The best wifi channel to use will be the one that no one else is using. In order to set this up you will need:
1. A way to set up ur own wifi channel.
2. Knowledge of other channels being used nearby.
1: Setting ur channel
“Usually” you can configure your wifi channel using the webpage for your wifi router. Assuming you are connected to your wifi, you will be able to log on to your routers webpage by using its IP address in ur web browser. This address is usually 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.2.1, if not then you will need to find out your routers IP address.
Finding ur routers IP address in windows
In windows you can find out your routers IP address by doing the following:
You want your gateway IP (your router is your internet gateway).
- Press the windows key and the R button at the same time
- In the dialog that appears, type “cmd” (no quotes) and press enter (or return)
- In the command window that appears type “ipconfig” and press enter
- This will bring up all your network settings n stuff, find your gateway IP (you may need to scroll up), should look something like 192.168.1.1
When you bring up your routers log in page, log in. This will need a username and password. Common logins are username: admin and password: password, or username: admin with no password, or blank for Belkin routers. If not, you should be able to find this out either by looking on the bottom of the router or by googling: “default password” and ur routers model eg “Linksys WRT54GL” (no quotes).
Congrats, u made it into your routers settings, here in the wireless settings (which you will need to find) you can change stuff like ur wifi channel, wifi SSID (your wifi name) and your wifi password, you can also change your routers login settings, although write the changes down somewhere permanent, like on the router.
2: Finding out which channels are being used nearby
In windows again using the command window you can actually do a scan of channels nearby and find out stuff about the nearby channels:
Open the command window and show wireless channels available:
- Press the windows key and the R button at the same time
- In the dialog that appears, type “cmd” (no quotes) and press enter (or return)
- In the command window that appears type “netsh wlan show all" (no quotes) and press enter
A bunch of stuff will appear and if you scroll down you should see this:
=======================================================================
======================= SHOW NETWORKS MODE=BSSID ========================
=======================================================================
Under this title will be all the wifi networks nearby, including their channel and signal strength. Perhaps its a good idea to write down their channel and signal strength. In order to choose a channel for your network, you want the channel with the least amount of noise (other wifi nearby). But! You can't just choose an empty channel, as shown below many of the channels overlap, so you want the one with the least overlap...
and thats it!