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need good coverage ... mesh or R8000?

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albireo13

Occasional Visitor
Hi,
I have a 2 story house, 2300sqft. I've been using an Apple AE for years. It has been quite stable but, coverage upstairs in bedrooms isn't great. I recently upgraded to 150MBPS Comcast and got a new modem, SB6190.
I am getting ~170MPS in a wired connection which is great. Now, I want to replace my AE router with something that can provide close to 150MBPS throughout the house.

Priorities: coverage, stable, 150+MBPS Wifi speed.

My house isn't huge so I may not need a mesh solution. Still, I wand good coverage.
I am thinking perhaps a newer multiband router will suffice. Coverage is key.
I am not a gamer and the network load won't be heavy.
So, I was thinking of the following options:

1. Single Wifi router:
Netgear R8000 X6
Netgear R7000P

2. Mesh:
Orbi RBK50
Amplifi HD system

What do you think? Any other good recommendations?
Should I go with mesh?

Thx,
Rob
 
This depends on your budget
A mesh are just some acces points and kinda like a repeater

So with the amplifi hd you install basicly 3 routers on 3 differend places and you gain 3x as mutch coverage

So if you want stable and fast I would use that amplifi. But if you just want internet everywhere and slower speed ( more away from router is slower speed ) then the router will be fine and you safe a few €

If you go for the amplifi. Then also take the acces points. Else the single router is stronger in signal ( and it beats the point of a mesh system xd )


Greets from PowerChaos
Verzonden vanaf mijn iPhone met Tapatalk
 
what other cabling do you have in the house ?
Any RG6 coax or CAT 5 or better ?

A plan view of your house, showing rough length x width, location of coax, cat5+, cable modem, AE, etc. would help us give better advice.

Also, do you know your wireless environment - neighbor channel/ bands and strength ?
You may be suffering from interference as much as anything.
 
Thanks. I'll try and get a house drawing together. The router and cable modem are on the 1st floor, fairly centrally located.
We just bought the house and moved in 2 years ago. There is no ethernet cabling installed in the house.

We have for Wifi clients:
2 Nest thermostats
1 MAC
1 smart TV
1 Wifi printer
daughter's laptop
3 iPhones (me, wife, and daughter)
2 Surface tablets
1 Alexa dot
1 smart bike trainer (basement)

When other kids visit we have up to 6 more devices
 
Hmm I haven't checked for wireless channel usage. I'll have to get a Wifi Analyzer app.
What app do folks like for their iPhones?
 
Well, I used Wifi Analyzer app to check channel traffic and it looks fairly clean. Most of the neighbors are on different bands and little band conflict.

If I go with a mesh system, don't I have the same problem of wifi range?
In other words, the satellite unit has to connect with the router unit through Wifi.
Won't it suffer from performance drop due to distance?
 
I just installed the amplifi
And I got now internet in my garage

The internet speed is also fine
But iT use 2 hops so iT suffer a little bit ( 2.4 GHz also )

You first need to link them and then you can place them where you like
Also configure the hops to 2.4 GHz for more range

Ofcourse try to place the router in the middle and On 5ghz for best speed. But If not possible then use 2.4 GHz to gain 30% more range
And If the router cant be placed in the middle then iT Will automatic make a hop

Anyway
In my case the mesh system works like IT need to be
And the speed is stable

For refference ( not directly linked to the internet and complicated setup )

My Speedtest after 2 hops ( 32% connection signal ) was 14 Mbps
Near the router iT was 22 Mbps

So iT does not lose to mutch speed

Greets from PowerChaos



Greets from PowerChaos
Verzonden vanaf mijn iPhone met Tapatalk
 
Well, I went ahead and bout the R8000 and have been using it for awhile. I find I still have coverage issues.
We have 150MBPS service and in the same room the Wifi gives 120+. In the upstairs Master bedroom I am seeing 2MBPS.
This doesn't do it for me so, I may replace it with Google Wifi or Orbi.
 
You need to see it this way
You got x power output and devices also got x power

If they can’t reach each other then they won’t communicate. Easy as that

I got a WiFi antenna that got 91 dBi
Most antennas got 6 dbi
So I should have full speed all the time
It does improve the range a bit. But the router is not strong enough to reply

So what does mesh do ?
It repeats the signal and based on signal strength it choose where to connect to
It prefer to connect directly to the router ( single repeater ) for best speed
But for best coverage it could connect to the hub. So the repeater is repeating the repeater
Only difference with mesh is that you keep full speed and same network name ( not exactly but let’s keep it simple )

So let’s round it up

More speed = better router ( more ram and CPU’s ... )
More coverage = mesh system ( amplifi works great for me )

Keep in mind that you need a good spot to balance speed and coverage when placing the mesh hub ( 50% or more signal recommend and 5g connection for hubs )

Ofcourse settings are more limited
Want both things ? Then get asus and use the aimesh system
Atleast if you can spend 800$ or more xd

Greets from PowerChaos




Greets from PowerChaos
Verzonden vanaf mijn iPhone met Tapatalk
 
well,
I checked again getting 4MBPS in bedroom on 2nd floor. If I go 5 ft into the hall I get 70MBPS. It seems I am getting shadowing of the signal by walls.
On the 1st floor, farthest from the router (30ft and a wall) I get 96MBPS.

I think a single wifi router wont cut it. I will try a mesh system.
Unfortunately the house isn't wired and fishing cables will be a big deal.
 
You could also do it differend but this system does not always work

It’s called power line adapters
So you connect 1 to the router and the other to a switch or pc
It runs over your power lines in your house
So no trouble with cables

Problems ?
The distance is limited based on your power grid layout
The speed is also limited
The connection is also limited

Why use it ? To prevent cable mess or to get it to a place where no cable is
But I won’t suggest it to use it as it can be complicated to get it working ( it’s only plug and play and a single sync button ... unless it does not work xd )




Greets from PowerChaos
Verzonden vanaf mijn iPhone met Tapatalk
 
The eero mesh system is working well for me. Have 3 nodes, one by computer and fiber gateway, one in the living room on the other end of the house, and one in the bedroom upstairs. Get really good wireless speed throughout the house. Also, the roaming works well for our phones and tablets. Lots of good features including IPv6, SQM, band steering, eero Plus (ad blocking and malware filtering) etc. Works well with wireless backhaul or wired backhaul. You can even have just some of the nodes connected via wired backhaul if that's something that you can do. Anyways, very easy to configure and use, and has just worked.
 
For mesh, I like Netgear’s Orbi as it allows local only management (no cloud) and its dedicated 3rd channel for the backhaul seems to work well.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

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