Are you struggling to figure out how to use more than one router in your house? You’re probably dealing with one significant issue: unreliable Wi-Fi. It’s a problem that many homes worldwide experience and there are a variety of strategies to mitigate it, including employing several routers.
In a word, yeah. It is feasible to connect many routers to the same home network, but you must be cautious about doing so. You’ll discover instructions on how to connect two routers in this post, as well as the benefits you may expect from doing so.
What Are Routers And What Do They Do?
A router is a piece of hardware that connects two or more packet-switched networks or subnetworks. It has two primary functions: managing traffic across these networks by forwarding data packets to their proper IP addresses and connecting numerous devices simultaneously to the Internet.
Your router, obviously, “routes” internet traffic. What else?
1. Routers use the Internet to request and receive the material: When you use your internet browser to search for answers to queries, your router sends a request to the Internet and receives a response transferred to your device.
Although this is the well-known function of a router and the basis for its name, routers also fulfill various other functions inside a network that are less known and occur behind the scenes.
1. Routers may listen for requests and offer information about your network’s settings: In most cases, a router serves as a DHCP server. Other devices on your shared network, such as computers, laptops, printers, tablets, Smart TVs, and so on, rely on the DHCP server for their network configuration because they don’t have one when they initially boot up (IP address, Gateway, DNS, etc.).
2. Routers may get used as access points for wireless networks: Your router may securely act as a wireless access point if the appropriate security settings are in place. Security-wise, the main power of a firewall in today’s environment is handled by your router rather than your operating system. (However, continue to update your operating system)!
3. Routers can increase the physical size of your network: Your routers may also operate as a four-port switch for wired devices, increasing the number of devices that can be physically hooked into your network.
Why Would A Home Require Two Routers?
Setting up a dual-router home network has several advantages, including:
1. More wired device connectivity: Your primary router will likely have a limited number of LAN ports accessible for connecting wired devices to it (five if you are lucky). Adding a second router adds extra Ethernet ports, allowing more devices to connect without using a network switch.
2. Improved support for mixed wired/wireless configurations: If you have a wired home network and wish to connect some Wi-Fi-capable devices, having a second router is a good idea.
The routers can be split in that wired devices connect to the primary router, while wireless devices connect to the secondary router. That is especially useful if the wired devices are on the other side of the house from the wireless gadgets.
3. Isolation for specific devices: If some gadgets in your house use the network connection a lot, you may use dual routers to isolate them and avoid a lot of network traffic from harming the other devices.
You may consider separating a PC that routinely transmits huge files or plays many online games from a smart TV that is streaming television.
4. Improved wireless coverage: A second router may easily be used to expand an existing Wi-Fi connection, vastly boosting your home’s scope and giving a steady wireless connection to even the most remote devices.
What Functionality Do You Want To Make Sure Not To Duplicate?
1. Do Not Use The WAN Port To Connect the Second Router: The WAN port (sometimes called the “Internet” port) is used to connect to the outside world. Duplicate routing occurs if you link your second router to the WAN port since a firewall now separates your network, and each device connecting to your new network gets connected twice (once by each router).
Instead, use any LAN ports on the routers to link them (numbering does not matter). Remember that only one of your routers has access to the Internet.
2. Configuration of DHCP: There can only be one home network, similar to The Highlander. To minimize IP address conflicts using two routers, deactivate the second router’s DHCP server capabilities.
Otherwise, devices on your network may get their IP address from a router without connection to the outside world, or the primary router may not recognize the device. As a result, the gadget would be unplugged from the Internet.
3. Check to see whether your routers are on the same channel: The channel is highly crucial if your two routers are near together (within fifty feet or so). Duplicated channels will create interference and reduce device Wi-Fi performance.
Utilize a non-overlapping channel if your routers use 2.4 GHz.
4. Remember that frequencies are essential: Consider if the routers utilize wireless frequencies of 5 GHz or 2.4 GHz. The frequency affects router range and bandwidth. A 5GHz router will deliver better data rates at a shorter distance, whereas 2.4 GHz routers may increase coverage at further distances at slower speeds.
How To Connect Two Routers To A Single Network
Now that you understand the advantages of adding a second router to your home network, let’s look at how to do it. This article will discuss connecting two routers to a single network using a wired connection.
Using Ethernet to Set Up a Second Router
1. Connecting to the Primary Router: First and foremost, we must complete the basic configuration on the primary router. Make sure the router is linked to your modem using an Ethernet connection before connecting the computer to the router with another Ethernet cable.
2. Accessing the Primary Router: This primary router will be in charge of the modem’s Internet connection and should be configured as if there was only one router in the house.
You’ll need to log in to the router’s web interface, which you can accomplish by putting the router’s IP address into your URL bar of the web browser.
Unless you’ve updated the router’s username and password, which gets suggested for security reasons, the router will usually come with a card with these details.
Remember, those router settings might vary greatly depending on the brand and model.
3. Change the DHCP Configuration: You may skip this step if at all you’re setting up a LAN-to-LAN network because the DHCP settings will remain unchanged.
If you’re setting up a LAN-to-WAN network, you’ll need to configure DHCP to offer addresses ranging from 192.168.1.2 and 192.168.1.50.
Log out of the router and unplug your computer after saving these modifications. On the primary router, that’s the end of the work.
4. Setting Up Your Second Router: Connect and login to your second router as you did with the first and after that, click on the page that allows you to set the router’s IP address.
Whether you’re connecting a LAN to a LAN or a LAN to a WAN, the IP address you use is critical.
LAN-to-LAN: Replace the IP address with the primary router’s, but add one to the second-to-last digit. For example, if your primary router’s IP address is 192.168.1.1, the secondary router’s IP address must be 192.168.2.1.
Change the IP address from LAN to WAN to 192.168.1.51. It’s worth noting that this is slightly beyond the DHCP range we established on the primary router.
Once the IP address is configured, double-check that the subnet mask matches the primary router’s and that UPnP is turned off if available.
5. DHCP Configuration on the Second Router: This step depends on setting up a LAN-to-LAN or a LAN-to-WAN connection.
LAN-to-LAN: Completely turn off the DHCP service.
LAN-to-WAN: Change the DHCP server’s IP range to 192.168.2.2 to 192.168.2.50.
6. Wireless Channels Should be Changed: If both of your routers are wireless, which most are these days, you’ll have to manually modify the channels so that the two signals don’t conflict. Setting the primary router to any channel between 1 and 6 and the secondary router to channel 11 is a simple way to accomplish this.
7. Place the Routers in the Correct Position: Now that you have configured both routers, Make sure to save your modifications, log out, and unplug the router from your computer before moving both routers to their final locations.
Remember that you’ll require an Ethernet wire to link the two.
If you’re using a separate modem and router, you might want to put them near to each other for convenience and to avoid having more wires than necessary running about your house.
8. Connect the routers: The routers must connect regardless of whatever network arrangement you use, but the port you must use will change.
LAN-to-LAN: Connect one end of the Ethernet cable to one of the available LAN ports on the back of the primary router and the other end to another available LAN port on the back of the secondary router.
LAN-to-WAN: Connect one end of an Ethernet cable to one of the available LAN ports on the back of the primary router and the other end to the WAN port (which may be labeled “Internet”) on the back of the secondary router.
You’ve successfully linked a second router to your home network through a wired connection after it is established.
Conclusion
As previously said, the second router extends the wireless range, and you may use the same strategy to daisy-chain more routers. However, you should be aware that your internet speed may be affected, particularly if you only have one outgoing connection.
Two routers on the same network give you access to all of your shared files throughout the network simultaneously. On any linked computer or mobile device, you may move, copy, and paste files, as well as play music, videos, and photos.
