Added Netgear range extender, now lost Arlo. Everything shows offline. Tried power cycling.

[ChicagoArlo]

I've had my system up over a year and it's worked pretty well, except that the camera furthest from the base station has been intermittent.   Last week it didn't catch a car speeding by at night, and that car might have been involved in a crime (not against us).  😕  

So that kicked me into gear, to finally do something to get the signal from the 'B' camera stronger.  I figured the simplest approach was to get a wifi range extender, place that in the middle of the house and attach the base station to the extender.   My 'A' camera was only about 15 feet from the base so moving the base further from it seemed like it would be okay.

I got a Netgear range extender, connected it to my network, found a good place for it (at least to test) where the B camera would be line-of-sight.  I set up the extender in the new spot, moved the base station to it, then connected them with the ethernet cable.  Base station lit up blue, but now I can't reach the base station or cameras at all; they all show up as 'offline.'  I've power-cycled a few times, still nothing.

If I look through networks with my computer I can see the Arlo base's network is still there.   So it evidently is online,  its data is somehow not going through the extender.   

Probably there is something I am missing.

I welcome any advice!   

[StephenB]

If you move the base back to its original location, does everything come back on-line?

[ChicagoArlo]

Haven't tried bringing it back to the original location yet.  Moved the extender closer to the router so its signal would be better.   Plugged Arlo base station in again, and after a couple of minutes got a blue light.   Yet it's still 'offline.'  I can see right there in my list of wifi networks that it's NOT offline.  It's online, yet somehow not connecting to the home network.   

I think what I'm missing is an essential step that connects the base station TO THE EXTENDER, so the extender can relay the signal to my router.   The base is physically connected by Ethernet to the extender, but there must be something missing for its data to get to the home network.

[StephenB]

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

I think what I'm missing is an essential step that connects the base station TO THE EXTENDER, so the extender can relay the signal to my router.   The base is physically connected by Ethernet to the extender, but there must be something missing for its data to get to the home network.

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Normally that will happen automatically.  

I suggest moving the base back, and see if the problem resolves - if it doesn't, then the extender is ruled out.

As far the extender goes, there are two checks to make.  One is to connect to the extender's wifi and see if you can reach the internet (using wifi of course) while doing that.  The second is to connect another device over ethernet (perhaps a laptop), and confirm that the ethernet port works properly.

What extender model are you using?

[ChicagoArlo]

The range extender is a Netgear AC1200.    I found last night that though it had set up two networks (2.4 and 5Ghz), the 5Ghz one wasn't working properly.   When I switched to that one on my laptop I couldn't connect to the internet.   So I did a reset on the extender and it's still doing the same thing, in fact I can't even connect to it from my laptop.   If the extender is dependent on 5Ghz to share the base station's data with the router, that could be the problem.   I am thinking I'll send the extender back and try a powerline adapter.  First though, I'll take the base station back to its original spot and start over.  

BTW I can see the base station's network, and tried to connect with it directly, but it's asking for a PW.  I don't remember ever setting one or going through that process when I set the system up!

[ChicagoArlo]

Moved base back to original location, connected to router with ethernet, and it's fine, back to normal, B camera even looks good.  Though that's always been intermittent.  

This wifi extender goes back, and I'll rethink things, maybe try a powerline adapter.  The one advantage of the wifi extender was that it would have freed up an ethernet port on my router, but that's not critical.

Thanks for your help, and I'm open to any further suggestions.

[StephenB]

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

If the extender is dependent on 5Ghz to share the base station's data with the router, that could be the problem. 

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If you log into the extender's web ui, you can usually choose which wifi radio will act as the client (connecting to the router), and which one is the server (connecting to devices that using the extender).

Since the current setup isn't working well, you can try switching, and see if that works better.

[ChicagoArlo]

The model extender I have is a Netgear EX6120, 1200 isn't the model, though it was on the box.

I was able to access the extender's ui by connecting directly through ethernet (so I knew that worked).  The extender has a 'Basic' default setting that (so it says) uses both bands though at reduced speed, but also an option of 'FastLane Technology' which allows you to specify which band is used for device to extender and ext to router.   It claims this way is much faster, but if either part of the signal relay is 2.4 then doesn't that limit the overall speed?   

So I changed to 2.4 to device, 5 to router, and tested my wife's computer on the 2.4EXT network.   Speed is not terrible, but not the blazing fiber speed the router provides and I am not sure this is going to help with her zoom class teaching, which is the other reason for an extender.

I was then able to connect the Arlo base station to the extender and it worked!  However the first position I tried gave good contact with the B camera, but terrible with the A. 

We are in an old house with stucco exterior walls, and plaster over lath inside. The stucco is laid over a wire mesh.   I think those walls are pretty tough for the Arlo's wifi to get through.   But I have finally found a position for the base where it's pretty close to line-of sight through windows to both cameras, and both seem to have a solid signal.  It will take a while to see if that stays good. 

So problem solved (maybe)!

Thanks for your help, Stephen!

[StephenB · Accepted solution]

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

 It claims this way is much faster, but if either part of the signal relay is 2.4 then doesn't that limit the overall speed?   

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Well, if the signal relay is 5 ghz, the client radio is still 2.4.  So either way the speed is limited. Higher-end extenders are Triband (or Quadband with WiFi 6e) so they aren't limited in this way.

However, the extender you have should have enough speed, since your cameras don't use that much bandwidth.

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@ChicagoArlo wrote:

We are in an old house with stucco exterior walls, and plaster over lath inside. The stucco is laid over a wire mesh.   I think those walls are pretty tough for the wifi to get through; hence both cameras do better if they're line-of-sight through windows.

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That is tough - you can end up with the walls acting as a Faraday cage, which will block electromagnetic fields.

[ChicagoArlo]

Exactly, the whole house is like a Faraday cage.  But the base station is now perched in a window where it's direct line of sight to the B camera, and through doorways and a window, almost direct to the A camera.  Both have 2 bars out of 3, and both seem to be working fine now, so this is a distinct improvement.   

As you suggested, adjusting the extender seems to have fixed the issue; its default setup was the problem.  This was by no means obvious.  Thanks again!