BT Home hub5 as extender

[wimpy]

I'm usiing a couple of powerline adaptors to connect my Smart Hub 2 with a spare Home Hub 5. At present the HH5 uses 2 separate SSIDs for 2.4 and 5 ghz. This sort of works. The USB wifi dongles I use are dual band and it is possible to use the smart hub 2 SSID or  the HH5 5ghz SSID (say). Elsewhere it has been said that one could use the same SSID for both hubs and set the security password on the HH5 to be the same as the Smart Hub 2.  The Smart Hub 2 uses 6 and 36 as its channels. If I set the HH5 so that the 2.4 and 5ghz are not split how should I set the channels. I was hoping to get away with the one channel - 11. Any help or advice would be much appreciated.

[licquorice]

Use separate channels and separate SSIDs for everything. Why do want to use one channel?

[wimpy]

In the location where I've put the HH5 you can connect to the HH5's SSIDs or you can connect to the Smart Hub 2 SSID. Sometimes the Smart Hub 2 gives abysmal speeds but at other times it knocks spots of the HH5. If you use the HH5 SSIDs and the DHCP is disabled there, how would you acquire an IP address? This other way the Smart Hub 2 would supply the DHCP automatically (I hope), but I still can't fathom how to get round the dual band wifi (2.4 and 5ghz). I hope I'm making sense.

[licquorice]

It doesn't matter which SSID you connect to, the main hub allocates the IP address, DHCP should be disabled on the HH5

[licquorice]

Just give different SSIDs and channels to the 4 signals and all will work fine

[wimpy]

Thanks for the reply. The problem, as I see it, is that it does matter which SSID I connect to, as far as speed is concerned. As I said, the speeds vary enormously.  In  the Smart Hub 2 room I'm getting 150Mbps (using Ethernet cat 6a cable). In the room with the HH5 I get 89Mbps using the 5ghz channel - somewhat less using the 2.4ghz.  Also, the Smart Hub 2 does not not let you split the 2.4 and 5ghz signals into separate SSIDs like the HH5, so that in fact there are only 3 SSIDs to play with.

[licquorice · Accepted solution]

Yes, that's precisely why you need to give everything different SSIDs, so that you know which device you are connecting to and can force a change to a stronger signal if necessary. Agreed that you can't split the band's on the sh2

I meant that it doesn't matter which SSID you connect to as far as getting an IP address is concerned, it will always be served by the sh2 regardless of what you are connected to

[wimpy]

If I connect to HH5 first (no DHCP) it says no internet available, but if I connect to the SH2 and then switch to HH5 it gets to the internet fine. Thanks again for your replies. I'll mark the last one as the accepted solution.

[licquorice]

How have you configured and connected the HH5? You should give it an address outside the DHCP range of the SH2 (say 192.168.1.10) , disable DHCP and connect a LAN port on the SH2 to a LAN port on the HH5 via the powerline adaptors.

[wimpy]

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@licquoricewrote:

How have you configured and connected the HH5? You should give it an address outside the DHCP range of the SH2 (say 192.168.1.10) , disable DHCP and connect a LAN port on the SH2 to a LAN port on the HH5 via the powerline adaptors.

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That's exactly what I've done.