UK How to go about adding a secondary router/wifi hub

Brad0593 · Nov 2, 2023

Hi all

I’m after a bit of advice regarding wifi/secondary router.
Data is not a strong point of mine so any advice would be very much appreciated.

I currently have the wifi hub set up in the hallway - located centrally in the house.
Wireless connections with phone, tablet and laptop works great, but for some reason the televisions throughout the house struggle to hold a stable connection for very long. Why, I don’t know.

I’m in the middle of renovating the house and have thought about hard wire an ethernet cable to each TV.

The problem now is that I don’t want that many cables on show in the hallway at the back of the hub - which has prompted me to come here and seek advice.

I’ve had a few suggestions about running a secondary router and having it somewhere out of site (I,e - in the attic). And using this second hub to house all the ethernet cables that would run to each television.

So my questions are:
1) Does anyone have any other suggestions?

2) If no, then how do I go about adding a second hub?
Is it as simple as running an ethernet from one hub to the other? (+ power supply obviously)

3) If that’s the route to go down, can anyone suggest a secondary router to use?
someone has told me about a TP-Link hub, but couldn’t remember which model.

Thanks in advance for any replies and suggestions

James · Nov 2, 2023

put a network switch in the loft or other place out of sight.
run all the house network points to there

tv's and game consoles use a lot of data so if possible, hard wire them.
think about adding a couple of wifi access points.
you will need to run a single network cable from where your router is to the network switch in the loft.

my preference is
have this next to your router, it will provide wifi and control all other switches and access points.

Dream Router - Ubiquiti Store

Desktop UniFi Cloud Gateway with an integrated WiFi 6 access point and PoE switch.

uk.store.ui.com

for the network switch i would choose this.

Switch 24 PoE - Ubiquiti Store

A 24-port, Layer 2 PoE switch with a fanless cooling system.

uk.store.ui.com

it will power any cctv cameras that use poe and also any wifi access points you want to install.

Access Point AC Lite - Ubiquiti Store

Entry-level, ceiling-mounted WiFi 5 AP with 4 spatial streams designed for small offices.

uk.store.ui.com

Brad0593 · Nov 2, 2023

James said:
put a network switch in the loft or other place out of sight.
run all the house network points to there

tv's and game consoles use a lot of data so if possible, hard wire them.
think about adding a couple of wifi access points.
you will need to run a single network cable from where your router is to the network switch in the loft.

my preference is
have this next to your router, it will provide wifi and control all other switches and access points.

Dream Router - Ubiquiti Store

Desktop UniFi Cloud Gateway with an integrated WiFi 6 access point and PoE switch.

uk.store.ui.com

for the network switch i would choose this.

Switch 24 PoE - Ubiquiti Store

A 24-port, Layer 2 PoE switch with a fanless cooling system.

uk.store.ui.com

it will power any cctv cameras that use poe and also any wifi access points you want to install.

Access Point AC Lite - Ubiquiti Store

Entry-level, ceiling-mounted WiFi 5 AP with 4 spatial streams designed for small offices.

uk.store.ui.com

Excellent.
Clear and simple information!

Thank you very much!!

pc1966 · Nov 2, 2023

Ubiquity are a good choice (our ISP uses them for professional side), I have also had good enough results from Netgear access points, and from TP-link as well for cheaper end.

Using a PoE router is a good idea as (many) cameras and WiFi access points then don't need a separate power supply as the ethernet cable provides power anyway.

James · Nov 2, 2023

if you want to have a more cost effective solution then this may be an option

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Deco-M4-Seamless-Coverage-Replacement/dp/B07WRDR22H/ref=sr_1_4?crid=3A1E2HY3IV7W9&keywords=tp%2Blink%2Bdeco&qid=1698957470&sprefix=tp%2Bl%2Caps%2C111&sr=8-4&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.cc223b57-2b86-485c-a85e-6431c1f06c86&th=1

you will need to add a switch in the loft to it

i would still recommend the ubiquity switch because later you may well prefer to go down that route because in my experience, it is just so much better.

also I have found that the tp link deco equipment can cause issues when a network switch is involved because they can cause a loopback connection that causes the switch to turn ports off to protect it self.

the basics are that a router or network switch cant deal with 2 routes to the same place so if you have a number of access points and they can talk to each other and they are also hard wired together then a network packet can be sent by cable and wifi at the same time and the packets of data arrive at a point in the network by 2 different routes at 2 different times and the data loops back round in an infinite loop.
(this is a simplified explanation)
network techies will tell you it is not correct but the principal is right without getting in to the nitty gritty of how these things work and fail.

James · Nov 2, 2023

if you are wanting to delve into the how much and what is happening on your network the data is easy to find.

OnlQQker · Nov 2, 2023

If you ever need to find out if the kids are in the house. Turn the internet off!

nicebutdim · Nov 2, 2023

OnlQQker said:
If you ever need to find out if the kids are in the house. Turn the internet off!

Done that on many occasions.

It's up there with hijacking a bluetooth speaker.

hydrocarbonPrimate · Nov 3, 2023

I had a wireless access point & switch in the attic of my last rented bugalow (a reporposed BT home hub with openwrt), the existing phone extension went up the exterior wall and into a breather brick thing, so I clipped in some external grade cat5 along side of it and into existing phone / fibre backbox. So no extra cables came through walls or ceilings, i also had a cable going into the garage.

It was a stealthy way to get full fiber speeds in the lounge, garage and wifi coverage throught the house and driveway, Its nice to download podcasts in seconds while warming up car for work.

Rockingit · Nov 3, 2023

I just envy James' speed. Out here in the sticks its all FTC and we get about 30/5 on a good day. It's OK for download and streaming but not good for any video call/cctv upload back. Although I do need to investigate options for getting off of Sky as their modem/routers aren't that great but you get tied in with VOIP over them, so not so easy to swap out.

James · Nov 3, 2023

I am in a rural location too, fibre to premises is being rolled out in the countryside before the cities.
a year ago it was dire, ftc gave me 30 in theory but on a good day 15 was more realistic and it would often drop out for a few min or a whole day.

Rockingit · Nov 3, 2023

James said:
I am in a rural location too, fibre to premises is being rolled out in the countryside before the cities.
a year ago it was dire, ftc gave me 30 in theory but on a good day 15 was more realistic and it would often drop out for a few min or a whole day.

Gigaclear have been claiming to be 'on their way' for about four years now.....

James · Nov 3, 2023

Where and when we're building Ultrafast Full Fibre broadband

Openreach is committed to being as open as we can about our Fibre to the Premises build programme and we regularly publish our roll-out plans..

www.openreach.com

Rockingit · Nov 3, 2023

TWENTY years ago I was working in Singapore. Every.single.last.new.build (anything) was having fibre laid to it, defacto. We are so behind in this country it's unreal, and we wonder why we're being overtaken by practically everybody else.

plugsandsparks · Nov 3, 2023

Daughter lives in ROI deep in the countryside, has fibre to home from Voda, 500M download but it does drop when busy. I was blown away... i have FTTC and 80M is a good day. @Rockingit bet 4G would give a better upload

nicebutdim · Nov 3, 2023

Rockingit said:
TWENTY years ago I was working in Singapore. Every.single.last.new.build (anything) was having fibre laid to it, defacto. We are so behind in this country it's unreal, and we wonder why we're being overtaken by practically everybody else.

This house was built 6 years ago as part of a new development. I was stunned to learn that Openreach were providing copper connections, despite being in the process of upgrading much of the town to fibre. Broadband speeds are decent with 1,000/200 being available, although we have a 'basic' fibre deal at just over 100mbps - provides what we need at a reasonable price.

My parents could avail of a maximum 3mbps until very recently and until a couple of years ago it was 2mbps. They're within several hundred yards (as the crow flies) of an openreach fibre cabinet, but instead are connected by copper to the exchange 3 miles away and openreach will not offer connection to that cabinet, despite it serving only a very small rural community.

Last year a rural broadband initiative finally reached them and offer up to 1gbps on their service, which is now available at reasonable rates only slightly more expensive than I pay on Openreach network. Despite this service, Openreach still have no plans to upgrade from those long copper lines.

It seems as though planning and roll out of fast internet connections has been effective, yet I fail to understand why existing networks could not have been utilised. I guess there will be factors involving Openreach license terms and guarantees given to providers who have rolled out new networks. Beyond my pay grade, unfathonable and likely involving some bonkers reasoning, but it will be a Godsend to those running businesses in rural areas or to those starved of readily available moving picture pornography.

Rockingit · Nov 4, 2023

plugsandsparks said:
Daughter lives in ROI deep in the countryside, has fibre to home from Voda, 500M download but it does drop when busy. I was blown away... i have FTTC and 80M is a good day. @Rockingit bet 4G would give a better upload

Nah, mobile signal is carp as well!!