Repeater / 2nd AP / RelayD?

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stuartbh
Posts: 76
Joined: Sun Oct 20, 2019 4:18 pm

Repeater / 2nd AP / RelayD?

Post by stuartbh »

Gargoyle users,

I recently moved my main router (a wrt3200acm) upstairs in my home and now realize that I have poor connectivity downstairs. Ok, I have more routers, what are the choices that are recommended?

Router 1 - Netgear WNDR3700v2 with Gargoyle loaded onto it (same version as what I have upstairs I think)
Router 2 - Ruckus / ZoneFlex 7762-S

I suspect that because the ZoneFlex cannot run Gargoyle, the Netgear is going to be better choice with a specialized configuration to get it to interact nicely with the upstairs Gargoyle router.

Here is a datasheet on it:
http://c541678.r78.cf2.rackcdn.com/data ... series.pdf

The 7762-S is a commercial router made for outdoor mounting and is very weatherproof. It seems that it is powerful enough to provide a "toukhes kicking" level of coverage for my house (indoors and outdoors), so I am reading about this device more to see how I can use it. I need to download all its manuals and also get its firmware updated and see what bridge modes it has. It would be nice to mount this thing out by my pool and get coverage inside and outside my house.

Overall, I do not care if the router downstairs uses a different subnet, but what I do care about is trying to keep all DHCP static IP address assignments managed by the Gargoyle router upstairs (wrt3200acm) with whatever router that is downstairs being a kind of slave router or repeater.

I do have Ethernet over Power (not Power over Ethernet) boxes that can LAN Link the second router downstairs where I want it to have coverage.

What say you?

Stuart
Very Respectfully,

Stuart, N3GWG
Computer Scientist

Lantis
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Joined: Mon Jan 05, 2015 5:33 am
Location: Australia

Re: Repeater / 2nd AP / RelayD?

Post by Lantis »

If you can get ethernet to the second AP, turning it into a "dumb switch" is the best configuration.

Otherwise, to keep the same subnet youll need to do a wireless bridge which won't be ideal.
I don't think you can have separate subnets and keep Gargoyle managing everything. The second subnet would need to be managed by the downstream device.
http://lantisproject.com/downloads/gargoyle_ispyisail.php for the latest releases
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westapher317
Posts: 11
Joined: Tue Feb 28, 2017 2:34 pm
Location: USA

Re: Repeater / 2nd AP / RelayD?

Post by westapher317 »

I would agree on the "wireless bridge" point; my experience with that has been hit-and-miss at best. May be "user error" to a certain extent, but still ... not something I would recommend.

Just to clarify, when you say "turning it into a 'dumb switch' is the best configuration," you mean configuring the following settings, yes?

On the "Connection > Basic" screen:

Device Configuration
Configure Device As: Gateway (Default)

Internet/WAN
Connect Via: Disabled
WAN Ethernet Port: Bridge To LAN

I suppose a simple yes would suffice, but I am also curious if there are pros/cons to this configuration versus plugging the Ethernet cable (the one presently in this bridged WAN port) into one of the LAN ports on the same device. Of course, this means losing a LAN port that could otherwise connect another device, but has anyone tested these configurations against one another to see if there are any differences in performance?

Lantis
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Posts: 6735
Joined: Mon Jan 05, 2015 5:33 am
Location: Australia

Re: Repeater / 2nd AP / RelayD?

Post by Lantis »

Yes.

No I've not compared the difference.
It probably results in simpler (or zero) firewall rules which may help performance, but no packets will hit the fw anyway.
http://lantisproject.com/downloads/gargoyle_ispyisail.php for the latest releases
Please be respectful when posting. I do this in my free time on a volunteer basis.

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