The wireless signals don’t penetrate these zones and thus your wireless device will fail to receive a Wi-Fi signal when in these zones.
You can easily find the wireless dead zones by taking a walk around your office or house. As soon as you find them, experiment with multiple solutions and fix the trouble.
Wireless Dead Zone
So, now the question is what exactly is a wireless dead zone? This is simply an area in your house or office where the Wi-Fi is supposed to work, but it fails to do so. In these areas, the devices fail to get connected to the network. If you take a device into the dead zone, regardless of whether it is your smartphone or your tablet, your Wi-Fi will stop working and you won’t receive a signal.
So you are eager to know what causes the wireless dead zones, right?
Anything that chooses to interfere with the Wi-Fi radio waves is capacitated to produce a dead zone. If you have a huge office or house and your wireless router is placed in one corner of the building, you may have a dead zone in another corner of the building. This is the place where your Wi-Fi signal does not reach.
Your house may have been constructed well before Wi-Fi technology came into being. Thus, there are high chances that it was made in a way that interferes with Wi-Fi signals. The comparatively old houses come with thick plasters containing metal wire for support. This metal wiring is capacitated to block Wi-Fi signals. The bigger metal objects like metal walls or cabinets may also block the Wi-Fi signals.
Detect the Wireless Dead Zones
To stop interference, you must first detect the wireless dead zones. Honestly speaking, you don’t need fancy software for identifying the dead zones. Simply pick up your tablet, smartphone or any other wireless device, connect it to the wireless network and take a walk around your house. Keep a tab of the Wi-Fi signal indicator on your device. If the signal strength drops to zero, you are in a dead zone. In case it has not yet dropped to zero, but it’s very low, you need to get concerned. Unreliable signal strength may bring down the speed and some of your devices may fail to remain connected. Remember that the tolerance level of each device is different when it comes to low signal strength.
The Wi-Fi indicator will not update immediately. So do not sprint while holding your smartphone. Move slowly and pause in places where you feel that there may be a low connectivity issue.
If you can’t rely upon yourself, you can always use software to detect the wireless dead zones. You can use the Wifi Analyzer app if you need detailed information on the strength of your Wi-Fi signal. Just take a walk with the app open. You will find the signal strength changing as you move from one location to another. You need an Android phone for this. Apple, however, does not allow the third party apps for accessing information. So, if you have an iPad, iPhone or iPod touch, you cannot use this app to get detailed information. In this case, you have no other option apart from checking out on the Wi-Fi indicator of your device.
Fix Wireless Dead Zones
Now it’s time to fix the issue. We have tried to detect some of your enemies that bring down Wi-Fi signal strength. Let’s have a look.
#1. Wi-Fi Network of your Neighbor
The biggest source of interference today is neighbor’s Wi-Fi networks. The problem here is that most Wi-Fi equipment uses the more crowded 2.4GHz band. If you are using a 2.4GHz band and stay in a densely populated area, the Wi-Fi network of your neighbor may interfere with yours, hindering your range and the performance network.
Solution – Buy yourself a dual band router. This operates simultaneously at 5GHz and 2.4GHz. No doubt the 2.4GHz one is necessary to support the older devices, but the 5GHz one will ensure you less congestion. The newer Wi-Fi devices are dual-band. So, if you want to take advantage of an empty highway, this is the best bet.
#2. Household Electronics
Your cordless phone, microwave oven or the baby monitor may also sabotage Wi-Fi streaming. Most problems with microwave ovens and cordless phones involve products using the 2.4GHz band. Most baby monitors work at 900MHz. They won’t impede your Wi-Fi signals. There are also a few wireless monitors that are 2.4GHz. This can interfere with the single-band routers.
Solution – While choosing wireless baby monitors, find a 900MHz model. The new cordless phones use 1.9GHz band and DECT 6.0 technology.
#3. Bluetooth Devices
Though the older Bluetooth devices used to interfere with the Wi-Fi networks, this is no longer the case. Over the last few years, the Wi-Fi and the Bluetooth manufacturers have implemented multiple strategies for minimizing interference.
Solution – Most of you replace your phone every now and then. Unless you have a very old phone or a Bluetooth device, you can rest assured of the fact that your Bluetooth device will never interfere with Wi-Fi.
#4. Security Settings
In the low-end routers, strong security settings may cast an impact on the performance. However, this certainly does not indicate that you need to switch off security or use a weaker protection plan.
Today the WPA2 and WPA protocols have displaced the older and the less secure WEP. The inexpensive routers that use WEP, upgrading to WPA may inhibit performance. But the more robust devices whose hardware is specially designed for WPA2 and WPA encryption, the strong security protocols do not bring down the Wi-Fi speed.
Solution – Router encryption is necessary. Never disable encryption even if that increases the speed of your Wi-Fi a little.
No doubt, the operation of your router may appear somewhat mysterious to you. However, by following a few simple strategies, you can keep your wireless network in perfect order and wi-fi interference to a minimum.
Images: “Internet technology and networking concept, Businessman hand with wifi on tablet virtual screen / Shutterstock.com“
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