novisnick
EmoPhile
CEO Secret Monoblock Society
Posts: 27,230
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Post by novisnick on Jul 28, 2021 8:57:08 GMT -5
garbulky and friends, I found that when changing to mesh or even a new router or modem that it’s a great time to change your SSIS broadcast name and password. Yep, it’s more work but it’s an optimal time to do so. Security measures never hurt, even with dozens and dozens of devices.. Ihave 36 I think. Just a thought
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Post by donh50 on Jul 28, 2021 9:32:29 GMT -5
Very curious to see how it works for you after a little more time. I have been thinking of a mesh system for a while now, just haven't plopped down the money and keep freezing with analysis paralysis whenever I start wading through all the reviews. My problem is reaching my basement media room in a big three-story house with the cable modem and wireless router on the top floor with HVAC ducts in the basement betwixt the main router and media room. And the media room is on a separate circuit so power line adapters don't work (that was the solution for my son's bedroom and the game room also in the basement). I have a range extender now that works, sometimes, but also seems to lose its mind now and then and not reconnect to the main route after a power glitch (fairly common in our area). Lately it is dropping out more often so it may be dying -- it is pretty old. Orbi, Eero, and Asus all came highly recommended by various folks I know who do this sort of thing for a living. The TP Link seems to be hit or miss; some have used it and it worked great, others found it unreliable and went with Orbi instead. One guy suggested I run a cable outside the house and down to the media room, which would not be completely insane if the media room were on the same side of the house as my office upstairs where the modem lives. My plan is to place the master in my office upstairs at the front of the house, second unit on the main (middle) floor at the back side of the house, and see if that is enough to get decent coverage to the media room in the basement also back side of the house. Add a third unit in the basement if need be. I'm an analog engineer type, networks I found vexing. My issue is not so much internet traffic but a large amount of devices. Somewhere around 43. Like you my router connection is stuck in a most innoportune place. So far when I switched wifi, my echo clock went out and the window ac lost the network immediately. I expected a few devices would feel a little bit weird (I kept the same network and password). After a quick recconection, it seemed to have fixed the matter. I had one light that didn't go off. But when I asked again without delay it went off. So I did a reboot. I'm counting on it being first day jitters of the network. Other than that it's been solid. We'll have to see how the network will hold up over time. One thing that might be helpful is that each orbi has a large number of ethernet ports. My main router is hardwired to the next router via a 100 ft cable with no issues. My next cable is going to be 200 ft from this satellite to the other one as it will go upstairs. Well it will, if the wife doesn't complain about the cables. Currently the third router is on wifi. What is interesting is that the system automatically adapts if one isn't hardwired vs being hardwired etc. I'll report back how that goes. I say this because of the distance issue you have. I will say though that spending $1k feels pretty ridiculous to me. But I was sick of dealing with routers with a bajillion antennas that couldn't keep track of low data devices in what is honestly a pretty small house. TP-Link claims 150+ devices on their totl unit, but I am unsure how this translates to real life. The competition cautions going over 35 to 50 devices before hitting "performance issues" and those devices are subtantially more expensive than TP-LINK. Nevertheless, Nick has had very good results with them so there's that. I will confide that I wonder if almost all of these routers use the same basic chipsets just with fancier chassis and charge and arm and a leg as in the case of the orbi. Now I'm wondering if the real issue is my cable modem. Does anybody know if cable modems can't handle connections from so many devices? My internet speed isn't too great - 60 mbps so it's not a speed thing. You seem to be tech savvy. My BIL who runs a company that services and provdes networking services to many companies reccomends ubiquiti amplifi alien for heavy duty needs. He uses the amazon eero at home. He also thought orbi was pretty good. My issue is just poor connectivity. Internet speed is limited by my provider and long drop from pole to house (rural'ish area). They have upgraded me from 100 to 150 to 270 Mb/s but I am stuck at ~80 Mb/s due to the cable company's equipment along the lines. In the house I have one temporary cable from office to media room as I was having problems with external support reaching it through the range extender (which creates a separate subnet, sometimes a hassle). That will go away soon; I cannot deal with cables running all over, so need a good wireless solution. The only things that need lots of ports for me are the main router, which feeds a bunch of stuff in my office, and the media room, which is using a WAP (wireless access point, a "media server" to Linksys) that has four ports and is (so far) enough. A 1G Ethernet switch with 4-8 ports is only about $20 these days so I am not inclined to pay extra money (and size) for extra ports on the WiFi units scattered around the house. I'll put the ones that need more ports on top of a little switch. I already have a switch in the office, but may have to add another (or buy a 16-port unit), since these mesh units seem to be limited to two or four for the most part. Your cable modem is probably not the problem with too many devices per se; as long as it delivers the max bits it can, then either you need a better data plan or your WiFi network (routers etc.) is just not able to handle all the interleaved traffic. I think. I have a good technical background in analog design, but I have zip background in networking support -- just what I have picked up while trying to get them up and running at home. One tech with whom I spoke highly recommended eero and uses them in most home theater and home network installs that need a mesh network. Online reviews have been mixed, however, and when I looked not too long ago they were just releasing the higher-speed models. Ubiquiti and Orbi seem to be favored among tech sites for performance but cost a lot more, natch. Other things have come up so I put the whole project on hold but hope to start again soon and have something in place by the end of the year. We've had some personal issues, work issues, and my NAS dying is an unexpected expense (I have not replaced it yet, just using a USB drive on my router, but want something with RAID).
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Post by garbulky on Jul 28, 2021 10:20:41 GMT -5
My issue is not so much internet traffic but a large amount of devices. Somewhere around 43. Like you my router connection is stuck in a most innoportune place. So far when I switched wifi, my echo clock went out and the window ac lost the network immediately. I expected a few devices would feel a little bit weird (I kept the same network and password). After a quick recconection, it seemed to have fixed the matter. I had one light that didn't go off. But when I asked again without delay it went off. So I did a reboot. I'm counting on it being first day jitters of the network. Other than that it's been solid. We'll have to see how the network will hold up over time. One thing that might be helpful is that each orbi has a large number of ethernet ports. My main router is hardwired to the next router via a 100 ft cable with no issues. My next cable is going to be 200 ft from this satellite to the other one as it will go upstairs. Well it will, if the wife doesn't complain about the cables. Currently the third router is on wifi. What is interesting is that the system automatically adapts if one isn't hardwired vs being hardwired etc. I'll report back how that goes. I say this because of the distance issue you have. I will say though that spending $1k feels pretty ridiculous to me. But I was sick of dealing with routers with a bajillion antennas that couldn't keep track of low data devices in what is honestly a pretty small house. TP-Link claims 150+ devices on their totl unit, but I am unsure how this translates to real life. The competition cautions going over 35 to 50 devices before hitting "performance issues" and those devices are subtantially more expensive than TP-LINK. Nevertheless, Nick has had very good results with them so there's that. I will confide that I wonder if almost all of these routers use the same basic chipsets just with fancier chassis and charge and arm and a leg as in the case of the orbi. Now I'm wondering if the real issue is my cable modem. Does anybody know if cable modems can't handle connections from so many devices? My internet speed isn't too great - 60 mbps so it's not a speed thing. You seem to be tech savvy. My BIL who runs a company that services and provdes networking services to many companies reccomends ubiquiti amplifi alien for heavy duty needs. He uses the amazon eero at home. He also thought orbi was pretty good. My issue is just poor connectivity. Internet speed is limited by my provider and long drop from pole to house (rural'ish area). They have upgraded me from 100 to 150 to 270 Mb/s but I am stuck at ~80 Mb/s due to the cable company's equipment along the lines. In the house I have one temporary cable from office to media room as I was having problems with external support reaching it through the range extender (which creates a separate subnet, sometimes a hassle). That will go away soon; I cannot deal with cables running all over, so need a good wireless solution. The only things that need lots of ports for me are the main router, which feeds a bunch of stuff in my office, and the media room, which is using a WAP (wireless access point, a "media server" to Linksys) that has four ports and is (so far) enough. A 1G Ethernet switch with 4-8 ports is only about $20 these days so I am not inclined to pay extra money (and size) for extra ports on the WiFi units scattered around the house. I'll put the ones that need more ports on top of a little switch. I already have a switch in the office, but may have to add another (or buy a 16-port unit), since these mesh units seem to be limited to two or four for the most part. Your cable modem is probably not the problem with too many devices per se; as long as it delivers the max bits it can, then either you need a better data plan or your WiFi network (routers etc.) is just not able to handle all the interleaved traffic. I think. I have a good technical background in analog design, but I have zip background in networking support -- just what I have picked up while trying to get them up and running at home. One tech with whom I spoke highly recommended eero and uses them in most home theater and home network installs that need a mesh network. Online reviews have been mixed, however, and when I looked not too long ago they were just releasing the higher-speed models. Ubiquiti and Orbi seem to be favored among tech sites for performance but cost a lot more, natch. Other things have come up so I put the whole project on hold but hope to start again soon and have something in place by the end of the year. We've had some personal issues, work issues, and my NAS dying is an unexpected expense (I have not replaced it yet, just using a USB drive on my router, but want something with RAID). There is a new wifi standard coming up which will open up a swath of frequencies making things less cluttered. You may want to consider waiting.
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Post by donh50 on Jul 28, 2021 10:32:06 GMT -5
There is a new wifi standard coming up which will open up a swath of frequencies making things less cluttered. You may want to consider waiting. WiFi 6 is supposed to be better for large numbers of devices on the network, and it's been available (if not cheap) for a couple of years or so. What is next? I can wait, but there is always something better on the horizon.
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Post by garbulky on Jul 28, 2021 16:26:05 GMT -5
There is a new wifi standard coming up which will open up a swath of frequencies making things less cluttered. You may want to consider waiting. WiFi 6 is supposed to be better for large numbers of devices on the network, and it's been available (if not cheap) for a couple of years or so. What is next? I can wait, but there is always something better on the horizon. Wifi 6e will exploit the 6 ghz band
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Post by donh50 on Jul 28, 2021 16:33:01 GMT -5
WiFi 6 is supposed to be better for large numbers of devices on the network, and it's been available (if not cheap) for a couple of years or so. What is next? I can wait, but there is always something better on the horizon. Wifi 6e will exploit the 6 ghz band Thanks, good to know. However, higher frequencies mean more problems penetrating walls and floors/ceilings, and I have more than enough bandwidth now for what I've got, so not a huge thing for me. I have actually forced the basement WAPs to use the 2.4 GHz band for better reception.
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Post by garbulky on Jul 28, 2021 16:46:09 GMT -5
Wifi 6e will exploit the 6 ghz band Thanks, good to know. However, higher frequencies mean more problems penetrating walls and floors/ceilings, and I have more than enough bandwidth now for what I've got, so not a huge thing for me. I have actually forced the basement WAPs to use the 2.4 GHz band for better reception. Me too. I got plenty of bandwith. I think the benefits of the new band is that it produces less clutter and interference with multiple devices.
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novisnick
EmoPhile
CEO Secret Monoblock Society
Posts: 27,230
|
Post by novisnick on Aug 7, 2021 23:58:58 GMT -5
TP-Link Deco WiFi 6 Mesh WiFi System(Deco X20) Thought I’d give an update now that I’ve owned this for a few weeks. It’s been a dream! No drops and huge coverage without a hitch. I true have no complaints at all. I have a shop out back an Alexa, it would get dropped all the time but hasn’t since my new mesh system has been installed. Highly recommend!
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Post by garbulky on Aug 8, 2021 1:51:13 GMT -5
TP-Link Deco WiFi 6 Mesh WiFi System(Deco X20) Thought I’d give an update now that I’ve owned this for a few weeks. It’s been a dream! No drops and huge coverage without a hitch. I true have no complaints at all. I have a shop out back an Alexa, it would get dropped all the time but hasn’t since my new mesh system has been installed. Highly recommend! Glad to hear! I am also satisfied with my Netgear Orbi. I have noticed rare mild sluggishness but the lights do still turn off. I hope to increase the number of smart devices by another three or so. It'll be interesting to see whether that affects things or not.
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