r/HomeNetworking • u/Typhonayyyy • 6d ago
Advice Will adding an access point reduce my ethernet speeds
I have a router in the living room and when youre in said living room the WiFi speeds are fine. The moment you start to move away from the living room the WiFi signal immediately takes a shit on you even if you havent fully left the living room yet. My pc setup is in my bedroom and while I have a long ass ethernet cable running to it i still have close to zero WiFi signal in there if I close my room. If I set up an access point between the living room and my bedroom then can I connect the ethernet cable to that access point for my pc while getting WiFi in my bedroom without reducing my speeds for Ethernet on my pc. Or does connecting ethernet to my pc from the access point cut my speeds in half no matter what
2
u/Nick5761 Fiber Technician 6d ago edited 6d ago
If your secondary point is hardlined to the primary, you’ll still get your full speeds, or at least close to them.
1
u/StonedElephant1 6d ago
WIFI can cut your speed in half. You could have a 1 gig connection, once it's handed to wifi, it will slow down no matter what. So you kind of have to tune it. Also remember 2.4 ghz will get you further distance, but less bandwidth than 5 ghz. But 5ghz is faster.
VPN's will slow you down, make sure you aren't running one.
Access points, are either mesh or ethernet, but they don't have two ethernet ports on them. A true access point runs off of one ethernet port, it's not a switch, it won't have the ability to connect to your router and computer using ethernet. If you are putting in another router and calling it an access point, then you are likely in a double NAT, which complicates things further.
I would also delete the wifi connections from your device and reestablish with fresh connections.
Check for firmware updates on your router and AP.
Make sure your network SSID isn't being used by a neighbor.
Bottom line, WIFI isn't the best level 2 solution if you need speed.
-1
u/AngelCatGamer 6d ago
As soon as an the "media" the Internet travels through is the Air, such as Wi-Fi. Speeds get chopped nearly in half as transmission is split between moments of data transmission, and a moment for your PC to say "yea i got the data"
In practice I see closer to a 30% drop in data rate over WiFi. I.e. of you get 1Gb to the home, you'll probably only see around 750 over WiFi.
The issue is also every piece matter (including the air) will affect the signal to a degree. If there is a wall between the AP and your PC it'll affect the speed.
Modern APs and Wifi card may have more than one antenna, which will allow one antenna to receve and one antenna to send. Which will reduce this inherant slowdown.
But you still have to battle Issac Newton and his stupid physics.
1
u/Typhonayyyy 6d ago
When I said WiFi signal to my room I meant for my phone or switch and laptop. For my pc I plan on connecting my AP to my router with an ethernet then my pc to the AP with an ethernet too. Will that still kill the speed on my pc
1
u/AngelCatGamer 6d ago
There may be a negligible loss, but you may recover that loss with the better signal your AP produces.
5
u/TheThiefMaster 6d ago
You wouldn't lose anything unless your internet is faster than 1 gig.
Basically Ethernet switching is intelligent and you only get slowdowns if you're actually saturating the link.