[Alicia]

Try Lenhart Electric - they are very good

[IvorT]

WiFi extenders are a waste of time. WiFi is relatively slow, so if you make another WiFi network dependent on the first, it amplifies the problem. Your cheapest and quickest solution would be to buy a pair of power line adapters. Key that into Amazon. Buy something that says it can do about 500mbits, but don't expect anywhere near that! But it will be infinitely better than what you have, and you'll be installing it is about two days. Basically it enables the Ethernet connection to be carried over the power line. It is perfectly safe. Been around for years.

Long term, you can modify your phone outlets to be Ethernet. But you have to download the wiring diagrams from the Internet. Don't get confused by all this type A or B stuff. That relates to the old phone outlets and whether a single outlet can have a phone with two lines (remember those.). For this to work, your low-voltage box has to have a little connection panel, when all of the wires are connected to wires of the same colour, that then go off into the attic space and down the walls.

Try powerline adopters first. You won't regret it. If you want to borrowed a couple, leave a post.

[biker1]

No, you don't need any wiring diagrams. The "A B stuff" refers to the wiring order for the RJ-45 jack. Use the "A" stencil included with the jack. You can convert the RJ-11 jacks (using cat5e) to RJ-45 jacks trivially. By the way, WiFi (contemporary versions) is plenty fast for consumer applications.

Originally Posted by IvorT

WiFi extenders are a waste of time. WiFi is relatively slow, so if you make another WiFi network dependent on the first, it amplifies the problem. Your cheapest and quickest solution would be to buy a pair of power line adapters. Key that into Amazon. Buy something that says it can do about 500mbits, but don't expect anywhere near that! But it will be infinitely better than what you have, and you'll be installing it is about two days. Basically it enables the Ethernet connection to be carried over the power line. It is perfectly safe. Been around for years.

Long term, you can modify your phone outlets to be Ethernet. But you have to download the wiring diagrams from the Internet. Don't get confused by all this type A or B stuff. That relates to the old phone outlets and whether a single outlet can have a phone with two lines (remember those.). For this to work, your low-voltage box has to have a little connection panel, when all of the wires are connected to wires of the same colour, that then go off into the attic space and down the walls.

Try powerline adopters first. You won't regret it. If you want to borrowed a couple, leave a post.

[chrissy2231]

OOMA is a voice over IP. It costs $75 to buy box on Amazon. Then it's $5.61 per month for taxes and 911. This is a landline with crystal clear clarity.
My cell phone is for emergency only. I'm on 10 cents a minute plan & pay $10 per year.
I don't like seeing people who need to answer their phone when out. Isn't the point of going out to get away from the house & phone. An emergency is different & they are far and few between. Don't get me started on F*%#__(!~__$<?K@+=ing call waiting.

[dpmers]

Originally Posted by scout2028

My house was built at the end of 2009 and has standard telephone jacks in every room. We gave up land lines years ago so the phone wires in the house are not being used.

My wife's computer has had difficulty with decent WIFI speeds. We have a Lantana with a Linksys EA7500 in the front guest bedroom and her computer is located in the laundry room separated by 2 exterior walls and 2 interior walls. I've placed a range extender in the dining room but it helps only a little and not even that all the time.

Recently I ran a 25 ft. ethernet cable from the single port on the range extender through the dining room through the kitchen up the wall over the door and then down to her ethernet port. Now getting ~100 Mbps on her system. And that's WiFi to the range extender and ethernet cable to the computer. That's great but the ethernet cable running through everything is not a long term solution.

Based on a previous thread

Looking to replace phone jacks with ethernet connections

I suspect that the cabling already exists for me to have a direct ethernet connection from my router (it has a open port), directly to her system. Adjacent to her computer is a telephone jack and adjacent to the router there is what used to be a telephone jack that CenturyLink converted to 2 RJ45 jacks when we had their service. (Went back to Comcast after CenturyLink for 2+ years.)

The previous thread noted above referred to a low-voltage panel but I do not have one in the garage but I do have a 'Network Service' box on the outside of the house. (Can't get to it now because of overgrown shrubs but have someone coming to trim later this week - at least he said he was.) I think this box was used for standard telephone wiring.

Is that the low-voltage panel?

Is it as simple as rewiring the laundry room receptacle from telephone to RJ45 and plugging an ethernet cable from router to wall and then another from laundry room wall to wife's computer?

Do I need to do anything inside the exterior box?

Thanks,

I had problems with 2 expensive netgear routers kept needing to be reset, so I bought s google wifi 3 node router, in my Lantana, have centurylink 1g optical service right into my middle bedroom(our office). Pay $65/mo for life, no taxes and after 2 years no issues whatsoever. I manage the router from my phone, worst downlink speed during peak busy time is better than 500 m/b.

[M2inOR]

Data point for fiber connection for internet.

Son is in Augusta, GA and recently installed the newer mesh network from TP-Link. He got a 3 hub system that is also WiFi 6 compatible.

It's available at Costco:

TP-Link Deco X60 WiFi 6 AX3000 Whole-Home Mesh Wi-Fi System, 3-Pack
Item # *1401347*

The older Deco is also available. Online or at the warehouse stores. Also available at Amazon.

He's getting 850Mbps over WiFi, for the one computer he upgraded to WiFi 6, and over 400Mbps with his older devices with WiFi that can't be upgraded. Up and Down, so great for streaming and cloud backup.

He has AT&T U-verse for TV and Internet. It is 1Gbps service.

So yes, WiFi CAN deliver exception internet performance

[FLSun]

Swap low voltage card in garage for Internet switch card. Change house phone jacks to internet jacks. We did this years ago

[scout2028]

Many thanks for the all of the suggestions. There is a lot of great information in this thread.

If I didn't like my current router, I'd consider the mesh solution (I've been watching that technology for awhile now) but the existing router is handling everything else quite well and see no reason to spend the money and disrupt the existing network - Alexa, smart plugs, iPads, cell phones and an occasional untethered laptop.

I had a friend send me pics of his newer low-voltage panel. That's a great idea and much better than what we have here in Pennecamp. But my low-voltage things are done differently - the irrigation controller is in the house, but there is an external Comcast box and an external 'phone' box. If I had the low-voltage panel inside I'd be tempted to convert the telephone wiring.

A special thanks to the responders who provided input on the telephone wiring conversion.

So my plan now is what I was going to do and was suggested early on - hire an electrician to run cable through the attic and install two jacks. That will allow me to connect the wife's computer to the exiting gigabit ethernet network. (The Gig-E isn't really necessary but comes in handy sometimes.)

Thanks again to all who responded.

[petsetc]

Just a quick question for the powerline adapter advocates. Are the new powerline adapters better at communicating than older ones - not a speed question, a reliability and quality on connection question. I am using TP-Link AV500 and they seem to drop the connection and then recover in a few minutes-all by themselves. Thank you.

[WelchNH]

I agree with the use of Netgear for power line adapters. I've used a Netgear 1200 for years here in The Villages: speed at the remote point is identical to the speed at the router. A Netgear pair is arounfd $100 total. Also agree the "phone wire" is not technically equal to "LAN wire"

[jump4]

Originally Posted by scout2028

Many thanks for the all of the suggestions. There is a lot of great information in this thread.

If I didn't like my current router, I'd consider the mesh solution (I've been watching that technology for awhile now) but the existing router is handling everything else quite well and see no reason to spend the money and disrupt the existing network - Alexa, smart plugs, iPads, cell phones and an occasional untethered laptop.

I had a friend send me pics of his newer low-voltage panel. That's a great idea and much better than what we have here in Pennecamp. But my low-voltage things are done differently - the irrigation controller is in the house, but there is an external Comcast box and an external 'phone' box. If I had the low-voltage panel inside I'd be tempted to convert the telephone wiring.

A special thanks to the responders who provided input on the telephone wiring conversion.

So my plan now is what I was going to do and was suggested early on - hire an electrician to run cable through the attic and install two jacks. That will allow me to connect the wife's computer to the exiting gigabit ethernet network. (The Gig-E isn't really necessary but comes in handy sometimes.)

Thanks again to all who responded.

Getting a new MESH router doesn't have to "disrupt the existing network". If you program the new mesh router with the same WiFi password you currently use, all your devices will automatically connect to the new router.

I've been using Google WiFi routers for past several years. I found they had much better WiFi range that the previous non-MESH router. You may only need 1 or 2 of the MESH routers to provide full WiFi coverage of your house.