Hey all, I was wondering if anyone could help me work out how to do this? Basically, I have a stupid number of smart devices and my router has become increasingly unstable. I want to have all my IOT devices on one router and reserve the other for priority devices like phones and PCs.

I plan to put my IOT hub on 2G only and my primary hub on 6G and 6e only to avoid 2G congestion.

Problem is, if I connect both my routers to my modem, only one can connect to the internet. I tried putting a network switch between the routers and the modem, no dice.

Does anybody know how I can have 2 separate networks using 2 separate routers on a single modem? Both require internet connection but they don’t need to be able to communicate.

Thanks in advance for any help people can give :)

  • 𝒍𝒆𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒏English
    4•10 months ago

    Two easiest options based on some general assumptions, not ideal but should work:

    • Connect the WAN port on the second router to any LAN port on your first/primary router. To change router settings you’ll need to change networks. If this doesn’t work, then it’s possible both routers are issuing DHCP addresses for the same subnet. Connect to either one of the routers and change the subnet to something else.

    • Disable DHCP on the second router, manually assign it an IP address within the DHCP subnet of your first router, and connect any of the second router’s LAN ports directly into any LAN port on your first/primary router. Leave the WAN port on the second router unnoccupied. You can change settings on either router you can be on either network

    Slightly more advanced territory:

    What routers are you working with? If these are standard off-the-shelf routers, you should be able to set up VLANs and separate wireless networks to isolate your IOT and personal devices, and set the IOT wlan to only broadcast on 2.4GHz.

    Also how familiar are you with networking? This might need some knowledge of subnets, VLANs and a few other bits, particularly in regards to configuring your router’s dhcp settings, and other stuff so you can (optionally) access devices on the IOT network from your personal devices network.

    You might get more help crossposting to the much larger [email protected] though.