Extending Wireless Network ?

I recently went from using a PC which has enternet cable into a Motorola Netopia router and DSL out (and wirelss broadcast to the rest of the house) to an iMac and an Airport Extreme (AE) - the iMac again has the ethernet cable to the Netopia and the idea was to extend the wireless network with the Airport extreme, as the wireless signal is poor to the rest of my house and this config should boost the wirelss signal in the weak areas.
However - I cannot extend the wireless network with the AE - it 'cannot extend the wireless network' no explanation. Apple can't advise because there is a Motorola router involved and thats the issue they say - Motorla can't advise because its out of warranty - apple agent retailer say its a case of asking ISP to change public IP address to public - ISP provider have no lcue what I am talking about (think I am on drugs) and I think it has something to do with the Motorla only being 801.1g and the AE expecting an N router - but I don't know - thought it would be a lot simpler - anybody any ideas ? the config I am trying to acheive is the phone line comes in to the DSL port on the Motorola and from there an ethernet cable out to the AE - as the AE doesn't have a DSL port this is the only way of using the AE. I did originally setup a seperate wireless network with the AE and found the signal was consistently weaker the the Motorola and spent 1.5 hours trouble shooting with Apple - replaced the AE for fear it was a faulty product but the replacement was the same - the signal was still weaker than the motorola hence the decision to try to extend the network - as originally I thought the AE would have a better signal than the Motorla and I could use that everywhere in the house. any clues as to why the netwrk cannot extend ?

If I had to hazard a guess - it probably has to do with how you've set up either the AE or your Motorola router. First - let me say I know nothing specific about either of these two - but I just ran the same exercise in my house - adding a Linksys 4200 to my existing Verizon FIOS wireless router - not to add range (not initially) but because I wanted better performance.

It's hard to write a comprehensive reply to this - because it could get a bit lengthy - so I'll start with something basic. Have you established one as an Access Point while letting the other be responsible for assigning IP addresses? In other words - did you turn DHCP off on the AE? You don't want both routers trying to hand out IP addresses on the same network.

Post back with an answer - and we (I or someone much smarter) can go from there.

Airport Extremes do have a DSL port. So I'm a little confused. It's the port to the right of the USB port here:

'Extending' a wireless network involves having one devce create a wifi network and a second device connect to and re-broadcast that wireless network. Apple network devices can only 'extend' wireless networks created by other Apple devices.

However, as you are connecting the two routers by cable what you are doing isn't wirelessly extending a network. What you are doing will only allow you to create two wifi networks.

What I'd suggest is either getting rid of the Motorola completely and just using the AE to supply your networks needs (worth trying as the strength on the network may solve your issue). Or connect by cable as you are doing now but use the airport utility to ensure (as suggested above) that it gets it's IP address from the motorola router. I.e. using the motorola as the DHCP server.

It's a topic that can get very complex very quick but if you try the above and post back I'm sure we'll be able to help you out.

Extending Wireless Network

a)first off thanks for your responses
b)Machine Spec is 21.5" - 3.06Ghz - 4Gb Ram - 500Gb HDD - iMac MC508
c)I am based in Ireland - the phone line here comes with an RJ11 connection and ethernet has a larger RJ45 - you probably know a lot more about this than I do but the RJ45 cannot go into RJ11 and RJ11 can go into RJ45 so I could put my phone line into the AE but it is generally accepted here the AE cannot be directly connected to our phone system using DSL. I could be wrong.
d)You are correct about the ethernet connection I have from the Motorola to the AE - and I had to think why I am doing that - reason is I took the advice of one of the guys in the shop where I bought the iMac - he had the exact same config. (Netopia and AE) and found he set-up i.e., extended the wireless network using the ethernet cable and then disconnected it and moved it (AE only) i.e., he plugged it in to a different room and it picked up the signal and boosted it to the rest of his house. That's the main reason I am doing what I am. He has since changed his config completely and cannot help me with his config that worked for him.
e) Getting rid of the Motorola was my initial hope (as I had done a lot of research and the AE came out as the best option for the type of walls I had in my house - solid).- but I found when I created the new network using the AE the signal was the same as, or weaker than the Motorola - as I moved further away from the routers (and I talked with Apple and tested for 1.5 hours on this - even changed the AE for another and had the same result). So option number two was to extend \ boost the current network of the Motorola using the AE.
f) not 100% how to switch off dhcp - is it Airport Utility ......'Internet'...'Internet Connection'...'Connection Sharing'...'Off (Bridge Mode)' ?

Ah..... You have ADSL got you know, my mistake, thought you were on cable.

To leave the motorola to act as the DHCP server you need to put the AE in bridge mode.

As far as getting the wifi signal around the house I'd suggest returning the extreme, getting some power over Ethernet adaptors to get the network to the other side of the house then use an Airport Express in bridge mode to provide a wireless network.

You'll end up with two wireless networks but you'll get far better coverage and having two networks shouldn't be a problem if you're not constantly walking around. Even if you did you'd just drop one network then pick up the other.

Another plus point is that an Airport Express and a pair of Ethernet over power plugs will still cost less than the extreme.

mrplow said:

However, as you are connecting the two routers by cable what you are doing isn't wirelessly extending a network. What you are doing will only allow you to create two wifi networks..

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mrplow said:

You'll end up with two wireless networks but you'll get far better coverage and having two networks shouldn't be a problem if you're not constantly walking around. Even if you did you'd just drop one network then pick up the other.
.

Click to expand...

I would slightly tweak the above comments. You can in effect extend your effective coverage - as the OP is attempting to do. While - it's true to a degree - that you have the option to create two wireless networks - you should configure both the router and the "bridge" or Access Point to use the same SSID - you will in effect be extending the range of that network.

For my home - I used unique SSID's but that was for a couple of specific reasons. One I wanted to evaluate the peformance of the Wireless 'n' router - without anyone else connecting, and just generally - I didn't want any 'g' devices on my 'n' network - to ensure channel bonding was always available.

I currently have 3 unique SSID's - the original SSID associated with the FIOS router, and then 2 for the new router (1 for each band of operation.)

You raise some good points. I too have gone for the seperate G and N networks to prevent the N network being dragged down by G devices.

However, while have two wireless networks broadcasting on the same channel and SSID on the same network effectively 'extend' the network I don't believe that's the way forward for the OP as both routers are co-located. While this is the physical setup it's not going to acheive the boost in signal range and strength that's required. That's why I suggested the use of ethernet over power (or indeed ethernet cable to the other side of the house if this is feasible). Either way it means that there will be two physically seperated wireless 'hotspots' in the house giving better coverage than two co-located devices.

extended wireless

ok - you have left me behind and lost me somewhat and gone into your own conversation - I am having difficulty in keeping up !- I did use Power over ethernet a few years ago so I still have the adaptors etc., and will try that but am unsure how to acheive this - also if its possible to achieve this using two seperate wireless networks, which is a great solution, could I not do it with one ? if so how - would using same ssid and power over ethernet work - and what's OP ?

OP = Original Poster i.e. you

Sorry I have a terrible rambling habit....

OK. As I see it your problem is that your wifi signal isn't strong enough from 1 router to work throughout the house.

So you have your Motorola modem router downstairs (for the purpose of this examble, this might not be how you are setup). This is setup to create a wifi network. Let's call it wifi1.
You connect an ethernet-over-power (e-o-p) adapter to this router with an ethernet cable.

Upstairs, you plug in a second e-o-p adapter with will connect to the first e-o-p. So now you have the equivalent of having run an ethernet cable from your router to upstairs.

If you connect an Airport express to the upstairs e-o-p and configure in to create a wireless network (wifi2) you now have two wireless networks joined together, control by your motorola router so all devices can communicate with one another.

A bit of experimentation with the positioning of the routr and airport express to maximise the coverage of the wifi signals and you'll be all set.

Sorry for the slow response - out-of-town all this week.

mrplow said:

However, while have two wireless networks broadcasting on the same channel and SSID on the same network effectively 'extend' the network I don't believe that's the way forward for the OP as both routers are co-located.

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No - clearly - if the routers are in the exact same location - that sort of defeats the purpose. I guess I assumed this wasn't the case. EOP is certainly a potential convenient mechanism if the OP doesn't want to run an Ethernet cable to the other side of the house or downstairs (as in my case).

I'll go ahead and add a couple of other pointers - just in case the OP hasn't considered these yet. In addition to setting up one as an AP (disabling the DHCP server) you may want to manually set the IP address for that AP. For instance 192.168.1.2 (assuming the Motorola is 192.168.1.1)

While it should be possible for the AE to pull an IP address from the Motorola - my Linksys didn't seem to do a very good job of that. There's a very good chance that by default - the AE's IP address is the same as your Motorola router so you need to eliminate that conflict. If you do set that address statically then check your DHCP range to ensure it doesn't include that new static address. For instance, you could adjust the beginning IP to 192.168.1.5.

Lastly, and this was a bit of a head scratcher for me (but I haven't looked into it any further) - maybe CWA could explain this - but the magic switch to get everything up and running for me was when I disabled NAT on the AP. Again, I've read of plenty who have dual NAT (for some odd reason) but that wasn't working for me and I certainly didn't need it. So if you have everything as we've described - and it's still not working - give that shot.

Am back after almost 2 weeks of travelling and used the p.o.e. to have 2 seperate wi-fi's by seeting up AE in bridge mode - thanks for all your help - didn't manually set ip address of AP (would have if it didn't work) - thanks for all the help - pity tho' I couldn't extend same network - mrplow do you reckon it would work now simply renaming ssid of AE to the same as netopia router - I have tried it with no success - but I reread the threads above and couldn't figure out what you settled on if it would or wouldn't work or to leave well enough alone ?

curlsx said:

Am back after almost 2 weeks of travelling and used the p.o.e. to have 2 seperate wi-fi's by seeting up AE in bridge mode - thanks for all your help - didn't manually set ip address of AP (would have if it didn't work) - thanks for all the help - pity tho' I couldn't extend same network - mrplow do you reckon it would work now simply renaming ssid of AE to the same as netopia router - I have tried it with no success - but I reread the threads above and couldn't figure out what you settled on if it would or wouldn't work or to leave well enough alone ?

Click to expand...

It should work - if you've set up the AE to use the same SSID and WPA2 passphrase as your Motorola.

Agreed...it 'should' work

I have an interesting and tricky problem, somewhat related to the OP's. I hope you don't mind me seeking advice on this thread, as there seem to be some pretty knowledgeable posters... Here goes:

1. It all started pretty well. I had internet via a massive (lightning-conducting) UHF tower in my garden, connected to a Time Capsule with ethernet. Attached to the Time Capsule I have a NAS, which serves music over the TC's private network to a network music player, and I get internet on my MacBook, iPad, iMac etc.

2. Then lightning struck, frying the TC. Apple kindly replaced it, but lightning sometimes strikes twice, so I asked my ISP for a solution. I suggested an ethernet surge protector, but they didn't like that idea (not having any, and claiming that they degrade performance). So instead they installed a wireless router ... 50m up the UHF tower. No more ethernet cable (can't have both).

3. PROBLEM. Can get internet fine from the tower router, but the TC can't extend that network (for reasons we've learned about above). So the NAS, which has to be connected by ethernet, can't serve it's music over the network. No more music. Also no more printing to the network printer attached to the TC.

4. As a temporary fix, I set up two networks: one with the TC, for printing and music; one with the router up the tower, for internet. This is a VERY BAD solution. i) I can't use my TC as a network backup, one of the main reasons for having it. ii) I have to change networks every time I print. iii) My network music player can no longer access the internet, so no streamed radio. iv) I can't even use the iPad as a music remote without changing networks.

5. I need a permanent fix. My ISP isn't open to any more fiddling with the hardware setup. This is where I need advice. I have one idea, and am interested in advice on whether it will work. I'm also open to other suggestions, of course.

6. My idea. Buy a Mac Mini in server configuration (2x500gig disks). Ditch the NAS, and use the MacMini as the music server. Connect to the tower router with the MacMini. Share internet from MacMini to TC, or just use the MacMini as the router and the TC as a backup only. Is any of this possible? I'm a networking novice.

A VERY LONG post. If anyone makes it to the end, understands the situation, and has any ideas, you will be a saint and I will be eternally grateful. If you ever come to Zimbabwe I'll buy you LOTS OF BEER.

Well this probably does deserve it's own thread but maybe a mod will do the honors for you.

1st you already owe me a cold Zimbabwean beer - just for making me read such a long post.

A few questions - Why did your ISP mount your new wireless router so high? 50m seems pretty excessive to me. What kind of router did they give you? Do you have administrative access to that router?

The beer's in the fridge

Not exactly sure about why the router is located there. There was already a weatherproof box up the tower with UHF modem and some other bits and pieces. (I may have exaggerated; the tower is 50m, but the box is only about half way up...) There was some talk about using a fibre connection from the modem to the router to protect against future lightning strikes, but I don't know if that was done in the end.

I don't have admin access to the router. Not sure what model; from memory it's a linksys, but couldn't swear to that...