Genos as Access Point (WiFi)

[jimlaing]

Hi . . .

Thanks to Iain McGuire who pointed out that Genos has an "Access mode" for its WiFi ... i have been experimenting with using the Genos as my "private little network" for connecting a few iPads together (they are running the music-display app "unrealBook".  It seems to work nicely!  I usually bring my own little hardware router, set to Access Point mode, to establish my little network when I am playing with my band and we have several iPads.  It would be nice to have one less piece of gear to set up etc., if I could use Genos itself.  I tested it to ~25 ft. distance and it still worked fine.

My only concern is WiFi channels.  I don't know a lot of detail about how WiFi channeling works - but I kind of thought many routers "found the best channel" and/or switched channels (and 'told' devices to switch channels) based on channels in use in the area.  I don't know if WiFi is this 'smart' or not.  The Genos lets you set a single, fixed WiFi channel (default = 11). 

What I wonder is, what if I'm in a public place playing, and they have several (or many) WiFi's going, and some use Channel 11.  Would mine not work, or interfere with theirs?  With my own router (hardware device), it seemed to "take care of" the channel issue, and nearly always work flawlessly. 

Does anyone have experience with this?  Esp. with using Genos as an access point to connect some iPads or similar devices in a 'private network'?  [I'm not talking about any Internet access, just a simple, private network for a few iPads to talk to each other].

Thanks...
Jim

[Marcel]

Hi Jim, you have been more successful than me in connection iPad to Genos (2.0). Using factory default settings and switching off my iPad VPN I can see the SSID.. the reference, no internet access (which is correct), but the vital tick on the left hand side of the SSID name does not appear (just the never ending wheelie "waiting for something"... Wonder what you did differently?

[chony]

I've been doing it for 2 years and haven't had a problem.

[jimlaing]

It did work OK for me, but I found that in public places, 2.4GHz networks are so prevalent, that we did have fairly common issues, I think due to so many 2.4GHz networks around (and there are only a small # of 'channels' and Genos is locked to a single Channel. So, I bought a small 'travel' router, and use its 5GHz network instead of the 2.4GHz.  The 5 is alot less common, so I have alot less problems with contention from other networks in a building etc.  5GHz networks have more channels, and there are less of them 'out there', so contention is way less - and I have way less problems since.

-Jim

[overover]

It did work OK for me, but I found that in public places, 2.4GHz networks are so prevalent, that we did have fairly common issues, I think due to so many 2.4GHz networks around (and there are only a small # of 'channels' and Genos is locked to a single Channel. So, I bought a small 'travel' router, and use its 5GHz network instead of the 2.4GHz.  The 5 is alot less common, so I have alot less problems with contention from other networks in a building etc.  5GHz networks have more channels, and there are less of them 'out there', so contention is way less - and I have way less problems since. ...

For the sake of completeness, it should be mentioned that Genos is only compatible with 2.4 GHz WiFi networks (WiFi standards b/g/n 2.4GHz), i.e. not with the WiFi standards "n 5GHz" or "ac").


Best regards,
Chris

[jimlaing]

Correct; since Genos only supported 2.4GHz wireless networking, I moved to different hardware (a travel router) to establish a 5GHz network.  My main use of the network is to network a bunch of iPads for all the musicians (using the unrealBook app).

-Jim