My old router used to offer both network speeds but the newer one doesn’t show multiple access points and decides for itself (I suppose) whether to use 2.4 or 5 GHz. When crossing multiple walls the 2.4 is much better. Any way to make the stock non-vpro adapter seek out a 2.4 GHZ connection?
Change your router to have different SSIDs for 2.4 and 5. Connect to the 2.4 GHz
SSID and don’t enter in the password for the 5.
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You’ll have to access your routers control panel to make it seperate networks.
ok, will see if it lets me
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In the WiFi settings, clone your existing network, rename one, and add the appropriate BSSIDs for each. Exact steps depends on your DE.
Or use nmcli con clone and nmcli con modify on the command line to do the same thing if you’re using Network Manager
Believe it or not, you can’t create two different speed ssid on the router that my isp supplied.
The BSSID for the 2.4 and 5GHz would be different (i.e. the MAC address on the router for the 2.4GHz and the 5GHz are different). Just make sure the client is associating to the one you want.
This post seems to give more details. I will give it a shot.
I’m not optimistic because the specs for the router specifically say that it is supposed to prevent clients from choosing a frequency. My hope is that they enforce that by not presenting two SSID, but you still can …
Setting a specific BSSID per saved network means the laptop will only try to associate with that BSSID first / ever, depending on your connection.autoconnect and .priority settings for each saved network (again assuming you are using NetworkManager).
AFAIK, the only control the router would have over what BSSID and band the client is trying to associate via would be to force de-auth the laptop, hoping that the laptop would try the other BSSID next. This would be a pretty poor design for a router/AP that stubbornly did so constantly, and would be supplemented or replaced with APs I could control if my ISP tried to force such garbage into my network.
Perhaps what you read meant that you do not have control over what frequency/ channel the ISP supplied AP choses to use in each band?
OK, the router exposes two BSSID on one SSID and they are both 5GHz.
That is the end of this story as far as I can tell. Now because of ISP fascism I must buy a new router.
But I will also say that the robustness of the wifi interface under the latest fedora on this HW leaves a lot to be desired.
nmcli commands are not consistent with the documentation in some instances, for example in some cases you should be able to use a name or a UUID but only a UUID will work. Stuff like that. The GUI is flaky in how it advertises the BSSID that are available. You never know what it will say.
I frequently have to turn wifi on and off to effect anything or sometimes to get it working again.
There is also a GUI tool called nm-connection-editor. When started it offers a list of your connections. After double-clicking the Wi-Fi connection you can edit its parameters. There is a selection labeled with “Band”. It lets you choose between “automatic”, “A (5 GHz)” and “B/G (2,4 GHz)”. I don’t know which distribution you are using. But on debian the tool is part of the package network-manager-gnome.
I guess I’ll try it, thanks. I actually just blew off fedora to try manjaro because the wifi was flaky in fedora in some ways I describe above. I kinda feel that the router actually knows the card that is the supplicant and might essentially refuse because it knows that card is capable of 5 GHz. We will see 