How to set up a cable modem to router to wireless hub?
 

I can't find a good answer to this online so I thought I'd go to the Pelican brain trust.

My situation is the cable line comes into a back bedroom and connects to a cable modem then connects to a wireless router. The room is too far from the rest of the house to give good wireless range so I have the wireless router placed out in the middle of the upstairs. This leave cables running all over upstairs to connect my son's gaming computer, a connection out to the garage, and extra lines for my son's friends when they have a LAN party.

What I'd like to have is the cable modem connected to a wired router in the same bedroom so the cables are kept mainly in that room. Then a single wire would go out to a wireless hub in the middle of the house.

I'm pretty computer illiterate so I don't how to keep from having IP address conflicts and too many firewalls and any other problems with connecting a standard wireless router to a regular wired router (or is it a switch?).

What device are you using for the wireless?

Several options.

1) Upgrade the primary WIFI router with a new dual band signal shaping router then distribute WIFI range extenders throughout the house.

2) Take advantage of the coax drops in the house.

If there is already coax in the vicinity of the gaming computer you can drop another MOCA router there and set it up as a bridge. Advantage there is it'll provide both additional WIFI and hard wired ports. If FIOS is available in your area ask your friends / neighbors if they have an extra one laying around or check Craigslist for Actiontec or Motorola MOCA routers.

3) Use the homes electrical wiring and get some Powerline extenders.

i just went through this. It is important that the line from outside to the cable modem be direct with a little to no splices as possible. The best way is to run a cable drop straight from outside to wherever you want the modem to be. Another option would be to leave the modem where it is and run a separate Ethernet drop cable to the room where the router is.

More detail: the coax cable comes directly to the cable modem from the supplier, no splits. The cable modem is in the bedroom where the cable enters the house. An ethernet cable goes from the cable modem to a Netgear wireless router about 20' away. Then 4 ethernet cables go back to the bedroom where the cable modem is with one of those 4 going out to the garage. So there are ethernet wires running all place upstairs.

Ideally I'd like those 4 ethernet cables to stay in the bedroom and only 1 ethernet cable leave the bedroom to the wireless device 20' away.

What's on the other end of the other 3 ethernet cables?

You mean they go to different bedrooms? Not all back to the same bedroom?

I f they are all indeed going back to the same room just toss a cheap 4 port hub in there and run one ethernet out to the wireless.

put the router next to the cable modem with a short ethernet cable.

Buy another cheap router and set it up as a "wireless repeater" for the first router, put it somewhere more in the middle of the house.

Done!


I'm with SM, what are the ethernet cables doing?

A wireless bridge, repeater, access point? It depends on what you are doing with the layout. It sounds like you could leave the wireless router in the room next to the cable modem and use a wireless repeater in the hall down towards the middle of the house since you don't need any cabling in the middle of the house. You can get them that plug into the wall outlet and are about the size of a power adapter.

A wireless repeater sounds like a good solution. Then I can put my existing wireless router in the bedroom and the repeater downstairs. I'll pick one up after the Christmas traffic dies down ;) Thanks!

I have a basic Netgear cable modem connected by a short ethernet cable to the LAN port of an ASUS wireless router (running Merlin firmware). This gives us wifi downstairs, but I also have the router connected to an 8 port hub that gives me data points for TV, Home office, etc.

From the hub there is also a cable running upstairs to another wireless router that gives the kids wifi on their own network (which can be managed/filtered content, etc).

DHCP is off on all routing or server type devices except the ASUS which handles IP addresses - there are no conflicts.

Works very well and if I need to flush the kids out from upstairs I just pull their wifi cable! They'll normally surface within 3-4 mins of no interwebs.

Make sure the repeater can reach your wireless router wirelessly and you should be good and they are pretty easy to set up.

If you do like D911SC you can just buy an access point instead of a full on router and setup will be easier.