bradleysmith
New Around Here
Hello everyone,
I'm looking for some buying advice for my home setup. I recently upgraded from 150Mbps internet to 1 Gigabit internet and am trying to maximize performance and coverage as part of this upgrade.
ISP Current Plan (in Canada):
TELUS PureFibre
Gigabit plan
(listed as 950Mbps down, 750Mbps up)
Previous plan: 150Mbps down/up
General usage/situation:
Wireless devices that must get on the network: (just the devices I own that are constantly in use)
Apartment layout
Apartment wiring
Current setup
Current performance
Goals
Things I've looked at
Any recommendations/tips for what I should pursue?
Thanks!
I'm looking for some buying advice for my home setup. I recently upgraded from 150Mbps internet to 1 Gigabit internet and am trying to maximize performance and coverage as part of this upgrade.
ISP Current Plan (in Canada):
TELUS PureFibre
Gigabit plan
(listed as 950Mbps down, 750Mbps up)
Previous plan: 150Mbps down/up
General usage/situation:
- I work from home and work in tech, so I'm generally on lots of video conferences and transfer large files
- Occasionally have visitors on the network (mostly for work related things)
- Have a single television connected to an IPTV Box (TELUS Optik TV service). I will likely upgrade this to 4K in the future
- Do lots of video streaming on the TV, iPads, laptop, etc. — sometimes simultaneously
- Condo is in a 3-story apartment complex, so potential for interference
Wireless devices that must get on the network: (just the devices I own that are constantly in use)
- MacBook Pro
- iPad Pro 2018
- Samsung tablet
- iPhone XS
- Sometimes an additional iPhone or two for testing
- 2x Apple Watch 4
- 4x Apple HomePods
- AppleTV 4K
- Thermostat
- Media remote
- Nintendo Wii
- Visitors phones
Apartment layout
- 580 sq. ft. single floor, ground floor unit
- 13ft. high ceilings
- long and narrow (around 38' from one end to other and 12.5' wide)
- small outdoor patios on front and back (another 5-6' in length each)
- communal condo courtyard beyond patio on one side
Apartment wiring
- Fibre terminates directly in the unit in a small wiring box in the closet/laundry room in the middle of the unit
- Cat 5e (I think) is wired from that closet to one port in a wall of both the bedroom and the living room.
- Power is available at all of those points, plus many others throughout the unit
Current setup
- Wiring closet
- Alcatel-Lucent 240G ONT for the fibre connection, directly into...
- Actiontec T3200M modem/wifi router.
- Router's wireless capabilities are disabled
- Router is set to bridge mode for port 1.
- Apple Time Capsule 802.11ac (circa 2013 — the small, tall one)
- Connected to port 1 of the Actiontec
- Handles all wireless clients in the unit
- Port 2 of the Actiontec is wired to the living room (see below).
- Port 3 of the Actiontec is wired to the bedroom (see below).
- Alcatel-Lucent 240G ONT for the fibre connection, directly into...
- Living room (from port 2 of Actiontec)
- Some cheap switch that TELUS gave me when they installed.
- TELUS Optik TV box (Cisco)
- Sony HDTV (mostly for software updates)
- Apple TV 4K (this is disconnected normally, as the Apple TV is used on WiFi currently so that it's on the same "network" as the rest of my devices)
- Potential future device: new AV Receiver
- Some cheap switch that TELUS gave me when they installed.
- Bedroom (from port 3 of Actiontec)
- Nothing in use here at the moment.
Current performance
- When wired directly into the Apple Time Capsule, I get around 950Mbps-1.2Gbps down and 530Mbps up. Not sure why the upload is so slow, but TELUS is coming out to swap my Actiontec for some reason next week as part of completing the upgrade. I suppose they might pull the ONT in favor of SFP?
- On wireless connected to the Time Capsule, I get around 350-500Mbps down from most spots in my apartment and 250-300Mbps up.
- I get ok performance on the patios, as that extra distance and wall seems to really hurt things
- I get spotty or no performance in the courtyard.
Goals
- Maximize speeds on WiFi as much as possible for the Gigabit service I have. I know that I won't reasonably get close to actual 1Gpbs speed, but I'd like to do better than the 350-500Mbps I am seeing now.
- Reach all areas in the apartment. Ideally I'd have satisfactory signal on the patios and better-than-nothing signal in the courtyard.
- Connect devices wired where possible/practical for best speed/performance.
- Support TELUS Optik TV.
- Ideally I'd like to take the Actiontec out of the mix, but I failed at doing that with the Time Capsule because I didn't have enough configuration options to make it work without destroying the network or keeping TV from working.
- If the above is not possible, continue using Optik TV driven by the Actiontec if required.
- Relatively easy to manage. I'm tech savvy, but not a networking geek. I'm willing to tinker and deal with setup, etc, but I also don't want it to be a full time job.
- Future proof. For needs for at least the next few years.
- I plan to spend at minimum CDN $250, but could go up to $1000 for the right setup. I'd like to have a solid, reliable, higher-end setup (whatever that means).
Things I've looked at
- A single, powerful router (like the Synology RT2600ac). Simple, single device. Could be a drop-in replacement for the Time Capsule keeping everything else the same. Might not fulfill all the goals and I've seen some mixed reviews.
- Mesh networks. Generally these seem to be slower for max throughput than the Synology, but I'm not sure.
- Prosumer/entry level enterprise (like Ubiquity). Mixing and matching routers, switches, and access points.
Any recommendations/tips for what I should pursue?
Thanks!