Sky
Regular Contributor
Hello everyone! I'm having some trouble I think will be resolved going to a Mesh network but may be addressed using Range Extenders and I'm looking for advice, help, and suggestions.
We have a 4-story building of about 4.000 SF that meanders down a fairly steep mountain slope at around 7,800' elevation. General internet is limited to cable at roughly 150Mbps (which is what we have), DSL, and satellite. An ASUS AC87R was used here successfully for several years and gave serviceable coverage*. There is no Ethernet strung through this building and for a variety of reasons pulling cable here is DOA. There are never more than a dozen users on site at any time, say max added 30-seats between computers, tablets, and phones, etc., and about 35 fixed devices ranging from internal operations to IoT.
In January of this year (2023) I installed the a Synology RT6600ax for a variety of reasons, realizing the coverage might not be quite as expected and planning to convert to a mesh system from the get-go. Now I find myself in a bit of a quandary. The 6600ax is running SRM 1.3.1-9346 Update 5. I've toyed with the idea of using an extender or two as relays, or even trying to repurpose an old router rather than suffer the expense of the Synology mesh devices, the main reason being that as of now, as far as I can tell, the Synology version of mesh might be more properly spelled m-e-s-s. Then again, that could very well be due to the small sampling of posts I've seen and those being somewhat uninformed as to how to make things work properly and have appropriate expectations.
I looked at power line but ruled it out due to the existing wiring quality and circuitry. Recycling old routers is out as this system runs several networks and any relay or mesh will need to accommodate all of that and be fully wireless excepting a power supply. This leaves me where I started, with either mesh or range extenders.
Using a couple of Range Extenders would obviously be less expensive, they should accommodate the primary network and VLANs. However, there would obviously be a performance hit although I somewhat doubt it would be horribly significant(?). That and the structure appears to dictate two additional devices. The Synology "mesh" stuff seems more cobbled together than I had at first imagined, but they would accommodate the multi-LAN, fully wireless including backhaul and keep throughput up.
I'm hoping some of you experienced with these variables will chime in.
Thanks in advance,
Sky
*The Asus AC87R served us well and never broke, an apparently rare experience we enjoyed with two of them. They were retired due to hitting their end of service life from Asus who stopped providing FW updates, etc., and due to our changing needs.
We have a 4-story building of about 4.000 SF that meanders down a fairly steep mountain slope at around 7,800' elevation. General internet is limited to cable at roughly 150Mbps (which is what we have), DSL, and satellite. An ASUS AC87R was used here successfully for several years and gave serviceable coverage*. There is no Ethernet strung through this building and for a variety of reasons pulling cable here is DOA. There are never more than a dozen users on site at any time, say max added 30-seats between computers, tablets, and phones, etc., and about 35 fixed devices ranging from internal operations to IoT.
In January of this year (2023) I installed the a Synology RT6600ax for a variety of reasons, realizing the coverage might not be quite as expected and planning to convert to a mesh system from the get-go. Now I find myself in a bit of a quandary. The 6600ax is running SRM 1.3.1-9346 Update 5. I've toyed with the idea of using an extender or two as relays, or even trying to repurpose an old router rather than suffer the expense of the Synology mesh devices, the main reason being that as of now, as far as I can tell, the Synology version of mesh might be more properly spelled m-e-s-s. Then again, that could very well be due to the small sampling of posts I've seen and those being somewhat uninformed as to how to make things work properly and have appropriate expectations.
I looked at power line but ruled it out due to the existing wiring quality and circuitry. Recycling old routers is out as this system runs several networks and any relay or mesh will need to accommodate all of that and be fully wireless excepting a power supply. This leaves me where I started, with either mesh or range extenders.
Using a couple of Range Extenders would obviously be less expensive, they should accommodate the primary network and VLANs. However, there would obviously be a performance hit although I somewhat doubt it would be horribly significant(?). That and the structure appears to dictate two additional devices. The Synology "mesh" stuff seems more cobbled together than I had at first imagined, but they would accommodate the multi-LAN, fully wireless including backhaul and keep throughput up.
I'm hoping some of you experienced with these variables will chime in.
Thanks in advance,
Sky
*The Asus AC87R served us well and never broke, an apparently rare experience we enjoyed with two of them. They were retired due to hitting their end of service life from Asus who stopped providing FW updates, etc., and due to our changing needs.
