The IT Pro Podcast: Supercharging your home office network
How to make your network fit for remote working
At this point, it should be clear that remote working is here to stay, but while we've all hopefully sorted out proper working spaces with all the laptops, keyboards, monitors and video conferencing equipment that we need to work effectively from home, one element that often gets overlooked is networking.
With cloud and SaaS platforms becoming more vital than ever for modern business, a robust network infrastructure is now just as vital for the home as it is for the office. This week, we're talking to PC Pro associate editor and co-host of the PC Pro Podcast, Darien Graham-Smith, to find out how you can turbo-charge your home network connection, and why it's worth taking the time to audit your infrastructure.
Highlights
“It is definitely the case that no two networks are the same. There are network engineers who've been in the business for 30, 40 years, and they will definitely tell you, every job is like a completely new learning experience to find out the ins and outs and the whys and wherefores of the particular way that all these things have been lashed together with Cat5 cable and so forth.”
“Wi-Fi 6 is becoming the standard, and a good, new, modern Wi-Fi 6 chipset can actually outperform a gigabit Ethernet connection for short range burst transmissions. So if you move up to Wi-Fi 6e, 6e doesn't actually raise the maximum speed of Wi-Fi, but it does move into a much less congested frequency range, so you're less likely to have problems with interference - so you're more likely to get the maximum speed or get higher speeds over a longer range.”
“There are many routers which will accept a USB 4G dongle, and you can plug that in, and you can set the router to use it as a failover. So you won't even necessarily know that your internet line has gone down except that probably it will be a little bit slower. If you think about what companies do, responsible businesses will definitely have a backup line at all times. There's no particular reason why we should imagine we can work from home and not have similar failsafes.”
Read the full transcript here.
Footnotes
- Exposing Silicon Valley’s remote working hypocrisy
- Why I need a gaming monitor for work
- Netgear Orbi Pro Wi-Fi 6 review: Super-fast and super pricey
- Wi-Fi 6E chipset shipments will triple by 2022
- What is Wi-Fi 7?
- Wi-Fi vs 5G: Is it time your business ditches broadband?
- Fastest Wi-Fi speeds in the world
- Best Wi-Fi routers and access points 2022
- Superspeed your network for free... or nearly
- What is network topology?
- View from the airport: Networking at MWC 2022
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