Mesh routers have become increasingly popular in the past few years, these are types of routers that create a mesh topology with two or more wifi access points together, creating a seamless single wifi network that can expand or can cover as much area you want. Mesh routers are highly expandable but they come with a limitation, You have to buy all of your routers from the same company.
Yes, you can extend the WiFi range with another router, connecting two routers doesn’t produce a stronger signal. But this will give you a wider range. You can create only one network name between the two routers if you want. In this setup, other network devices will connect to whichever router has the stronger signal.
Process To Create Mesh network with Two router
If you are willing to create a mesh network with your two routers, read the process given below.
First Router
- Take one of your routers and go to the wireless security settings of the router, disable Automatic Channel selection, and set the channel to channel 3.
Second Router
- Now take your other router
- Connect it to the first router with a cable. And turn off the DHCP server of the router to prevent IP conflicts or network.
- Now, set the IP Address of this router to 1 number higher than the existing main router, Like from 192.168.1.2 to 192.168.1.3.
- Now make sure this address is out of the 1st router’s allotment of addresses for DHCP distribution. If not, Reserve a DHCP for this router’s address in router 1’s DHCP table.
- Then set the internet gateway of router 2 to router 1’s IP address, and use Wireless Media Bridge or Powerline Ethernet Kit to create a wired connection from any of the first 4 ports in router 1 to any of the first 4 ports in router 2. Avoid the WAN port of router 2.
- Now manually set the channel to any other channel not being used by the main router or any other router on this network. And set up similar wireless security in both the routers.
This method will give both the routers two similar access points working together to create a single distributed network within a wide range. The two-router network will Support more wired devices.
Will two wireless routers conflict?
If both the wireless routers are situated close to each other, that might cause some problems like slowdowns in performance. it’s best to get them on channels at least 6 apart, so no part of the bands creates a conflict in network distribution. You can use android apps like Wi-Fi analyzer to see which one is working at which channel and manually modify it if you get into any problem related to speed or reliability.
The setup guide given above is comprehensive so it is likely that you don’t face any problems while performing the task. Hope you will find this blog helpful.