My dad and older brother and I have been arguing about why our WiFi connection has been really bad. My little brother’s Zoom meetings always disconnect and his Xbox never allows him to play with his friends for more than a couple seconds before it times out. I just built a new, strong PC that also has a lot of trouble staying connected to our WiFi. I just found out that my brother and dad moved our router behind our living room television, completely enclosed from all sides by a home entertainment center, but they insist that it has no effect on the speed and strength. I need to stress how enclosed the router is; it is 100% fully covered by 5 walls and the backside of the television, located on the opposite side of the house, away from where all our bedrooms are. Instead, they are shoving down my throat that because of the pandemic, more people are using their WiFi, and therefore servers are going down (?) I completely disagree. Our router is pretty old, and we all agree (mostly) on the fact that it’s time for a replacement. But they will not budge on the placement of the router. My brother is even pursuing a degree in Computer Information and Systems, and it really shocks me on how stubborn he is on this. I am far from an IT tech expert, and have no authority in this type of area, so am I really wrong about this or is the placement of the router the issue?
We have a basic Spectrum plan and I did a speed test by Ookla which showed this:
21 Pings ms, 38.5 Download Mbps, 10.95 Upload Mbps
EDIT: Thank you to everyone for the advice, suggestions, comments, etc. I’m looking into some ethernet cables you all suggested for my little brother so he doesn’t have to suffer. Unfortunately, my dad and older brother won’t budge on moving the router, and they don’t want me to discuss it any further with them. I’m leaving for college in a few weeks, so I won’t have to deal with it, but I’ll make sure my little bro gets to join his Zoom meetings before I go. Thanks everyone.
