Laptop Does not Switch AP when Roaming

I have two Linksys routers in my house. There is a WRT54GS in my
office upstairs and a BEFW11S4 downstairs in the living room. They
are connected to each other via the LAN ports (bridged). The SSIDs
and WEP keys are the same but one is set to channel 1 and the other to
channel 7. I enabled DHCP on the upstairs router.

When I roam around the house I can see the signal strength drop to one
bar but XP does not switch to the other router unless I disable the
connection or disconnect from the network. Then after I enable or
re-connect, I'll get all five bars if I'm near the alternate router.

Can XP be configured to transparently switch to the stronger signal? I
notice that channel 1 is specified in the advanced tab of the wireless
adapter configuration. Is this the problem? If not, is there another
network design and/or configuration that will do what I want?

On Aug 7, 6:00 pm, Bob Simon <nob...@nowhere.com> wrote:
> I have two Linksys routers in my house. There is a WRT54GS in my
> office upstairs and a BEFW11S4 downstairs in the living room. They
> are connected to each other via the LAN ports (bridged). The SSIDs
> and WEP keys are the same but one is set to channel 1 and the other to
> channel 7. I enabled DHCP on the upstairs router.
>
> When I roam around the house I can see the signal strength drop to one
> bar but XP does not switch to the other router unless I disable the
> connection or disconnect from the network. Then after I enable or
> re-connect, I'll get all five bars if I'm near the alternate router.
>
> Can XP be configured to transparently switch to the stronger signal? I
> notice that channel 1 is specified in the advanced tab of the wireless
> adapter configuration. Is this the problem? If not, is there another
> network design and/or configuration that will do what I want?

Wi-Fi is not as good as it should. A Wi-Fi client (in this case, your
XP) does not look for another AP unless the actual signal guest too
week to communicate.
As you mentioned, when you go upstairs, the XP still can get a signal
from downstairs´ AP, so it does not disconnect.

That is the Wi-Fi were built, there is little (as far as I know) that
can be done. There is a technology called wireless switch that
synchronize APs and help with that, but it is only for the business
market... too expensive for home use.

May be, if you put both on the same channel, they might create each
other interference, so when you go upstairs XP no longer sees
donwstair AP. Just may be.

On Sat, 9 Aug 2008 18:15:34 -0700 (PDT), "mlrodrig@gmail.com" <mlrodrig@gmail.com> wrote:

~ On Aug 7, 6:00 pm, Bob Simon <nob...@nowhere.com> wrote:
~ > I have two Linksys routers in my house. There is a WRT54GS in my
~ > office upstairs and a BEFW11S4 downstairs in the living room. They
~ > are connected to each other via the LAN ports (bridged). The SSIDs
~ > and WEP keys are the same but one is set to channel 1 and the other to
~ > channel 7. I enabled DHCP on the upstairs router.
~ >
~ > When I roam around the house I can see the signal strength drop to one
~ > bar but XP does not switch to the other router unless I disable the
~ > connection or disconnect from the network. Then after I enable or
~ > re-connect, I'll get all five bars if I'm near the alternate router.
~ >
~ > Can XP be configured to transparently switch to the stronger signal? I
~ > notice that channel 1 is specified in the advanced tab of the wireless
~ > adapter configuration. Is this the problem? If not, is there another
~ > network design and/or configuration that will do what I want?

~ Wi-Fi is not as good as it should. A Wi-Fi client (in this case, your
~ XP) does not look for another AP unless the actual signal guest too
~ week to communicate.

That is not necessarily true. The basis on which a wireless client scans
for and associates to APs is an implementation detail. Client vendors
(may) put in a lot of thought as to how and on what basis their clients
find APs and decide which one to associate to. With some client devices,
this is tunable by the end user.

For the o.p.: you should find out what wireless client (chipset) and
driver version you're using. Maybe newer code is smarter, or maybe you
can tune the client behavior

Aaron

----

~ As you mentioned, when you go upstairs, the XP still can get a signal
~ from downstairs´ AP, so it does not disconnect.
~
~ That is the Wi-Fi were built, there is little (as far as I know) that
~ can be done. There is a technology called wireless switch that
~ synchronize APs and help with that, but it is only for the business
~ market... too expensive for home use.
~
~ May be, if you put both on the same channel, they might create each
~ other interference, so when you go upstairs XP no longer sees
~ donwstair AP. Just may be.