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For Windows 7 or 10, I'd like to connect a computer to WiFi router that is internet-connected while also being connected to a second WiFi router that is not internet-connected.

The purpose of the offline WiFi is for WiFi-based file transfers between devices.

Is there a way to do this?

plu
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    if you have 2 Wireless NICs installed then you can do, just assign the offline one a different IP address subnet (e.g.192.168.10.X instead of 192.168.1.X which is what the internet one would use) and it should work – QuickishFM Apr 13 '20 at 20:59
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    Does this answer your question? [Using two wireless NICs at the same time on Windows 10 desktop PC](https://superuser.com/questions/1025471/using-two-wireless-nics-at-the-same-time-on-windows-10-desktop-pc) Since the internal network connects more rapidly than the router handling external traffic, routing will soon only use the internal network for file transfers. – K7AAY Apr 13 '20 at 21:07
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    @K7AAY Not sure its the same thing (I want to connect to two different routers at the same time, and am not interested in boosting speed) but I'll look into that and QuickishFM 's suggestion. – plu Apr 13 '20 at 21:08
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    @QuickishFM Have that second wireless NIC worked, thanks! It turned out that the change in the IP address subnet changed automatically upon connecting to the second offline router with the second wireless NIC. – plu Apr 13 '20 at 21:24
  • It's not speed per se, but routers will use the connection which works faster to connect to a PC attached through the less slower router. Also, make sure the two different WiFi LANs don't have the same or overlapping frequencies (especially likely with 2.4 GHz, less likely with 5GHz) and if at all possible, set the WAPs to use 40 or 80 Mhz wide channels. – K7AAY Apr 13 '20 at 21:59
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    @Tim_Stewart No, that's not asking the same thing and I wouldn't have been able to find that post with a search. Also, the solutions from that other question do not solve the question being asked here. – plu Apr 13 '20 at 23:32

1 Answers1

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From the comments and further testing, a specific solution on a Windows 7 or 10 machine with built-in WiFi hardware is the following (assuming two different routers to connect to):

1) Attach and install a second WiFi adapter (i.e.: a USB-to-WiFi device). Power on a second WiFi router.

2) Go to Network Connections, disable the original built-in WiFi hardware, enable the second WiFi adapter.

3) Connect to the second WiFi adapter to the second WiFi router connection, then re-enable and connect the original WiFi hardware back to the first WiFi router connection.

From there, one should be able to have two simultaneous independent WiFi connections across two different routers.

plu
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