Shockingly bad wifi range for TD-W9980

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Shockingly bad wifi range for TD-W9980

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Shockingly bad wifi range for TD-W9980
Shockingly bad wifi range for TD-W9980
2015-10-05 21:54:37
Model : TD-W9980

Hardware Version : TD-W9980 v1 00000000

Firmware Version : 0.6.0 1.12 v0021.0 Build 150507 Rel.40130n

ISP : TalkTalk

Hi there,

I purchased this router to replace the FTTC router supplied by Talktalk.
I have a number of complaints in with TT due to the reliability of the Huawei HG633 unit they supplied.
Basically while LAN connected surfing was fine, and the speed and range of the 2.4MHz and 5Mhz channels was fine, but the Huawei wifi would disconnect/reconnect through out the day on multiple devices rendering it useless (if you check the TT forums you will see that loads of people have this issue).

Hence I bought the TD-9980
My new TD-9980 is positioned high up, near (but not right in) the corner of my lounge. All routers I have owned over the years have worked just fine there.

The range on this unit is shockingly bad. While the Huawei (and prev routers) could reach all corners of my 2 floor, 4 bed house with decent enough signal, the TD-9980 struggles to cope. Signal strength drops rapidly as you move from the unit - on both freq bands.

While I know 5MHz gets attenuated much sooner then the 2.4MHz channels, I was not expecting the lack of range on the 2.4MHz channels.
What I was also not expecting, until I dug further, was that the 2.4MHz aerials are internal - its only the 5Mhz bands that use those chunky external aerials.


I have tried locking down the 2.4Mhz channels to the obvious 1, 6 or 11 settings and restricting the channel width to 20Mhz, even moving the unit a little. No real joy. Got to be said, the cheap and nasty Huawei router significantly out-preforms the TP-Link unit for wifi range and associated speed.

BTW - its not near any external sources of interferences (wifeless phones, microwaves etc etc)

What am I missing here? Do I have a duff unit?

Cheers
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Re:Shockingly bad wifi range for TD-W9980
2015-10-09 15:25:44
What's your expected Wi-Fi coverage?
That the previous router will disconnect Wi-Fi may be caused by unstable Wi-Fi signal?
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Re:Shockingly bad wifi range for TD-W9980
2015-10-10 17:50:24

M Diamond wrote

What's your expected Wi-Fi coverage?
That the previous router will disconnect Wi-Fi may be caused by unstable Wi-Fi signal?

Hi there,
I live in a 4 bed house, two floors, not overly big.
I was expecting the range to be at least as good as the last 3 routers I have owned - at least on 2.4MHz, i.e cover the whole house without the need for range extenders. This unit doesn't even cover the ground floor.
I expected ideally range equal to the last Fibre medium/FTTC/VDSL2 router (yes with its instability) - but this TP-Link unit is I understood better built and got good enough reviews from independent experts.
Also as good as the last two ADSL2 routers as supplied by Talktalk - both these had no issues with wifi dropouts or range..
In every case the last 3 routers have had better range, and two of them have been more stable.
To my mind the fact that the external aerials are only used for the 5MHz channels, and the 2.4MHz aerial are internal, means the flattish design does not lend itself to a unit with good 2.4MHz range, but as I say I only uncovered this after purchase.
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