What Do You Use To Help Your Wifi?

[Barbara & Dave]

I took a look at the Pepwave device. As I understand, it is essentially an amplifier. In my experience in RV Parks, the problem is not always a weak wifi signal. I can frequently get a strong signal, but I have very slow download/upload speeds. I have attributed that condition to too many users on the network or "not enough bandwidth." Will the Pepwave, or a similar device help with that situation?
(I'm a liberal arts bozo, so Keep It Simple please.)

K

The Surf On-The-Go can be used in a couple of different ways. One is as a Wi-Fi amplifier. This would amplify an existing Wi-Fi signal, but wouldn't provide any additional bandwidth. It would be like moving your site closer to the office (or wherever the campground's router is located) to get a stronger signal, but you will still be sharing the available bandwidth with everyone else in the campground.

It can also be used to set up a cell-phone Hotspot, provided 1) you're within range of your cell provider's signal, and 2) you have a data plan on your cell phone. Check with your provider before buying, since (AFAIK) not all support Hotspots.

Dave

[SkiSmuggs]

Dave got it right, nothing can put 10 lbs I to a 5 lb bag. Too many users makes it slow and the stronger signal can't fix that. However, I have picked up unprotected WiFi signals and connected to them to get faster service.

[Paul & Deb]

Dave got it right, nothing can put 10 lbs I to a 5 lb bag. Too many users makes it slow and the stronger signal can't fix that. However, I have picked up unprotected WiFi signals and connected to them to get faster service.

You sneaky devil you

[SkiSmuggs]

Opportunity knocked.

[RamGunner]

Another way to go is the Netgear PR-2000. It can be used several ways - but does not support directly connecting to a USB cell device. It will hook up to any WiFi source (including a 4g hostpot WiFi signal), and gives both wired and a WiFi signal of it's own.

In our trailer, we are going to have what we will call our core network. In our case, we have a router with both wired ports and WiFi. The wired ports will be connected to things like a Roku and a media server. WiFi will be used for laptop and tablet connectivity. Nothing on this will ever change.

For WAN (Internet) connectivity, we also have a cable modem, a DSL modem, and a Netgear PR-2000. This way we can connect to just about anything anywhere - just plug in the functional modem to the WAN port on the router. If we need to piggyback onto the park WiFi or access the hotspot from a cell device, we plug the PR-2000 into the router. One benefit is that the park WiFi sees only one connection - even though it is shared to all of our devices via our router. They normally only talk amongst themselves, but can each reach the Internet if required.

However, it won't speed up a connection that is overused. No amplifier will do that for you. If the park WiFi is too crowded, you need an alternate source - a 4g hotspot device is a good option in that case. Finding something that gives you enough data for the month is the hard part.