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Nest wifi setup advice please

Selfdoubtkills
Community Member

Hello all,

Here’s my situation, moving into a house that is wired for Ethernet with the main panel in a cellar (I suspect significant signal loss given the location). That said I have a Cisco switch and the modem will arrive this week. The modem will be located by the patch panel and I am looking for advice on setup. 

Do I bridge the modem, plug into primary Google router (primary) then go to switch and patch panel (and place the other node somewhere it can get a signal from the primary)

or

Modem to switch to patch panel then plug the Google wifi router and nodes in whatever room makes sense (I believe this would be using them as access points…if it is possible)

or 

Something I haven’t thought of yet!

Thank you in advance, I’m a rookie when it comes to networking. 

16 REPLIES 16

MichaelP
Diamond Product Expert
Diamond Product Expert

Hello @Selfdoubtkills 

First off, here's the support page documenting requirements for connecting Google WiFi secondary units back to the primary/router unit via Ethernet: https://support.google.com/wifi/answer/7215624?hl=en 

In short, your primary/router Google WiFi unit will need to be in between the modem and the switch ("WAN" port connected to modem, "LAN" port connected to switch). Then, any secondary Google WiFi units can be connected to that switch after they've been set up as wireless nodes once. I would also caution about using more expensive "managed" or "smart" Ethernet switches, since they often have loop detection enabled in a way that will cause significant problems when wiring secondary Google WiFi units back to the primary. It may be possible to configure them to avoid this, but that is going to be switch dependent. I say this only because you mention using a Cisco switch, which may be more difficult to configure properly.

Is it possible to put the modem somewhere other than in the cellar? If you can locate it near an existing Ethernet outlet, preferably one that is relatively centrally located, then the modem can connect directly to your primary Google WiFi unit in that location, and that Google WiFi unit's LAN port can just plug into the nearby Ethernet outlet to feed the switch (and any other wired devices, including other secondary Google WiFi units).

Jezza
Community Member

Hi @MichaelP   

I am in a similar situation with a house wired for Ethernet and patch panel located in a study (not quite central) to the house. Connected the Nest Wifi Router (WAN port) direct to a NBN modem via ethernet, then via LAN ethernet to a 8 port network switch (https://www.officeworks.com.au/shop/officeworks/p/d-link-8-gigabit-port-switch-dgs-1008a-dldgs1008a) from the Nest wifi router.

I then connect all my other 3 additional Google Wifi points (1st gen) to the wall ethernet sockets which are wired back to the patch panel in the study. The patch panel is then connected to the D-Link switch above via patch cables. 

All tested and meshed and download speeds seems awesome except for an issue which a Lenovo Laptop which is connected to the furthest Google Wifi point's LAN port (about 50m away, 1 floor up from the Router and patch panel in study) - seems to drop out and have issues when trying to do VC/Teams calls (ie. can't share screen). Have reinstalled TEAMS app and tried Optus but was told to plug that directly into back of the router (not via switch). The Lenovo was previously plugged directly into the wall ethernet outlet upstairs, back to the Study which was then patched via Ethernet cable directly to back of a Optus Sagemcom F@st 5366 modem LAN port (it had 4 LAN ports) which worked fine. Given the Nest Wifi router only has 1 WAN and 1 LAN port, can;t do this without losing all the others.

Any advice / suggestions appreciated. Should I try to install the Optus router (turn of wifi) upstream between the NBN NCD and the Google Nest Wifi router? Or is there a better way?

Jezza
Community Member

 

This is the setup in the study 

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi, Jezza.
It's been a few days and I wanted to check in to see if you were still needing help on this or if you were able to get things sorted out. If you're still needing some help here, let me know and I'll be happy to look into this with you.

Thanks.

Jezza
Community Member
Hi Jeff
 
Able to solve the drop out issues but its not the recommended Google nest solution. Ie. had to connect the old router upstream to Google Nest router -> modem and plug the wall outlets to the back of the other router (via patch panel)
 
I now have another issue that a wifi connected printer is no longer discoverable (under the Google Marsh Wifi) when i have laptops connected directly to the old router to solve the bandwidth / drop out issues above
 
So any help to solve would be appreciated. I have contacted my ISP as well.
 
Thanks

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey, Jezza.

That's great news! Thanks for coming back and letting us know what worked. I'm happy to hear that things have worked out for you. As always, come let us know if you ever need help with anything else.

Thanks.

Jezza
Community Member

Hey jeff

its not quite solved. Doing the above has stopped me from being able to print via wired connection

need to switch to wifi to print 

any ideas?

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi, Selfdoubtkills.
It's been a while since we've been able to discuss this, so I just wanted to check in to see if you still need help. If you're still needing assistance, please just let me know and I'll be happy to continue helping.
Thanks.

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey, Jezza.

Well I'm happy to hear that some things are working, but that printer issue sounds confusing. Let's work on that next. Before I can go too deep on suggestions, I do need a little bit more info. I have a few questions.

  • What make and model printer are you using?
  • Does your printer use WiFi direct, a true WiFi printer (over the network), or does it use some cloud service to print?
  • Is there a reason why you would prefer a wired connection over a wireless one?
  • Are you getting any error messages?
  • Will the printer not connect to the network, or does it connect and just fail to print?

If you can give me a few more details, I'm sure we can sort this out. I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks.

Jezza
Community Member

@Jeff wrote:

Hey, Jezza.

Well I'm happy to hear that some things are working, but that printer issue sounds confusing. Let's work on that next. Before I can go too deep on suggestions, I do need a little bit more info. I have a few questions.

  • What make and model printer are you using?

Epson Workforce 630

  • Does your printer use WiFi direct, a true WiFi printer (over the network), or does it use some cloud service to print?

I think its WIFI direct, not cloud services. Nest router setup

Is there a reason why you would prefer a wired connection over a wireless one?

Just trying to see if I can print direct from the wired connection as well as wireless.

  • Are you getting any error messages?

The wired connection cannot find the printer which is connected to Google Nest Wifi. The wired connection has an IP address of 192.168.0.163 but the Google Nest router / wifi has an IP address of 192.168.86.1 and when the printer is connected on the WIFI, its IP address is 192.168.86.45

  • Will the printer not connect to the network, or does it connect and just fail to print?

It will not connect to wired network, only the wifi network. 

If you can give me a few more details, I'm sure we can sort this out. I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks.


This is the feed link to my ISP provider if it helps https://yescrowd.optus.com.au/t5/Broadband-Telephony/Sagecom-F-ast-5366-TN-and-google-mesh-support/m... 

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey, Jezza.

Thanks for getting that back to me. Give me a few moments and I'll jump back in here with some stuff I can find for you.

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey, everyone.

This one has been hanging for a bit. I've yet to find a solid answer, but I wanted to check in and see if any of you are still seeing the same issues. I would love to get this sorted out for everyone if we still need help here. Just let me know.

Thanks.

Jezza
Community Member

Hey jeff

just switching to WIfI to print and back when on teams / VC calls. Not enough of a nuisance to need a better solution so just leaving it at that 

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey, Jezza.

Sorry we weren't able to find an actual fix here. I'm happy you have a workaround, but hopefully an actual fix is made available at some point. Thanks for hanging in there on this.

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi, Selfdoubtkills.

It's been a while since you chimed in, so I wanted to check in and see if you were still working on this or if you managed to find a resolution. Let me know what's going on and I'll be happy to keep helping if needed.

Thanks.

Jeff
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hi, everyone.
As we haven't had any activity here recently I'm going to go ahead and close the thread. If you have more to add, feel free to start a new discussion.
Thanks