V6 Box dropping wireless signal

[steven-poore]

Hi there, sorry this is probably a real newbie post. We live in a terraced house. The TV & V6 are on the ground floor, front room, the router is on the first floor, back bedroom. The wireless signal, for going to Netflix and Prime, drops out and it often takes an hour of on/off/on/off shenanigans to get the V6 to see the signal again. To get around this I installed a wireless booster in the front bedroom, nearly above the V6. Better, but still drop outs. It's now becoming frustrating especially since we're paying for all these services and the V6 is the only device in the house that can't see a signal (right now I'm in the cellar, 2 floors below the booster unit, and i have no issues).

1) Is there a wireless solution to this that won't drop a signal and cause havoc for my tech-luddite partner?

2)If no wireless solution, can Virgin install a wired solution so we can get the services we pay for? A second router, or a split cable?

3) Total newbie: Do Channels 204 and 205 (Netflix and Prime) operate via wireless, or do they come through the Virgin cable? Have we been doing this the hard way all along?

Many thanks in advance...

[japitts]

First off I'll answer the easy one - channels 204 & 205 are not broadcast channels in the same vein as every other, but just shortcuts to the streaming apps. And with that in mind, the physical co-ax cable feed carries your live TV signals. All your OnDemand & streaming services are carried over the internet, via your home-hub. How your V6 is connected to your home-hub is then the second question.

Ideally, an Ethernet cabled connection is always recommended and preferred. But of course there's times when it's not practical, and reliable WiFi is often perfectly fine. In your case, the first check, is to see the strength of the wireless signal your V6 is receiving. Follow Home > Help & Settings > Settings > Network, and check in the top-right.

The VM Superhubs are cheap routers and not known for their WiFi-performance. But that's a whole other story.

[jb66]

You can buy home plugs for this type of scenario.  It means the V6 wont be using wifi.  If you go into the wifi settings of your v6 and select your network choosing 2.4ghz rather than auto might give you a bit more range

[steven-poore]

Oddly enough it was the 2.4gHz setting that kept dropping out. The 5g one is currently connected but possibly only through the power of prayer!

By home plugs you mean they conduct signal through the ring main? Does that only work if all sockets are on the same ring?

[japitts]

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@steven-poore wrote:

Oddly enough it was the 2.4gHz setting that kept dropping out. The 5g one is currently connected but possibly only through the power of prayer!

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What does the signal strength report?

[steven-poore]

Mode: Infrastructure
Link Status: Connected (5Ghz)
Channel: 46
Signal strength: none
Connection speed: 54Mbps
Security: WPA2-PSK AES
Status: Connected

[Unknown67]

If you on the ultimate Oomph bundle you could try one of the Virgin wireless “Pods” free on this bundle.£5 a month on anything else and not worth it. I bought a Deco M4 Mesh WiFi system that works flawlessly. All three V6 boxes are connected to them, no buffering or losing connection. The newer version is on offer at Amazon at the moment for less than £100. Well worth the money.

[japitts]

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@steven-poore wrote:

Signal strength: none

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Therein lies your problem.

You've alluded in earlier posts to having WiFi "boosters" - are these the VM-supplied pods (which as per another post here, are chargeable on all but the UO bundles), or some other setup?

It does sound like you could be better off in the long-term by installing some new wireless equipment of your own.

[mjpartyboy]

Strange that the V6 can see the harder to travel far signal of the 5 GHz wireless, although it's weak from your post, and it can't see the capable to travel further signal of the 2.4 GHz band.

If wireless is your preferred solution, then I would look into disabling Intelligent Wi-Fi and running separate 2.4 and 5 GHz bands and then look into optimising them for the best channel and bandwidth for your environment for each band and then see how the V6 gets on.

One of our V6 boxes is wired to our AC86U router and the other is connected via wireless, as it's in the room above the router, and on the 5 GHz band it achieves a consistent 1300 Mbps link rate.

[steven-poore]

Thank you all for your replies. The booster is a TP-Link signal extender. It looks as if i shall have to try to tweak some settings somehow and see if anything improves first, and then look into other ways of solidifying the connection. My partner is not keen on having more cables around the house, however.