virgin hub 5 - how can I setup separate 2.4 & 5ghz ssid's (WIFI access points) like Hub 4

[TiMiT]

Hi All, need some help if possible, I did search about but had trouble finning anything. 

I used to have two WIFI access points setup on the Hub 4 which allowed me to connect to either the older 2.4GHz WIFI signal or the newer (not so well supported) 5Ghz on the same router (which was a great option). 

This made setting up the house easy due to the mixture of 2.4 & 5ghz hardware we have.

Now, the setting for this on the Hub5 seems to be missing, can anyone tell me if this is still possible?  I did try to enable both signals thinking it might have some kind of smart switching but this just causes the WIFI to crash with WIFI black out round the house while it resets; Only to find the system turned 2.4 off again.

I'm currently wishing I stuck with the Hub 4 as Hub 5 hasn't provided me with any warn or fuzzy feeling of an upgrade 😞

[jbrennand]

It is possible... see the procedure below. This was for the Hub3 but does work for a Hub4/5 although some of the wording may have changed regarding the various pages to access boxes to change.
_____________________________________________________________________
If you haven't done this already - try it first - it helps sort some Hub3/4/5 wifi issues for some devices.
Go into the Hub’s settings. Type in  http://192.168.0.1  into your web browser’s url box and login with settings password on the Hub's base sticker (or your own if you changed it). Then in Advanced>wireless signal >smart wifi - tick the disable “channel optimisation” box or “Smart Wifi” box and save settings.  May be different pathways and wording on the 3 Hub types
Then, go to advanced>wireless signal>security, rename the 2.4 & 5 GHz network ssid's.  Just type over to change 'em to whatever you like and something that will differentiate them (e.g - Billybob2 & Billybob5) Try to avoid spaces and periods in the SSID names as they can cause issues with certain devices. Use the same password for simplicity,  Then, apply settings and restart the Hub.  Your 2 wifi networks will now be clearly separated - and you can then select the network you want each device to connect to… individually from the "available networks" list on each of your devices. 

Note all your wifi devices will need re-connecting to the new SSID's and passwords.
All things being equal, 5 GHz is always better/faster and subject to less congestion/interference (and is better for iDevice speeds than the 2.4 one - although the 2.4 one has the better "range" and will be needed when the 5 GHz drops out of range and some older/cheaper/dumber or “specialised” devices can only use this one. 

You should also use a wifi analyser App (or Airport Utility on iOS) to check which 2.4 channels are being heavily used around you and move yours to one of numbers 1,6,11 that is least so, but it wont help if there is other interference.
See if these changes help - you will lose any “seamless roaming” benefits but it may not matter and you can always change the settings back by doing a " pinhole factory reset " if you prefer the way it was - or it doesn’t help.

[TiMiT]

Thanks John, much appreciated 👍 not sure how I missed that! lol 🙄

I still couldn't get the 2.4 to stay on so had to do a full factory rest and now it seems ok. 

Also noticed it doesn't play nice with my android phone when using Chrome to changing the settings, seems to work fine with my windows PC though

[trevor1967]

Thanks  - this solved my problem too  - after upgrading to hub 5 and older products woulnt work with 5ghz so renamed th e2.4ghz and all working fine now

[Ryan_N]

Thank you for letting us know 🙂 

Cheers, 

Ryan. 

[Client62]

Tip for the day : Manage your Hubs via a network cable !

Even a simple Wi-Fi change such as a manual change of channel numbers will cause the Hubs to stop their Wi-Fi service for a short period and in that period your mobile / Wi-Fi laptop becomes disconnected & at the same time Hub's admin session is lost.

[HavencroftKev]

Thanks John,

nice simple instructions and managed to do exactly what I wanted to do.

[Matthew_ML]

Glad to hear the advice has helped HavencroftKev.

Please do reach out if you need any further advice at all. 

[Viper-t]

Didn't know this, this will help my parents terrible wifi without me having to buy them a 3rd party router thx 👍

[Adduxi]

@Viper-t   Note doing this SSID split will stop any VM Pods from working.  The Pods need the Hub to have  "out of the box" settings.