[CraiulLup]

Hey folks,

I want to extend the range of my network so that I can have wireless internet in my back garden. The signal I have from the main router inside the house is very weak as soon as you exit the house because of how the house is built (reinforced walls and all that). I hardly get 1 bar of signal once I step outside the house and the signal is lost very often.

So this is what I need to do:

1. I've got 1 router (hereafter extender1) that I want to connect to the main router through a cable and setup wifi so I have a good connection in the back yard (the area right around the house)

2. I've got a 2nd router (extender2) that I want to connect to extender1 (if thats possible) which will provide wifi in the back of the garden.

The distance between the routers is about 25m/82ft between main and extender1 and 20m/65ft between extender1 and extender2.


My question is what are the settings I need to use on both the extenders? (both running dd-wrt)

Thanks in advance.

PS: here is a scheme of the network I'm planning, if that helps any

[CraiulLup]

I've tried setting up the 1st extender by using this link
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Wireless_Access_Point

Fixed the problems with it and now it works. Moving on!

Any ideas what the settings need to be on the 2nd extender? Or do I have to connect this to the main router as well (which would suck)

[araya1987]

let me try to help you.

some notes first:
-you dont need the crossover cable, if you already buy it or made it thats ok, it will work too
-no need to flash the routers with ddwrt, if the routers are running ddwrt is also ok

steps for main router.

1. configure it like if it was the only router in the house (wan (pppoe, ipoa, etc)
2. set the dhcp server from the range xxx.xxx.xxx.100-150 (i dont thing you will get more than 49 devices connected to your network at the same time)
3. regarding the network, i wuold say you can stick to the 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.100.1, it doesnt make a difference which one you use
4.configure the wireless ssid, security and channel (write this info down)

Steps repeater 1

1.connect a utp cable from one of the ports from router one to one of the ports in the repeater 2 (NOT THE WAN PORT in repeater 1, you can put the cable there if you assign the wan port to the router's switch, this is something you can do with ddwrt but not with the stock firmware
2.connect your computer to the repeater and access the web gui configuration (it is usually 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.100.1)
3. change the local ip to one from the network you choose in the step 3 for the main router, so, if in the main router you choose 192.168.100.1, this one should be the 192.168.100.2
4. disable the dhcp server on this repeater
5. save the settings, at this point the repeater should reboot, and since we change the local ip to 192.168.100.2 you will need the internet explorer or firefox and open that ip to get to the repeater web gui configuration again.
6.disable firewall
7. in the wireless configuration set the exact same configuration you entered in the main router, same ssid, same security, same password, the only thing you should set different is the channel, you can use 1, 11, 9 for example

this on is done

steps for repeater 2

1. do the same cable connections as repeater
2. this time you need to change the local ip to 192.168.100.3 (since .1 is taking by the main router and .2 is taken by repeater 1)
3.disable dhcp, firewall
4. configure in the same way the wireless settings, changing the channel is optional really

Done!

now, this way the three devices will be on the same network, and there will be only 1 wireless network on the hole house and if you walk around inside and outside the house your device will never loose the conection since it will jump from the main router to the repeaters automatically as needed and will be seamless.

all the devices will get an ip from the main router and can share files printers no matter to wich router/repeater the device is connected

hope it helps