Many homes now have dual band and even tri-band routers, guest networks, etc. Which one do you connect to?
2.4 GHz Vs. 5 GHz.
Your Aquarium Guardian uses a 2.4Ghz connection. This is intentional. 2.4Ghz is not going away anytime soon and will always be the standard for in-home IoT devices like Aquarium Guardian for the simple reason that 2.4Ghz has more range than 5Ghz. 5Ghz carries more information and is great for video streaming, but not so great for devices.Our devices are rarely "right next to the router" so we want to design for the maximum range possible. If you have a 5 Ghz network in your home you will want to be sure that network has a different name than the 2.4 Ghz network.
If your looking at your router and it does not say 2.4Ghz or 5, that's because the industry has decided to disguise it from you. It will say something like 802.11b/g/n. All three of these b,g, & n are 2.4 Ghz networks. If your router has an 802.11ac that's the 5Ghz network, and the Aquarium Guardian will not connect to that one. If you have 802.11ac, chances are you also have b/g and n.
Guest Networks
You can connect Aquarium Guardian to your guest network, as long as it meets the password requirements of the Aquarium Guardian (see separate post). This is basically a minimum 8 character password that is letters and numbers only. In other words, it cannot contain special characters such as ?!@#$%^&*().
WPS Connections
The fastest way to connect new devices is to use the WPS settings. Most routers have a page you can log onto (often you can locate this by typing 192.168.1.1. into your browser window. If you don't find it there, google your router number and find the manual.
Some routers require that (for security reasons) WPS be enabled by the user. The next question is if the WPS connection mode is going to attempt to connect the device to the 2.4Ghz or the 5Ghz network. If you don't want to deal with all of this, just use the hotspot mode to connect your device.
Please - if you have anything to share - or feedback on the article in terms of anything else we can add.. please leave a comment below. We love to hear from our users and often update these articles based on customer feedback.