Hi guys. We are moving into a new home. It's two stories and it's long from one side to the other.
My current home is also long, but we are on AT&T fiber optic internet. AT&T sent someone to set it up and make sure we had the right equipment to have good WiFi coverage.
Basically, my only option in my new home is Xfinity. I signed up for 1200 mbps service. They mailed me a router/gateway. Great customer service so far.
The previous owner of this home had the Xfinity gateway in a closet on the exterior wall of the home. This will be my husband's office. It's really the only place to put it because this is where all the coax and cat5 cable is wired to. There is a Netgear Ethernet port the same closet. There's also Netgear Wi-Fi range extender in the front hall, which is not quite in the middle of the house.
My office is upstairs on the far opposite side of the house.
I need to get better WiFi to the far end of the house. He has these things (see photo) plugged into two electric outlets upstairs as well as an electric outlet in the office where the IT closet is located. What are these?
What's the best way to extend coverage from the far, downstairs side of the house to the rest of the house?
Lastly, my boys are 16 and spend a lot of time gaming online. They really prefer to be hardwired. The room that their computers will be in only has one cat 5 outlet in it. Is there a way to split that cat five cable so they can both use it or do I need to drop a second CAT5 cable port into that room? Would it work to plug an Ethernet port in at the wall and then wire both of them to that? That would mean that the main line coming out of the gateway would be plugged into one ethernet port and then the outgoing cable from that would be plugged into a second ethernet port. I don't know if it works to do that.
Sure would appreciate any suggestions. I'm "IT Support" in our house. I have no business holding that title. The simplest, most effective method for achieving these goals is what I'm looking for.
Thanks!
![](https://f5s-img.s3.amazonaws.com/000/1f/2c/1f2cd2477557d6a755705964f582fbede1807ba5_2294123_u16697.jpg)
My current home is also long, but we are on AT&T fiber optic internet. AT&T sent someone to set it up and make sure we had the right equipment to have good WiFi coverage.
Basically, my only option in my new home is Xfinity. I signed up for 1200 mbps service. They mailed me a router/gateway. Great customer service so far.
The previous owner of this home had the Xfinity gateway in a closet on the exterior wall of the home. This will be my husband's office. It's really the only place to put it because this is where all the coax and cat5 cable is wired to. There is a Netgear Ethernet port the same closet. There's also Netgear Wi-Fi range extender in the front hall, which is not quite in the middle of the house.
My office is upstairs on the far opposite side of the house.
I need to get better WiFi to the far end of the house. He has these things (see photo) plugged into two electric outlets upstairs as well as an electric outlet in the office where the IT closet is located. What are these?
What's the best way to extend coverage from the far, downstairs side of the house to the rest of the house?
Lastly, my boys are 16 and spend a lot of time gaming online. They really prefer to be hardwired. The room that their computers will be in only has one cat 5 outlet in it. Is there a way to split that cat five cable so they can both use it or do I need to drop a second CAT5 cable port into that room? Would it work to plug an Ethernet port in at the wall and then wire both of them to that? That would mean that the main line coming out of the gateway would be plugged into one ethernet port and then the outgoing cable from that would be plugged into a second ethernet port. I don't know if it works to do that.
Sure would appreciate any suggestions. I'm "IT Support" in our house. I have no business holding that title. The simplest, most effective method for achieving these goals is what I'm looking for.
Thanks!
![](https://f5s-img.s3.amazonaws.com/000/1f/2c/1f2cd2477557d6a755705964f582fbede1807ba5_2294123_u16697.jpg)
![](https://f5s-img.s3.amazonaws.com/000/dc/35/dc356994d3dfd29be44a806ed970495853086d9b_2636749_u16697.jpg)