Is Your Home Wi-Fi Keeping Up?  

Wi-Fi has completely changed the way we live, work, and play. We can browse the internet while sitting on the couch or by the pool. Find a recipe in seconds, and even connect our lights to voice control. It’s no surprise that it was welcomed with open arms, but is your at home Wi-Fi keeping up as well as it could be?

Wi-Fi has matured into a behemoth of speed and accessibility that we can’t live without ten years after it initially made its way into households with those enigmatic rabbit-eared boxes. Consider how many wireless gadgets you have in your home; the average home has at least ten devices linked to the internet wirelessly, and many have more.

While older gadgets are usually content with a slow internet connection, newer devices such as 4kTVs and video streaming simply cannot function without fast internet. When you add a game console, tablet, a couple cellphones, and a laptop or two, your Wi-Fi is suddenly strained to its limits and fighting to keep up. However, most people have no idea how fast their Wi-Fi is or if it is operating properly– they only know how many bars they have. Counting bars, on the other hand, can be a real pain.

Here are some of the reasons why relying on your Wi-Fi bar count may be harming your internet experience:

The bar measures the wrong thing: 

While knowing you have a ‘strong’ signal is great, having a ‘fast and available’ signal is much better. The internet could be down and you’d still have full bars because it’s only measuring how near you are to the Wi-Fi router. That proximity metric ignores how many devices are competing for the same bandwidth or whether there is any remaining for you. We will ensure that your Wi-Fi is not only operational, but also up to the task.

Your Wi-Fi is being stretched: 

While the Wi-Fi from next door can reach the back of their property, it can also go a similar distance sideways inside your home. This additional ‘noise’ can interfere with and slow down your own Wi-Fi. In densely populated areas, your Wi-Fi is effectively lost in a swirling vortex of signals. All of which use the same channel and frequency. It’s a digital mob that can significantly decrease your speeds. We can resolve this by switching your Wi-Fi channel to one with less cross-talk.

The default setting has got to go: 

By default, most home Wi-Fi networks use a 2.4GHz frequency. While this makes a plug-and-play router simple to set up, it means you’re not getting the speeds you’re expecting. When you switch to the 5GHz band, your Wi-Fi is no longer affected by neighborhood cross-talk. 5ghz is also significantly faster, which is a plus. We can assist you with upgrading to a 5Ghz-capable router or switching your current frequency.

Not prioritizing your Wi-Fi: 

While not specific to Wi-Fi, we can also adjust “Quality of Service” if your router supports it or provide you with one that does. This allows Netflix and Skype calls to always take priority and remain uninterrupted over less vital tasks such as downloading. You’ll be able to watch movies without those annoying buffering jumps, and you’ll be able to video chat without stalling.

Is your home network not keeping up? Feel free to get in touch with us here at Stan’s Tech Garage. Give us a call at 323-761-2634 or schedule a consultation by clicking the icon at the bottom left-hand corner of your screen.