Need 6/6e mesh recommendations for 2400sqft 3 level + garage

[rutilate]

Folks,
I'd love your recommendations for a wireless backhaul mesh system for a 2400 sqft home, three levels, with cable/network drop in a detached garage.
We run two businesses out of the house, one on the upstairs floor and one in the garage, and a home office in the basement, with tons of video streaming, Zoom conference calls, streaming broadcasts, Apple TV, and occasional gaming.

Here is what I think I need:
At least wifi 6 (AX6000), but 6e (AX11000) would be nice
One router plus at least one extender for main floor of house, possibly an additional extender for the basement
Mesh connections to satellites (sadly, wired backhaul isn't an option right now)
at least one 2.5Gbps port, two is ideal
USB 3 connection for at least a Time Machine backup and ideally a NAS (not absolutely critical--the NAS could use an additional 2.5gbps connection, albeit at slower speeds than the 5gbps USB3 standard)
Guest network integrated with the main network (i.e. guests could use a printer if necessary)
IOT network that can be isolated from the rest of the network to isolate greater potential security risks (apparently Netgear Orbi cannot do this)
Decent mobile app (God the Arris S33 modem app won't even allow me to reboot)
Ability to separate networks (i.e. use the mesh or turn off smart connect and separate into 2.4/5-1 networks should the mesh fail)

Here are the restrictions of the environment:
Comcast: 944Mbps down, 24Mbps up last on-router speed test
Arris S33 modem
Sadly, I'm stuck with a network drop in the garage thanks to the previous owner/builder. The garage is separated from the house by a 20' breezeway. Modem/router are essentially in the center of the garage.
Numerous wifi-enabled thermostats, power plugs, thermometer/hygrometers scattered throughout the house/garage
Wireless camera/lights in the chicken coop 100' to the rear of the garage
Relatively uncongested network in most areas of the house.



What I've tried:
I currently have three Asus ZenWifi XT8s and it has been a nightmare keeping them running, devices self-assigining IP addresses, re-pairing nodes, dropping connections between nodes, dropping devices in the middle of video calls, etc. With the gnuton firmware it has been better, but still having some problems. Tech support was a nightmare. Numerous forum posts here have convinced me that this model is fraught with problems that all the reviewers never discovered--kinda like Windows Vista.

I bought two Asus GT-AX6000s and they absolutely refuse to pair, despite every possible combination of stock/Merlin firmware, wired/wireless connections, etc. I might have bad hardware, but these are so reminiscent of the XT8 problems that I'm sending them both back.

I'm willing to be convinced to try Asus again, but the track record here is pretty iffy so far.

The Netgear Orbi RBKE960 is apparently the best all around as far as range and throughput according to Toms Guide and PCMag reviews. However, there are a decent number of recent 1-star reviews on Amazon describing massive connectivity problems, no ability to set the preferred node to connect with in the backhaul (i.e. a node will sometimes connect with the furthers/weakest router instead of another node nearby, and the only way to fix it is to reboot until you get lucky).

I've been looking at the Eero 6/6e and they seem to have the easiest interface but no USB connection, and according to one review they may be collecting some data about you and the sites you visit. Apparently you cannot separate the mesh, and you cannot select the channel for each radio.

What options would you recommend?

 

[coxhaus]

I suggest you dump the wireless back bone and go to wired. Wireless is the slowest mode of communication with the most latency.

One other thing is when you are using a wireless back bone your wireless APs are running serial not parallel which is much slower also. Use wire with separate channels on your wireless APs and you will have higher bandwidth because your wireless APs are running parallel.

My current Cisco 150ax wireless APs support mesh but I am not interested in it, so I have not tried it. And yes, I know mesh is not dependent on layer 1 but it has become known as wireless.

 

[rutilate]

One other thing is when you are using a wireless back bone your wireless APs are running serial not parallel which is much slower also. Use wire with separate channels on your wireless APs and you will have higher bandwidth because your wireless APs are running parallel.

when you say serial not parallel, what do you mean? I understand what those terms mean, and I understand the potential implications of info/data/objects streaming serial vs. parallel, but I'm not sure what you mean when you're applying it to a wifi router.

 

[coxhaus]

I was applying it to a process. With radios one gets to talk while the others wait when using the same channel. Using different channels allows multiple devices to talk at the same time.
And there is much more bandwidth in wire vs a radio.

 

[rutilate]

I was applying it to a process. With radios one gets to talk while the others wait when using the same channel. Using different channels allows multiple devices to talk at the same time.
And there is much more bandwidth in wire vs a radio.

Got it. Perfectly clear! Thank you