Dear Lifehacker, I am moving into a new place and the place has VDSL2 cable internet – hooray! However, the modem supplied only has one output on it, and I am planning to connect five devices to it. Am I best off purchasing a wireless router and attaching that to it, or hunting for a wireless VDSL modem? Thanks, Cabled Wireless
WiFi picture from Shutterstock
Dear CW,
We’d start by contacting your internet service provider and seeing if they can upgrade your modem for a model with inbuilt Wi-Fi. That way, if anything goes wrong they wont be able to lay the blame on your third-party equipment.
If your ISP cannot offer a wireless VDSL modem for whatever reason (or wants to charge too much for it), we’d go for the separate router approach. Wireless routers are generally more affordable and you’re less likely to run into troubleshooting problems if you stick to the modem supplied by your provider.
If you’re unsure about what to look for in a wireless router, this Router Hardware 101 post will guide you through the basics.
See also: How To Extend Your Wi-Fi Network With An Old Router | Top 10 Ways To Boost Your Home Wi-Fi | Ask LH: Which Wi-Fi Router Should I Buy? | How To Supercharge Your Router With DD-WRT
Cheers
Lifehacker
Got your own question you want to put to Lifehacker? Send it using our [contact text=”contact form”].
Comments
4 responses to “Ask LH: What’s The Best Way To Share My Cable Internet?”
If you don’t need wireless, a switch will be cheaper and easier to set up.
And run 70m of Cat5 throughout the house? Are you sure, given the sparse information of the original question, that WiFi isn’t cheaper?
if youre stretching wifi over 50+ meters in a house then youd need wifi extenders… thus the Cat5 Cable is cheaper.
Well as you point out, the question is very low on detail.
But if they have a couple of PCs, a Network Printer, a NAS and a VoIP handset all sitting in the same room as the Modem, then yes, running cable to a switch is going to be cheaper, faster, easier and more reliable.