Cascading routers

[myersjr]

I am at very basic level with tech. I am attempting to resolve an issue with wifi. My house is bandwidth hungry. Im always finding my devices are getting kicked, switched, etc as my AT&T gateway can only handle 5 or so connections at a time. What is the quickest, easiest way to remedy this. I bought a junk router from the goodwill to see if i could get it to cascade or whatever they call it. As for how to get it to work..im not quite there yet..lol

[myersjr]

bump

[renegade600]

need to know the following. what internet package are you subscribed to? what router did you get from goodwill? Is the at$t device a router/modem combo?

you can get wifi testing app for your smartphone and use it to check the wifi signal around your house to see if you have any bad spots.

[myersjr]

Originally Posted by renegade600

need to know the following. what internet package are you subscribed to? what router did you get from goodwill? Is the at$t device a router/modem combo?

you can get wifi testing app for your smartphone and use it to check the wifi signal around your house to see if you have any bad spots.

I have AT&T. They provided a "gateway" i believe is the term they use. I assume that it does both. From what i understand, the gateway will only allow 5 wireless connections. This is what i'm trying to remedy. The used router is a LInksys BEFSX41 V2. Generally, all my devices do "connect". Its the staying connected that seems to be tough. Really, i'm up against the device connection limit with the gateway itself. I need to create another access point so that "all my devices" can connect freely without worrying about a device limit. That is the goal.

[renegade600]

still need the model number of the gateway. I have looked at many at$t gateways models and not one has a five device limit. a lot of homes have more than five wifi devices these days so I am wondering if you might be mistaken. besides if you are going to use the old router to, as you say, cascade, we need to know exactly what you are working with.

[Ned Seagoon]

You may have wi-fi in a building that is not suitable and has too many reflections and blocked paths causing packets to have to be resent. Congestion can occur this way.

A hard wired network is the solution if this is the case.

Five devices is not a high number for any network. A hub could be used after your router if it lacks sufficient ports to support five hard wired devices.

[myersjr]

Its a 5268AC-FXN. I know I can have 4 wired connections. Its the fact that ive been trying for months to ensure that the 15 devices i have can all connect. Probably wouldnt have them all on at once..but my dish receiver, 4 cell phones..maybe an additional laptop or tablet or two also on at the same time. I have been told by AT&T that my house is a heavy handed user..lol

[Ned Seagoon]

Nothing to stop you purchasing a hub or a switch and pluging it into one of the hard wired connections and then hard wiring from it to the devices. Alternatively if you wish to stick to Wi-Fi and your device is only capable of 4 connections, purchase one or a number of Wi-Fi hubs and connect them by cable to the ethernet ports on your gateway, you can place each of them in different parts of your building so as to allow good short paths to the devices in the close-by rooms.

[renegade600]

I just scanned the owners manual for the router and did not see anything about limited connections. IMO, there should not be any. have you contacted at$t about this? they also have a users forum.

https://forums.att.com/