Mesh Wi-Fi System, Up to 6000 Sq ft Coverage, Dual-Band AC1200+HomePlug AV1000, Gigabit Ports, Compatible with Amazon Echo/Alexa, limited walls impact, Pack of 3 amzn.eu/d/9yKTDyf

I had the same problem so bought a basic WiFi booster and plugged it into the nearest "good" plug upstairs. WiFi doesn't drop in my bedroom anymore. I also recommended this to another poster in the last week and they said it worked for them.
https://www.argos.co.uk/product/1115138

Who is your provider? We are with virgin and had shocking coverage in 2 rooms upstairs so they sent me a 'pod'. It has a 'mesh' so uses the same password etc as the main router - some extenders mean that you have to effectively login to a different network if you move your device from one room to another. The pod is fantastic and our WiFi is strong and reliable everywhere now.

Absolute best solution is to run ethernet to the top floor, to a socket for hardwiring either your devices, or a wifi access point.

Second solution is a mesh WiFi - if you're on any of the BT Halo packages they will give you extender discs for your home hub for free, as a part of the whole home wifi promise, otherwise you can buy your own mesh wifi.

Option 3 - powerline - is great when it works, but depends very much on the wiring in your house. I tried this for a bit - it was flawless to some rooms, and wouldn't connect at all in others.

I avoid wifi extenders, they 'work' but have severe technical limitations, most notably that they reduce the bandwidth across the whole network in order to expand the coverage, which may not be a problem for some people, but in a house with lots of children using tablets, gaming, streaming it quickly becomes an issue .

I went the 'pro' route and put a ubiquiti network in that cost about £2.5k, but it is absolutely flawless in terms of performance and configurability - I have 3 gaming PCs, 4 consoles, 6 phones, 5 laptops, 7 tablets, 10 smart home appliances and 5 smart TVs all running with no issues. It also handles CCTV and runs a business web and email server.

Would any of these solutions extend the WiFi to the garden? I’ve been thinking about getting a Ring stick up battery cam and putting it on the shed to face the house…..then realised it would need WiFi and the WiFi doesn’t reach the shed.

The ubiquiti unifi solution will def cover the garden (they sell specialised waterproof long range access points), but it is expensive. My unifi setup for my 4-bed house cost about 1.3k and I had to do all the wiring myself.

the simplest solution is a mesh network, Google Wi-Fi mesh is the easiest setup I’ve seen. Basically each node receives the signal, and then amplifies and sends it on, so you can daisy chain you coverage upstairs for example. As long as the coverage between each node is good, you’ll get good Wi-Fi at the end of the chain. Costs around £150-£200/node (most houses will need 2-3)

unifi is the best “entry level enterprise” solution- so not expert or fully professional, but high quality hardware. Beware, some of their devices come with great headline stats but have big bottlenecks. The main heart of your network is expensive (£400-£600), but each access point is relatively cheap (£100-£200). It does require hardwiring and most of it is PoE so make sure your central router is well ventilated because it gets hot.

a cheaper but still effective solution I installed at work is the ASUS mesh system. Fairly easy to use, and relatively easy to setup (although google Wi-Fi is way way easier) and cost is around £100/node.

Anything beyond the unifi setup you’re spending stupid money, and you won’t be coming to mumsnet for advice. Anything cheaper and it will probably work but not very well (my dad installed a £50 mesh network in his house when he proudly got gigabit internet, and you couldn’t get more than 50 mbps anywhere cause the mesh was so garbage…way to waste 95% of your internet…)

If you’re hardwiring your network be sure to use Cat7 or better cabling. Gigabit internet is here and becoming more and more standard. I can get 3gbps internet for around £50/month now. Those speeds will only get faster and faster so throttling your performance by putting in cheap cabling is just stupid.

There are various different types of the plug in I posted, mine was the very basic model from several years ago.. Both argos and curries stock them. My WiFi naturally extends 20ft into garden but that is where my router is placed. If your router is front of house but you need it for the back and there is a plug socket near it then I would guess so. Maybe chat to a Curries assistant on tha basis if it doesn't work then can you take it back (you can test using your phone for WhatsApp on home wifi before buying ring).

Second user of tplink Deco. V fast and stable even in basement, not too dear and good app.

Worth downloading the apps of anything you consider buying as this is often the key difference between something good on paper and actually good to use.

Our house is Georgian with stupidly thick walls and an unusual layout over 4 floors. My home office is in an attic room and DP's is on the ground floor. The sitting room (with the TV) is in a sort of offshoot of the main house.

We have one of these mesh systems Zyxel Multy X Tri-Band AC3000 Whole Home Wi-Fi Mesh System. Router or Satellite Extension - Pack of 3 [WSQ50] : Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories- one in DPs study where the main internet router is, one in the living room (which also covers the garden) and one on the half landing below my attic room which covers the bedrooms and upper floors. We've had it about three years now and it's worked very well so far.

Thank you @Pixiedust1234 , as of today I am the owner of three Deco M4 units and have got WiFi all around the (not very big) house AND in the (not very big garden) garden. Previously the WiFi stopped at the back door. Tomorrow I’m going to see if I can get WiFi in the front garden!

We turned the virgin media hub into modem only and got a far more powerful router. It's way better now and we can access the wifi in the garage and back garden.