Improving my home network...

[bejamartins]

Hi guys,

 

I feel ashamed asking stuff like this on networking as I work with VMs on my thesis, but it really was never my cup of tea, so I only learned what I needed to do my job.

 

Anyway, I live on a pretty crappy place, connections-wise. There is no fiber, no cable, my only choices are ADSL, 4G and satellite. Unfortunately, ISPs here are said to be pretty dishonest with 4G (I also had a very bad experience with them when I tried 3G on the past) and some people complain awful speeds during more traffic-intense hours, so I resisted until now with good ol' ADSL.

 

So this is my connection at the moment:

 

 

I used to have significantly better speed and ping with my previous ISP, sadly, as of recently, the current one is the only one in the country that still provides ADSL (and they claim their central is further).

 

Some people told me I could improve a bit my experience with a better modem and router. How could that help me if so?

 

I'm currently using an ISP provided ADB 4000n (I found someone that emulated the ISP firmware here, btw) to which my PC is connected directly through cable (I also have a Buffalo Air Station Turbo G WHR-G54S connected to it just to expand my ethernet ports - not that I use all at the same time, but just to reduce the hassle of changing cables).

 

Also, what can I do in general to improve my connections at home in general? I'd say there is usually a max of two devices connected at the same time through ethernet, and 4 or so using wireless for light stuff (web browsing mostly, and at most software updates like Windows's or Android apps'). For the wireless to cover the whole house I use couple of 150MB/s modern TP-Link range extenders, that extend the main network, though I set them with new SSIDs). Please keep in mind the my budged is quite limited.

 

Thanks in advance for any help.

[W-L]

-SNIP-

 

GG ISP...

 

There isn't that much that can be done really unless your able to get a new ISP, satellite systems are good if your in extreme rural areas and can't get a decent connection but do cost more.

 

For wireless connections wireless extenders perform very poorly where most cuts speeds to almost half when repeating a signal so a single large or multiple access points would be a better choice.

[EposVox]

When you already seem to have decent hardware, there's not much that can be done. If the cable in your home/running to the telephone pole/source of connection is super old, it could potentially be replaced, but other than that, it's just your connection to your ISP.

 

As said above, multiple APs are better than range extenders, but that will only make your network experience smoother, not improve your mainline speed.

Same with wiring everything you can - more on ethernet is better than more on wireless. But again, you're 100% limited by your connection to your modem.

[skywake]

Multiple access points is the best way to improve wireless coverage. Preferably dual-band so that your higher end devices can sit on the 5Ghz band when they have a solid signal. Won't make much of a difference for internet given your connection speed but it'll help with local traffic.

 

As for routing well for the most part you're kinda stuck. You're not going to get that much better speeds. However if you get a better router with great QoS you can stretch that bandwidth out further. Something like this: https://www.ubnt.com/edgemax/edgerouter-x/ ... you can set it up so that higher bandwidth tasks don't chew up all your available bandwidth. It'll result in slower speeds for individual tasks but everything will be more responsive. Web pages will load quicker when you're downloading something, game pings won't go to shit etc, etc.