Home WiFi failover solutions

KJK1LL3R

Good afternoon folks, I wanted to ask if anyone has a solution to the following potential dilemma:

I am currently living with my in-laws, the WiFi here is fine most of the time but does have a tendency to drop out a handful of times per week and only on very rare occasions would it take more than a couple of minutes to come back but there has been times that I have had to manually reboot the broadband hub to fix the problem.

I have an important job interview via Microsoft Teams next week, so I am worried about potentially losing internet connection in the middle of my interview. I could of course just manually switch over to tethering from my mobile phone in the event that the main home WiFi cuts out, but this can sometimes be a little time consuming to configure and I would be worried as time is kind of crucial in an interview scenario.

I would really want the job interview to go as smoothly as possible, so I am wondering if there is any kind of failover solution or app that would enable my laptop WiFi to automatically switch from the main home WiFi to my mobile hotspot in the event that the main home WiFi went down? I know I could connect to a wired network and wireless network simultaneously, but unfortunately the broadband hub is not in an ideal location for me to be able to connect to it wired via an ethernet cable.

Has anyone got any ideas or contingency solutions that would give me a little more insurance should anything go wrong on the day of the interview?

DeconSheridan

Just use your phones Internet and as a hotspot for your laptop, connect 30mins before the interview to remedy any issues. Setup up is easy.

Diggerdunne

Hard wire the laptop to the router temporarily. You might have to do the interview in the same room as the router or just run the cable up the stairs to the office etc. It’s only for the duration of the interview and I’m guessing the house will be empty during that time so no issue with trip hazard etc

andublin

KJK1LL3R wrote: »

Good afternoon folks, I wanted to ask if anyone has a solution to the following potential dilemma:

. . . the WiFi here is fine most of the time but does have a tendency to drop out a handful of times per week and only on very rare occasions would it take more than a couple of minutes to come back but there has been times that I have had to manually reboot the broadband hub to fix the problem.
. . .

Has anyone got any ideas or contingency solutions that would give me a little more insurance should anything go wrong on the day of the interview?

Hope this helps in time for you:

(A) Reboot the router in advance of the interview.
(B) Is the problem WiFi side or Internet side?
(C) have the hotspot turned on in advance. if the laptop is already configured to connect automatically to hotspot, then it should do that if the router WiFi signal drops completely. Or do it manually if the WiFi signal stays up but not connected to internet. Practice in advance.

(D) if the problem is on the wan/internet side, ask the provider to lower the speed profile a little, or set the router if possible, for a more reliable connection. That made a dodgy connection into rock-solid for me in the past for about a 10% loss in speed. Also stopped the router needing reboots.

Let us know back whether that helps and how it goes!

Wizard!

Diggerdunne wrote: »

Hard wire the laptop to the router temporarily. You might have to do the interview in the same room as the router or just run the cable up the stairs to the office etc. It’s only for the duration of the interview and I’m guessing the house will be empty during that time so no issue with trip hazard etc

I agree. If you are sure the WiFi is the issue and not the connection itself, which I think is more likely, get a 10m cable, connect via it and do the interview from there.


Keep in mind, that few companies forbid to use WiFi when working from home, so you might need to use the cable anyway if you get the job.


ps. Did an interview few weeks ago for the same team, feel free to send pm if you have questions