Home hotspot 600 cloning advice

[debsdenton]

Hello, I've just purchased the Home hotspot 600 multi kit and it is working perfectly for wifi and wired connection.

I want to do the cloning, so that the kids don't need to mess about changing connection in different parts of the house, but I was a bit concerned about how this works in areas where the router signal is stronger?

If, for example, I am in my lounge where the router is, but my device detects a weak hotspot signal from upstairs, if I've cloned the signal, will my device connect to the hotspot rather than my router?

I've had a look through all the FAQs and I can't find anywhere where this is discussed? Thanks in advance if you can help.

[licquorice]

I really would advise against cloning. If everything has the same SSID you don't know which device you are connected to. If the SSIDs are different you can at least force a change to a stronger signal.

I don't understand the bit about 'messing about changing connection'. Once the credentials for a wireless signal have been entered, the devices will connect to whichever device is appropriate at the time. For various reasons, I have about 8 different wireless SSIDs here and my phone just connects to whichever it fancies at the time.

[sjonez]

Yes, if the devices aren't doing a very good job of switching between the different SSID's at the moment automatically then they won't be any better when its the same SSID - the only difference is you won't be able to "force" the device onto an access point with a better signal like you can right now.

Roaming of devices is very much dependent on the client, e.g. on PC's you can usually alter the roaming aggressiveness in the driver configuration but its unlikely you'll be able to do this on a mobile. They usually do a good job of switching to another AP that's in range once the signal degrades enough to cause issues, but they won't if the AP you're using is still perfectly "usable"

[Oxlade1]

Hi,

Generally most devices are known to cling onto a connection until it is completely lost or very weak.

If you wanted something that handles having one SSID/network name on different Wi-Fi access points quite well, you'd be worth getting a "mesh" system e.g. BT Whole Home Wi-Fi 

With your current router/hotspots, it's probably best to keep the SSIDs different so you know which one you are connected to and can manually change if the device gets its wrong. You could set them all to the same password to make it easier to remember. If you go to http://mybtdevice.home while connected to the hotspot, you can log in and make changes.

If you do want all of the SSID/network names to be the same, I would suggest to manually set them all to exactly the same security key, security mode - WPA2(AES) and Wi-Fi channel. This helps encourage devices to roam by themselves.