Summary: Depending on what you're planning, you can use a second wireless point to extend your wireless network.
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Can I use a second wireless access point to extend my wireless network? |
It depends on what you're planning.
If your access points will be wired together, you're probably okay. But if you're looking to use the wireless access point to avoid more wires ... well, as odd as that sounds, maybe not.
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If you plan to have both access points wired together, and perhaps placed a fair distance apart then this should work. This diagram illustrates that scenario:
The important thing is that the access points are actually wired to each other and, say, your internet connection.
On the other hand, if you want to connect some computers and the internet to one wireless access point, and then connect some wired computers to the other access point as in this diagram:
And you're expecting the access point to access point wireless connection to act as a virtual extension cable then this will probably not work. Access Points typically do not communicate with each other.
A better approach for small installations might be to set up a computer with both a wireless card and an ethernet card, and then use connection sharing to share the wireless connection to other computers on the ethernet connection. The only drawback here is that you stand a good chance that these other computers will essentially be "double NAT-ed" - which means that they are effectively behind two NAT routers. The bottom line to that is that some software will not work, and there's a slight performance penalty.
Related:
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How should I set up my home network? Once you add a second computer, you're faced with setting up a network, at least to share the internet connection. Here are some general guidelines.
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What's the difference between a Hub, a Switch and a Router? Hubs, switches and routers are all computer networking devices with varying capabilities. Unfortunately the terms are also often misused.
Article C2103 - July 7, 2004
Similarly to David way back in December, I'm considering either having two access points or one access point and a repeater. If the coverage of the two signals intersect what kind of interference problems can occur? Could there be a problem with the requesting computer receiving the same packet multiple times?
Posted by: Mike Maxson at April 22, 2009 11:51 AMIts possible i connect internet & sharing network to my office and my house?
this is the set up. My house near from my office its around 150 meters away i have a dsl in my office.but in my house i have no internet connection its possibly i connect using AP to AP connection? In my office i have 3 computers 1 router & 1 AP.In my house i have 16 port HUB & 1 AP 1 computer...pls help me... thanks
Posted by: Toyang at June 5, 2009 3:28 AMI'm trying to setup something like the second diagram in the article except by using wireless routers which cannot be wired together. My situation is kind of strange and I need to have my router provide a way for my two hardwired computers to access the internet. Any ideas on if this is possible and if so, how I'd set up my wireless router?
Posted by: Ethan Cunningham at June 8, 2009 8:36 AMToyang:
I'm trying to do this. On this momment I have two 2.4ghz antennas looking to each other on a 900 feets distance. I had some problems with the routers I got (ALFA NETWORKS) I have to solve this problem until the weekend so you can email me next week and I'll tell you how I solved this configuration.
Posted by: Ticus at July 16, 2009 9:38 PMIts possible i connect internet & sharing network to my office and my house?
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Hi Leo, I'm trying to setup a wireless connection in my home, is it possible I can use a accesspoint as my internet connection.I have wireness router and accesspoint connected on the same network.I wont to use my wireness modern to commicate with my wifi and I wont to connnect my desktop to my wireless moder using a ethernet cable.will this work
Posted by: demetrice at July 20, 2009 9:06 AMYes you can!!! Search for mesh networks and you will find how to do it!
Posted by: Marcus at August 22, 2009 1:41 PMhi
Posted by: hecky at September 9, 2009 12:41 AMcan i use a dlink range extender to boost an unsecure wireless signal that i pick up.
thanks
You can extend an unsecure wireless signal as long as it is on the same channel and use the same SSID. But that will still be leeching and is illegal in some countries.
Posted by: Nick at October 1, 2009 7:36 PMEthan, for the second diagram to work, the second wireless access point must function as a repeater. So it must be able to function as a "client" and a "server" concurrently. Most wireless routers don't do that but there are wireless access points that have that functionalities. Linksys & Belkin calls them Range Extender and DLink calls the Repeaters but they refer to the same thing.
Posted by: Nick at October 1, 2009 7:43 PMDear Mr. Leo
i have problem to configure my network
i have a desktop with MSI motherboard have two ethernet with XP OS and i installed wireless card for my wirless enternet.
the wirless is ok with me and working fine, but i have issues when i want to connect my desktop with my brother desktop wire network.
i already configure the IP adress for both computers and it was connected but when i want to open the other computer to see the sharing files that i already shared it wont open and i noticed it use the wireless network for searching not the ethernet that i already connected it with the other computer.
but in the end it manage to open the other computer from the wirless network (the other desktop have also wireless) not from the wire network.
please help me in this i dont know what to do and i searched alot but unable to find a solution for this.
Posted by: Faris at October 14, 2009 7:57 AM