The past few years have been full of challenges and we are grateful so many people have been fortunate in functioning with the Work From Home (WFH) option. The Covid situation has resulted in long-term changes to the workplace environment and for many organizations, it triggered a cultural shift in how we work.
What we have come to see with this though is that many people are finding that their home network and/or Internet connection have not performed as well as their office networks. There can be many factors with this, either ISP (Internet Service Provider) or home LAN (local area network, which includes Wi-Fi and wired connections inside the home).
WFH will cause us to be more sensitive to consistent connectivity where you’re constantly online and may have high bandwidth requirements may not be quite as smooth as the office. This is exacerbated if you have roommates or a significant other also working from home or kids doing distance learning, streaming media, or playing video games online. One of the most sensitive services is video or voice collaboration, in the form of Zoom, Teams, or any voice Internet service (such as VoIP telephones, Skype, etc.).
There are two main factors with regard to home Internet quality.
The first is the ISP. Most people have residential or consumer grade Internet at home. Honestly, this is generally okay. What differentiates residential from business grade service is often realized in the consistency of the service. Business class service often has minimum service assurances meaning that when the entire block is online, you’ll still have a consistent level of performance. There are also uptime guarantees. Many ISPs will have multiple tiers of service with varied maximum bandwidth. This is a big money maker for ISPs as they will encourage you to subscribe to their higher tiers but this comes with a significant monthly bill. In our experience though, you can find greater improvements by managing your internal network.
On your internal network (your local area network or LAN, this includes your internal Wi-Fi), this is typically the weakest link. Often times people use just the ISP provided modem with Wi-Fi and that’s typically installed in a location most convenient for the installer. Many times we find that it’s on one side of the house (often closest to the sidewalk or street) but the heavier users are on the opposite side of the house and are connected over Wi-Fi only (no wired connection). If you’re on a laptop and you find that your problems melt away as you get closer to the modem/wireless access point, then it’s clearly a reception issue. If possible, you can try to relocate the modem/access point closer to the center of the house with as few interfering devices in between. Kitchen appliances often cause Wi-Fi interference or can hinder Wi-Fi transmission so ideally you don’t want your kitchen to be between your home office and your Wi-Fi.
For individuals who are doing a lot of Internet connected work from home on a regular basis, our preference is wired connections to the network. While this can be an expensive cost, it is a one-time cost and completely eliminates the Wi-Fi variable from the equation. If you’re on a wired connection in your home LAN and the performance is problematic, it makes troubleshooting infinitely easier. In the author’s home, he ran network cables under the house and through the attic to the main network in all the rooms where computers are permanently setup.
If pulling network cables is not an option, the next option is to improve the Wi-Fi. In the past few years manufacturers have acknowledged this as we add more wireless devices to our homes. Different vendors offer dedicated routers/Wi-Fi systems that build what’s called a ‘mesh network’ of Wi-Fi. This involves a router that connects to your ISP’s modem and is mounted near it. Then there will be one or two or more wireless satellite access points. These are installed near the heavier computing areas and plugged into wall power and combined with the Wi-Fi router, they build a singular Wi-Fi net. Larger homes may require additional satellites, as well as homes with interior walls constructed with lathe and plaster or brick as those materials are more difficult for wireless signal to pass through.
One of the other benefits of a dedicated router is that many have the ability to manage the internal network traffic so that no single device can consume all the available bandwidth from the ISP. Some even have web filtering so that you can layer in a degree of protection for younger children on the Internet. Most have a dedicated SmartPhone app that lets you check the health of your connection and what devices are consuming the most bandwidth.
Your author’s full setup includes a small business class router and 5 wireless access points throughout the 2600 square foot home. In addition there are multiple hard-wired network connections that go back to the router, most importantly to the primary home office, as well as areas that have high bandwidth consumption, such as the TV areas and the streaming devices are connected with a network cable as opposed to Wi-Fi. The router allows traffic shaping on a schedule so that during business hours, priority is given to the home office and work-related devices while leaving ample bandwidth for the kids Zoom calls for school. While the network connection is only a 75 mbps small business connection, even with 4 individuals online with multiple devices per person, they never run into bandwidth issues. Because it’s a business class connection, the speed is consistent and stable.
If you’re experiencing challenges working from home, you can use resources such as speedtest.net to check your bandwidth. This is not a one-time thing because to get an accurate picture you’ll want to check it throughout the day and this doesn’t really give you a full picture because it can’t differentiate between your Wi-Fi and your ISP’s service.
Our recommendations then: Try a wired network connection to your router (if you have one) or to your ISP’s modem. If things work as hoped, you should probably look into relocating the modem. If moving equipment is not an option, you might consider a mesh network system (Eero, Orbi, etc.). If possible, pulling wired network cables or hiring a service to install network cables is even better. If you have several high bandwidth users at home at the same time, most of the mesh network systems have the ability to manage bandwidth so that might make a lot of sense.
If you expect to have long-term home working needs, a combination of wired network and robust Wi-Fi will make you more productive and reduce complaints from other members of your household.