How to Optimize the Settings of the Router to Increase the Speed

For getting the best speed from your router, it is important to ensure that you have optimized the router for getting the best speed from your network. The settings of the router impact the internet speed that you are getting. By configuring the router for the best speed, you have to optimize the traffic to ensure that the priorities are taken care of.

For instance, you can change the settings in the router in a manner that the video and audio are given a priority, which ensures that your video calls run smoothly and the task of downloading software at the same time is given a lower priority. Here are a few ways in which you can optimize the settings of the router to increase the speed.

• Disable network encryption

You can enjoy 300 Mbps speed through your network if you run the router in an 802.11n standard setting. However, most of the users unknowingly put a limitation into it by going either for the WEP or WPA encryption which straightaway reduces the speed of the network to 54 Mbps. Without the barrier of encryption, the router reaches its highest speed. However, if you still want to go for network encryption, opt for WPA2 encryption. You can change your encryption settings from your router panel located at 192.168.1.1. The IP address varies from different router brands, for example, TP-Link uses 192.168.0.1 so make sure to check properly.

• Change the channel width to 40 MHz

To accommodate all the computers in a network, by default, the channel width of the router is maintained between 20 and 40 MHz. The 20 MHz channel width accounts for a lower network speed than 40. MHz. If your computer supports 802.11n, chances are high that you are running in a newer version of a computer that doesn't need to run on 20 MHz and therefore, it would be advisable to change the channel width to 40 MHz for improving the speed of the network.

• Enable QoS

Not all the activities on the internet require the same amount of priority of bandwidth. For instance, when you are watching a video or attending a video conference call, speed becomes of utmost importance and it should overrule other activities like software updates or leisure browsing. From the settings of your router, you can decide which activities should get a priority. To get the priorities right, enable the QoS from the admin dashboard of the router which will give utmost priority to phone calls and video calls over the internet.

• Choose between WMM support and QoS

WMM support refers to Wi-Fi Multimedia support which when enabled in the router gives priorities to audio and video traffic that requires its streaming. If you deal with traffic more than the video calls, you should enable WMM instead of enabling QoS. You might like to enable both WMM and QoS, which is a great rookie mistake. If you enable both, there will be interference from both the traffic which will ultimately reduce the network speed.

• Disable AP Isolate In-home Wi-Fi

AP Isolate prevents the computers and other devices working in the same network to talk to each other. With AP Isolate, it becomes impossible for the devices to share anything wirelessly when the AP Isolate is enabled. When you are using your router for your home, it is advisable to disable AP Isolate. However, if you are configuring the settings of your office Wi-Fi, then enable the AP Isolate.

• Disable IP Flood Detection on Home Network and Enable it on Public Network

IP Flood Detection recognizes the attacks in which the bandwidth of the network is all consumed in gathering information that is not asked by the users, and thus, minimizing the bandwidth for the actual work of the users. In your home network, you already know about the devices that are using the network connection and therefore, it is suggested to disable IP flood detection in-home network to increase the network speed. However, in a public network, it is difficult to see whether a malicious device is present or not. Therefore, it is advisable to enable IP flood detection when you are working on a public network to improve network speed.

These tips will surely improve the network speed of your router and will help you to navigate through the internet in a speedy way. All the settings can be accessed from the admin dashboard of your router.

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