I've been having an issue with my network for weeks relating to the ethernet in my home after bridging my modem. I have not been able to figure out what to look at and I was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction.
At first I was wondering if it was some type of firewall issue, but after toying with a few things, I haven't had luck in resolving it even with the pair of AmpliFi I purchased. If anyone could point me in the right direction, I'd be very grateful, but I won't be able to try and resolve the issue until Feb 6 as I have papers to write which are due Feb 5 (I'm procrastinating). I am decent at computers, but a total newbie in terms of networking stuff (thus why I've been trying to learn more about it by experimenting on my home set up)
Spoiler!
Basic setup.
- I have a utility room in the basement where the modem is set up (wife thinks it's ugly)
- Hitron modem is connected to a switch which feeds to ethernet pulled throughout the home.
- The home is a two story town house with my upstairs room furthest from the utility room in the basement.
- I had internet 150 which would have been upgraded to internet 300 since last year.
Setup 1, no longer using (December 2018 and earlier): Seemed to work minus the fact I could never seem to get wifi upstairs even with extender gear.
1. Hitron modem, wifi mode
2. Ethernet from Hitron to switch
3. Switch to rest of home (ethernet plates on the walls)
4. Archer C7 and Netgear N400 in the upstairs room. The routers seemed to work as switches, but not really for wifi even if I changed the SSID to different or same wifi as the Hitron (Double NAT issues IIRC).
All the ethernet ports around the home worked under this set up. But wifi was abysmal anywhere other than in the room directly beside the utility room. I think wifi speeds were 180/15 on 5G right beside the router and around 2.2/4 in the bed room on 2.4G. So I moved to setup 2.
Set up 2, no longer using (December 2018 to today): It was workable, but some significant issues.
1. Hitron modem; bridge mode (Contacted Shaw to change it)
2. Ethernet to switch
3. Switch to rest of home
4. Router in my upstairs room (Some netgear N400 router or something as my Archer C7 is currently bricked and I have no luck reviving it just yet)
All the ethernet ports around the home did not work. But the router was definitely getting connection via ethernet port to broadcast wifi from my room upstairs room. Issues was no ethernet other than the seemingly one line to the router. Luckily, nothing really needs to be hardwired, so I could manage to life without it as I tried to figure things out. Wifi speeds were around the reverse (180/15 upstairs, 2.2/4 ish in basement) and since my Archer C7 bricked during a DD-WRT firmware update with me having no luck unbricking it over two weeks, I had decided to try a mesh system.
Setup 3, current (Today onwards): AmpliFi HD x2
1. Hitron modem; bridge mode
2. Ethernet to AmpliFi HD #1
3. Ethernet from AmpliFi HD #1 to swich
4. Switch to rest of home
5. Amplifi HD #2 connected via ethernet port previously used in setup 2.
The ethernet ports around the home still do not get ethernet. I get a constant 30/15 upstairs 70/15 main floor and 80-200/15 in the basement via 5G wifi. AmpliFi #2 is connected to the mesh point band via 2.4G per the AmpliFi app, but I have doubts it's even doing anything. Attempts to choose the ethernet backbone option just causes the AmpliFi #2 to become unresponsive.
My next move would have been to connect an ethernet cable to the AmpliFi HD#1 and test to see whether it is working to determine if I should focus on the switch, modem, router or if it's something firewall. I'll continue poking around after my papers are done.