Testing Your Network After a New Installation

The most decisive moment in a new internet installation is the last ten minutes, once the technician is finished and waiting for you to nod. After they leave, every defect turns from unfinished work into a complaint that has to be rescheduled.

The trouble is that installation defects are nearly invisible at the time. All you see is that the internet works. The list below runs most important first, and all of it fits in ten minutes.

1. Test over cable first

Almost everyone immediately tests on a phone over Wi-Fi, which produces a number that can't be interpreted. A Wi-Fi result mixes two different things: the quality of the provider's link, and the quality of signal inside the house. If the number is low, you don't know which one is at fault.

Connect a laptop to the router with a LAN cable, then test. That number becomes the basis of every later conversation with the provider. How, in checking your internet speed, and what's reasonable for your needs in how much speed you actually need.

Record the upload figure too, not just download. Many later complaints, especially about video calls and cameras, are really about the upload path (why upload is slower).

2. Check every room, not just the router's

The most-skipped step and the most-regretted. Walk to every room you'll actually use, including the farthest bedroom and the kitchen, and open a video on your phone. You're not looking for a speed figure, but whether it plays without stalling.

If a room is weak, now is the moment to raise it, because moving the router or adding a second point is far easier while the technician is still there with their tools. Positioning is in where to put your router, and if one point genuinely isn't enough, the options are in mesh versus repeater.

3. Passwords, both of them

A router has two passwords, and the second is often forgotten entirely:

• The Wi-Fi password, usually already changed. If it's still the one printed on the sticker, change it (strong Wi-Fi passwords).
• The router admin password, the one that opens the settings. This is the one most often left at factory default, and the more dangerous of the two. Why, in default ISP router admin accounts.

Also confirm encryption is WPA2 or WPA3 rather than an older setting (WPA2 versus WPA3), and if WPS is on, turn it off (WPS is convenient but risky).

4. Look at the physical work

The part that will never be easier to fix than today:

• The fibre isn't sharply bent or pinched behind a cabinet or door. Too tight a bend damages it slowly, and the symptom appears months later as a connection that drops in and out. See caring for fibre at home.
• Clips are tidy and no cable hangs across a walkway.
• Equipment has ventilation. An ONT and router in a closed cabinet will run hot, and heat shortens their life (overheating routers).
• Cable crossing a neighbour's property has been discussed. Far easier to settle now than later, covered in cable crossing a neighbour's land.

5. Ask what the lights mean

Have the technician show you which light means normal, and which means the link to the provider is gone. That's the information used in every future outage, and the first thing they'll ask when you call. Reference in router indicator lights.

While you're at it, get the installation ticket number and ask how long the work is warranted.

6. Connect the devices that matter, now

Don't leave it to tomorrow. Connect what will actually be used: TV, printer, cameras, till. Two things commonly appear at this stage and are better found now:

• Older devices that don't support 5 GHz can't see the network. Symptoms and fixes in laptop can't find 5 GHz Wi-Fi.
• A TV or camera far from the router connects but stutters. Better known now than at the moment you sit down to watch (smart TV slow on Wi-Fi).

For a business, this is also when to test payment terminals, not just phones (networks for tills and card terminals).

7. Write it all down before they go

Five things whose value only shows months later, and which are nearly impossible to recover:

• Measured speed over cable, down and up, with the date.
• The router settings address and its admin password.
• Service name, account number, and installation ticket number.
• Photos of the ONT, router, and cable entry. Very useful when another technician visits later, or when you have to move furniture yourself.
• Make and model of the equipment, to know later whether it still receives updates (updating router firmware).

What to check a few days later

Two things can't be tested on installation day, so schedule them yourself:

• Speed at peak hours, usually evening. A good daytime figure guarantees nothing, and a peak-hour drop is the complaint that most often surfaces later (slow internet at certain hours).
• Behaviour in rain. A joint that isn't quite tight or an enclosure that isn't properly sealed usually shows itself only at the first heavy rain (internet problems in the rain).

If either goes wrong while the installation warranty still holds, that ticket number you recorded is what makes the conversation much shorter. Your rights as a customer when the service falls short are in customer rights when internet is slow.

Frequently asked questions