Are you working from home on a full-time basis? Have you thought of ways you can optimize your WiFi so you can effectively work from home without issues? Don’t wait until your work from home arrangement is revoked as you are constantly offline and have spotty WiFi during Teams Meeting with your boss and customers. Your home WiFi network is under pressure ever since the start of Covid-19 back in 2019 and you have been holding on ever since. Many homes that we visit for WiFi support have this issue of not having consistent internet speeds even on their high-speed fibre lines. You know you have bad WiFi when simple things such as sending a WhatsApp message get difficult as the network is almost non-existent. Many have even thought of canceling their internet subscription as it just isn’t working.

A lot of homes rely on the free-to-use router they got from their ISPs. These routers are just standard routers built for minimal performance. Most don’t have Quality of Service (QoS) and Beamforming Technology to address the issue of giving quality internet services to all connected devices. Let’s take a look at a few things we can do to improve your WiFi for Work from home and homeschooling.

Low Speeds in Certain Rooms

The internet router is built with antennas that transmit signals via radio waves. Some routers are cable of transmitting in all directions (omnidirectional). The antennas have their own range limits. If you happen to have placed the router out of sight far from everyone, it’s highly likely that your WiFi signal won’t reach everywhere you want it to. This issue starts when your fibre line is installed at a random place in your house and away from where you will mostly need internet access.

You can solve your WiFi reach issues by using Mesh WiFi routers. The Mesh WiFi system is made up of the main router which connects directly to your modem/internet router and additional small nodes that are placed across your home to give full wifi coverage everywhere. The mesh WiFi nodes are not like traditional extenders that rebroadcast your WiFi signal. Extenders take the WiFi signal from your router and rebroadcast it creating another WiFi network. WiFi signals sent from the extender are half the speed of your router. You can read more about WiFi extenders in this article. On the other hand, the nodes from a mesh system work together with the router to create one seamless roaming network. This secure network extends both range and signal strength with dual-band capabilities.

The Tenda Nova MW5c is the most affordable Mesh WiFi system to deploy in your home. Once you activate the main node on your router using the Tenda WiFi mobile app, the other nodes automatically connect with each other to create a single mesh network. You can add more nodes for your larger home to increase coverage. Each device connects to the best possible access point to ensure a strong signal at all times. The system has an easy-to-use app interface so you have full control over usage, troubleshooting, and WiFi management.

Interference Causing Drop-Offs

So now what exactly causes WiFi dropoffs? WiFi dropoffs are known to be caused by environmental factors that can sometimes leave you very confused as to what exactly is happening to your network. It is like the one minute you have a strong and consistent WiFi signal. Then suddenly it drops very low leaving you frustrated with no clue what is happening.

How to Diagnose WiFi Dropoffs

You need to check the location of your router if it is closer to household appliances that emit radio waves. Your WiFi signal will likely drop if your router is near microwave ovens, wireless mouse, Bluetooth devices, baby monitors, and any other smart home device that is using the 2.4Ghz band.

Can your neighbor cause a signal interfernece?

Yes, your neighbor can also cause WiFi signal interference when using routers with overlapping channels. You need to do a WiFi Analyze to determine what channel your neighbor is using so that you can adjust your own to a less congested channel. Many routers are set to automatically select the channel. So your best channel to look into is channel 1, 6, and 11. Try to stay clear of those that are overlapping.

What is Co-channel interference?

Co-channel interference happens when you are using the same channel as others broadcasting on the same channel. A perfect example of a co-channel is when you are listening to the FM radio in your car. The moment you enter a new area then suddenly your radio picks up another radio station broadcasting on the same channel you are in. If that channel is stronger than yours it will cause interference. To get back to that station you were tuned into you’ll have to rescan for a new channel.

Routers use a similar concept as the FM radio. The WiFi signals are sent through channels that need to be optimized for better performance. By default, your router is set to automatically switch channels every few microseconds to ensure the best connection is being used.

A 2.4GHz signal has 11 channels, but only 3 are non-overlapping. Therefore, if you live in an apartment complex with 4 neighbors nearby and you’re all using 2.4GHz WiFi, the likelihood of at least two of you using overlapping channels is very high.

A 5GHz signal supports 45 channels, 23 of which are non-overlapping. On 5GHz WiFi, the probability of interfering with a neighbor’s WiFi goes down dramatically due to three factors:

• An increase in the number of non-overlapping channels
• Your router automatically choosing the channel with the least interference
• Unlike the 2.4GHz frequency, 5GHz frequency signals trail off significantly over long distances

A simple way to resolve Interference issues: You must place your router away from devices that may cause interference and ensure you have a dual-band router that can operate on both the 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequencies.

All Tenda Nova Mesh WiFi nodes are dual-band and offer band steering to further increase performance. Band steering steers dual-band compatible devices to the 5GHz band, which decreases co-channel interference.

Devices not Connecting

Have you ever had that one device that just won’t connect to your WiFi? We all experienced it, when suddenly your device says connected without internet but other devices are working perfectly at full speed. Occasionally when only one device is not connecting to the internet, we don’t restart the whole network. You only need to restart that one device and then do forget the network after restarting so you can reconnect again. Yes, it is that simple. When it is your laptop that doesn’t want to connect to the WiFi network. You need to check if the network card firmware is not outdated. Go to manage device and then go to network properties and check for updates. If any are available then update your network card drivers.

These tips will help you troubleshoot some of the most common Wi-Fi problems but in some cases the router you’re using simply may not be able to provide the speed and coverage you need. As you’re considering how to equip your home office for the increased demands of social distancing, a modern mesh WiFi system could be one of the best investments you can make.

Are you looking for a solution for your home, like having WiFi coverage in certain rooms in home? We offer Free Home WiFi Inspection and Advice on what can best work for your home. Get in tour with our office on 082 670 3622 or 087 821 6085. You can load a support ticket via the chatbox on your left bottom corner and we will call you back.