I’ve recently bought my first home (2 floors, 1400sq.ft. / floor) after living exclusively in small apartments beforehand. I’ve brought over my modem/router from my apartment (Netgear C3700 2-in-1 N600 WiFi Cable Modem Router with DOCSIS 3.0). The internet plan I pay for is through Cox and should provide me with 500mbps down / 50mbps up.
The house also has only one incoming cable line, and it is on the opposite side of the house as my home office (I work from home). Also, there was some weird wiring done where I only have a male coaxial coming from the wall with a short reach, so I can’t move the modem/router to a more central area of the home.
With that said, I’m not happy with the internet speeds I’m getting at my new home (especially in my office) and running any of the online speed tests show me speeds much lower than the 500/50 that I’m paying for even right next to the router. I see a couple of things I can improve on. Which of the following options would you all suggest I work on first?
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Upgrade my router hardware. I’ve had the C3700 for a few years now and I’m well aware it’s nothing close to top of the line, and also is not capable of handling 500mbps from what I can tell from the spec sheet.
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When upgrading my hardware, should I buy separate modem and router so I can put the modem in the (less than ideal) corner of the house, and then run Ethernet to the router which is in a more central location?
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Should I have an electrician/technician come to my house to run a new coaxial line to a better part of the house? If I do this, I could connect a WiFi extender or something similar to the new coax line to get better connection near my office.
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Should I look into a mesh system to get better range to my office?
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In regards to the coax line that I have in the house, it had some bad wiring done where the line was very frayed, so I had to re-crimp the ends which I may not have done super well. Would it be worthwhile to have a professional look at that as well?
If there are any other suggestions, I’ll be happy to listen to those as well. Also, for upgrading hardware, please suggest some good options and/or the specs I should look for when searching myself.
I like the idea of running some Ethernet around the house and setting up some APs in those areas.
This might be a simple question, but what is involved in setting up an AP? I assume I will still have my modem/router connected to coax in the same location it is now, and then hook up the AP to one of the new Ethernet lines (and probably a wall outlet) in the area I want a better WiFi signal. Is that it? Or do I need to connect those Ethernet lines to my modem/router in some way? Maybe the cable runner would do that in their work, but I’m pretty naive in that world.