Large Family Home - Router / Multiple WAPs Whole System Needed

[Jonnie Cache]

Yes you seem to be right I just checked, it's supposedly in the works according to a Netgear moderator (wired option) but I wouldn't hold my breath.

If I'm going to spend money on new network hardware, I'd like it to be fairly future proof. I would like to get 4x4 MU-MIMO APs if feasible. The mesh systems I've seen only support 2x2, I believe? Maybe I'm misinformed and it would be overkill. But, for example, my MacBook Pro has a 3x3 radio, I believe.

The other concern with the mesh packages is the routing performance. I find it hard to believe that the router from those systems would be able to keep up with Gigabit speeds. I wish there were benchmarks that I could rely on that would show a total package of wireless performance for the router and APs (or mesh satellites). It's not enough for me to have the test indicate only wireless performance. What does that mean in terms of real-world performance to/from the Internet? Unless I'm missing things, I don't know of any resources on the web that provide this kind of test data.

Sometimes I feel like this whole thing is a crap shoot...

 

[avtella]

Well the AE is by no means bad I just think it's held back in range by internal antennas and I don't think your going to gain too much from 4x4ac over it in terms of cost/benefit ratio unless you do tons of file transfers where you will see a difference. I would just wait till next gen 802.11ax devices get released if you are going for a major upgrade. As for MU-MIMO from what I've seen in reviews only the newer Qualcomm based chipsets/routers seem to do it well. There aren't any Apple devices that support it either. I'm sure Apple will eventually use MU supporting chipsets around the time newer "ax" devices get released. Currently only the Intel 8265ac WiFi adapter in some high end Windows laptops and a QCA adapter in some low end Acer laptops support MU-MIMO in addition to many high end Qualcomm based Android devices.

If you want Gigabit speeds, a router in a central location connected to wired APs is the way.

 

[abailey]

There is a thread somewhere on this forum about Apple Airport Extreme being able to do VLANs in AP mode, so you can have a visitor network. I can't find the thread right now. Something like it is a hidden VLAN ID but if you know the ID you can use it for visitor. The thread told the VLAN ID. I could be mistaken but I am almost sure that is right. Anyway if so, you could save a little money up front by using your Airports a little longer.

UPDATE: This thread talks a little about it: https://www.snbforums.com/posts/317824/

 

[tannebil]

You’ve got to be careful talking about the AirPort Extreme as there are multiple generations that look identical but only the last one (6th gen) is 802.11ac. The ac version works fine but I’d definitely replace the older versions. I’m sure that the state of the art has progressed (things like beam forming and band steering) since the last AirPort Extreme was released in 2013 so if you were were buying new APs, I’d be amazed if the AE wasn’t a laggard. On the other hand, if you already have 6th gen units, the performance boost might not be noticeable.

I’ve never done much with the guest network capabilities of the AirPort Extreme but I suspect it won’t do what you want. Plume doesn’t support a guest network (yet) and even when it’s added, I bet it won’t work in bridge mode and you don’t want to run Plume in router mode (a different discussion) at least until they release a model with two wired ports.

eero has a guest network and is OK running as a router although its’ router features are basic. The eero guest network implementation is easy to configure and use. I don’t know the technical details but it looks like it doesn’t support VLAN tagging so my guess is that guest network isolation isn’t as strict as you can do with Ubiquiti (although I’m sure there’s a big difference in configuration complexity as well).

No bucks, no Buck Rogers. If you want to do more sophisticated stuff that consumer stuff doesn’t do out of the box, you have to pay the price (dollars, complexity, or both).

 

[Jonnie Cache]

Thank you everyone for your help. I've decided to go ahead and get a Unifi system. I have ordered a Unifi US-48-500 and some APs. I decided to go with the AP-AC-HDs. I realize that it may be overkill for some, but with all the streaming that we do on multiple devices, I believe it will be good for us in the long run.

 

[pege63]

Does Orbi support wired backhaul? Everything I've read so far says that it doesn't support it yet.

No it does NOT it has a 5GHz band as backhaul, but Velop, TP-Link Deco M5 has wired backhaul

 

[avtella]

Pretty good choice, hope it works well for your needs.

 

[Jonnie Cache]

By the way, I never did find a very good way to deal with parental controls with a decent router. I found the Disney (?!?) Circle that appears to hit all the important points. Plus, it allows me to install an app on their iOS devices so they can’t just switch off WiFi to bypass the controls!