Forum Discussion

rossbaker3's avatar
rossbaker3
Tuning in
4 months ago

WiFi pod location

Hi all,

I'm looking for some advice please!

I live in a 3 bed semi-detached Victorian property and currently have:

  • a Super hub 5 router with 1 GB broadband in the lounge
  • a TP-Link power line adaptor at the rear of the property in the dining room which connected to the router via ethernet (basically acts as a wifi access point)
  • a virgin wifi black pod in the upstairs hallway to boost the signal to the bedrooms.

When I first received the wifi pod, I was getting high speeds, often over 100Mbps and sometimes over 200mbps in the bedrooms, however, recently I have been getting anywhere between 20 - 40Mbps, even though nothing has changed in terms of the set up. The pod is also showing as fair / poor on the VM Connect app and I've tried resetting it / refreshing the wifi but it hasn't improved anything. It seems odd that this would have started performing poorer but I have spoken to Virgin today and they have advised they will be sending me another wifi pod so I was after some advice in terms of where I should locate it to hopefully boost the signal up to the one upstairs. The trouble is, I am limited in terms of where I can locate it so I have a couple of options:

  • on top of the kitchen cabinet units
  • plugged into a socket behind the kitchen door but it will need to sit on the floor. 

Both these locations are about 25ft from the router in the lounge and will be located almost directly beneath the existing wifi pod upstairs. In the kitchen, the new wifi pod will also be about 25ft from the TP-Link power line adaptor as well. I wondered if anyone is able to provide any advice on locating it on top of kitchen cabinets and also if it will make a noticeable difference having one located directly beneath the other? 

I have provided some plans below to show the layout to give some idea but it is not to scale! I have added the 2 locations I have identified for the new wifi pod and the second plan shows the upstairs where the existing pod is located.

Many thanks in advance for any advice / suggestions anyone can provide!

 

  • Client62's avatar
    Client62
    Alessandro Volta

    "getting anywhere between 20 - 40Mbps, even though nothing has changed"

    Seeing 100 .. 200 Mb/s requires a 5 GHz Wi-Fi connection.

    What has changed is these are speeds that are typical for devices connected via he 2.4GHz band.
    Has the Black VM Wi-Fi Pod lost its 5GHz connection to the VM Hub 5 ?  

    Or has the Black VM Pod failed totally and the devices are now connecting on the longer range
    but slower 2.4GHz band directly to the VM Hub 5 ?  

    • rossbaker3's avatar
      rossbaker3
      Tuning in

      Many thanks for taking the time to respond Client62. Is there a way of checking if it’s lost its 5Ghz connection?

  • Tudor's avatar
    Tudor
    Very Insightful Person

    The downside with using VM pods is there are no tailoring options, they are plug and pray not plug and play. I use ceiling mounted PoE WiFi access points and they radiate the signal much better than any units that are lower down in a room. There are a lot less hazards in the way of the WiFi signal. The WiFi 7 units I use have many tailorings options even 8 SSIDs per radio, that’s 24 per unit, so you can split up IoT devices onto a separate VLAN. Also the output power levels can be controlled so if you have ones an adjacent rooms you can ‘turn down’ the WiFi signal. All VM equipment is designed with no tailoring options for the user and where that used to be ok for most of their users with the increase of WiFi devices it becomes very restrictive. 

    • rossbaker3's avatar
      rossbaker3
      Tuning in

      I agree, this would be the ideal but I’m not currently in a position to be running cables through the house. Hopefully we’ll be able to do that at some point though! 

  • Adduxi's avatar
    Adduxi
    Very Insightful Person

    The VM Pods require the Hub 5 to be set as “out of the box” so Single SSID and Smart WiFi enabled. Any changes will stop the Pod working.  It also needs to be within range of the Hub for signal propagation.  The TP Link will not be involved as such as it is not part of the VM Intelligent WiFi.   However you should set the TP Link to have the same single SSID and passwords as the Hub to allow roaming of devices.  Personally I use my own WiFi solution like many others on these Forums. 

    • rossbaker3's avatar
      rossbaker3
      Tuning in

      Thanks very much. I set the TP Link to mirror the router settings when I first installed it so it’s always been one SSID and didn’t adjust the out of the box settings. As I said, when it was first set up the speeds were great although I agree it would be best if I sorted out my own WiFi - I guess putting the super hub into modem only and getting a different more powerful router?

      • Tudor's avatar
        Tudor
        Very Insightful Person

        "powerful router?" yes there are many, but they fall into two categories. 1) what I call a "retail router" which is not only a router, but has WiFi and a network switch; 2) what I call a "real router" which is a router with no other ‘bells and whistles’, this is in fact the correct definition of a router. I have the latter and mine is located in the cupboard under the stairs. When I decorated my home sometime ago I wired up every room  including the loft with Ethernet cable. All cables lead either to the loft or the under stairs cupboard where I have PoE network switches located. I have a very automated home among other things all the lights can be controlled either by voice, iPad, wall switches or externally.

  • Roger_Gooner's avatar
    Roger_Gooner
    Alessandro Volta

    The way to get good performance from the pods is to use an Ethernet connection for wired backhaul. As the black pods have two ports you can daisy chain them by connecting the second to the first or connect them separately to the hub.

    I don't understand your powerline adaptor connected by Ethernet as powerline uses electricity cables. If you actually have an Ethernet cable going into your dining room you can connect it to a gigabit network switch and plug a pod into it.

    • rossbaker3's avatar
      rossbaker3
      Tuning in

      Thanks for replying. I agree the best thing would be to have them connected via Ethernet but unfortunately I’m not in a position to do that currently.

      I do actually have an Ethernet going to the dining room. We had an extension a few years back and I got them to run the cable round. As I knew the router’s signal wouldn’t reach that far. I’d previously had a plug in booster which had worked ok but had its own EXT SSID and I wanted it to be the same throughout. Therefore the TP Link is connected and mirrors the router settings and has always given us really good WiFi speeds so I’ve just never changed it, especially as Virgin make it so difficult to get extra pods. However, it’s getting the speeds and signal upstairs which has been the issue. I got the first WiFi pod from Virgin which did help initially, but recently the speeds have been much lower therefore I thought I would try and get a second one and place it in a position below it in the hope it would improve the signal to the upstairs one. 

      • Adduxi's avatar
        Adduxi
        Very Insightful Person

        The problem with Wifi is the property itself, and the surrounding area. It may well be the next door neighbours have recently installed "something" that is interfering with your Wifi.  I can understand your reluctance around running cable, but it is the only answer that is stable from interference. Also don't forget cable can be used externally, e.g. I ran a Cat 6 cable from a family members Hub, through the wall and up into the loft.  From the loft I dropped it down into a bedroom. The external run is hidden behind a drainpipe.  So perhaps think outside rather than worry about cables all inside?  Just food for thought 🙂