Sky Q Wired Vs Wireless

johnny777

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Ive been pretty lucky whereby my Silver and 2 minis have been pretty stable via wireless. However, I am wondering why Sky state that they do not recommend wired connections.

My broadband is not with Sky so I had the limitation of 2.4ghz wireless connectivity to my router. As an experiment, bought a couple of TP Link Powerline adapters and decided to connect my Silver box via a wired connection.

Easy to set-up and it then walks you through resetting minis etc (you have to do this apparently after going from wireless to wired on the Silver) and all working perfectly. Sky downloads are also a lot quicker and are now coming through at the full speed of my fibre connection.

Have the following queries:-

1. How do the minis now connect to the router? Does it all go through the silver box?
2. Is there any advantage of connecting one or both of my minis via a wired connection?
3. If either of the minis are connected via cable, what is the score with regards to the Sky Mesh network (I see this as 'SKYFB19).........is it still used?

I'm old school and believe that cable has to be better than wireless if an option.

Thanks.
 
From my 5 day ownership of Sky Q, my understanding is as follows-
1 - The minis connect to the main Sky Q box by its MESH network which in turn connects to the router by the household WiFi network.
2 - I would assume there is a benefit in hard wiring the minis to the Sky Q box depending on distances, floors, walls etc.
3 - Don't know what network would be used.
My sky system is linked in to the 5ghz wireless home network, my provider being TalkTalk. No problems to date. Could be worth using a WiFi analyser app on your phone to check signal strengths of the wireless and MESH networks around your house.
 
I can't say what is best but I know traditional networking works very well. I.e. Each box connected to router by wifi or wired.
 
My 2TB box and 2 minis are all connected using home plugs. No issues with connections in the last 6 months just the odd reboot of main 2TB box. Works very well
 
Don't forget that Powerline is built in to the boxes so there is no need to buy powerline plugs. (Sky still dont support it though - reasons still unknown).
 
Don't forget that Powerline is built in to the boxes so there is no need to buy powerline plugs. (Sky still dont support it though - reasons still unknown).
I don't understand the concept of this completely. So are you saying that box will pick up a network connection from the mains etc? If this is the case, how do you pair up the Sky box with the powerline the other end? Also, is this also in the minis?
 
I don't understand the concept of this completely. So are you saying that box will pick up a network connection from the mains etc? If this is the case, how do you pair up the Sky box with the powerline the other end? Also, is this also in the minis?

Thats the theory. We are short on instructions as it's not supported but some have done it. To complete the picture a Sky Hub is required to have the whole system Powerline enabled. I'm using external Powerline s for my minis and it works so I'm not fiddling.
 
Yes, powerline is an option in the Settings menu on main box and mini (and Sky router if you have one). The airties system that provides the communication "mesh" between all the components was designed to constantly balance the signal between 5ghz wifi, 2.4ghz wifi and Powerline. For some reason Sky have so far chosen not to support the Powerline part. But you can switch it on in the menus if you choose to.

I have mine switched on on all three components and can see from the router stats that it is sending quite a bit of data via Powerline.

Of course if you don't have a Sky router then all that enabling Powerline will do is to allow communication between the boxes, you will still need wifi enabled (on the main box at least) to get access to your network.
 
Yes, powerline is an option in the Settings menu on main box and mini (and Sky router if you have one). The airties system that provides the communication "mesh" between all the components was designed to constantly balance the signal between 5ghz wifi, 2.4ghz wifi and Powerline. For some reason Sky have so far chosen not to support the Powerline part. But you can switch it on in the menus if you choose to.

I have mine switched on on all three components and can see from the router stats that it is sending quite a bit of data via Powerline.

Of course if you don't have a Sky router then all that enabling Powerline will do is to allow communication between the boxes, you will still need wifi enabled (on the main box at least) to get access to your network.

Is the switching on all that's required? Is the pairing automatic after that? Are your boxes plugged directly into mains, no plugboard s? I have seen little discussion of this.
 
Yes, the pairing is automatic. Yes, I have them plugged directly in to mains as usual Powerline "rules" apply: no RCB, best on same ring main (but not a huge problem if not), best in mains socket rather than trailing extension.

Fair bit of discussion on it (and Q connectivity in general on the Sky Q forum: Sky Q - Sky Community
 
IMG_0110.jpg
Ok, so now I'm confused. This is a screen grab from my Asus router. The IP ending .91 is for the Silver which is connected via a TP Link powerline. .137 and .252 are the 2 minis are connected wirelessly.....Ethernet and Powerline set to off. However, my router sees them as a wired connection. I'm guessing that this is due to connection via the Silver?

All is working fine so I'm reluctant to experiment wiring the minis at the moment. Just interested how this all hangs together.

Thanks.
 
View attachment 816985 Ok, so now I'm confused. This is a screen grab from my Asus router. The IP ending .91 is for the Silver which is connected via a TP Link powerline. .137 and .252 are the 2 minis are connected wirelessly.....Ethernet and Powerline set to off. However, my router sees them as a wired connection. I'm guessing that this is due to connection via the Silver?

All is working fine so I'm reluctant to experiment wiring the minis at the moment. Just interested how this all hangs together.

Thanks.
Very true. I was getting intermittent 2.4ghz wireless drop outs overnight from the Silver box which was playing havoc with the minis for some reason. Since going wired, seems rock solid......so far. Just tempting as I have cabling to the router available in one of the rooms where a mini box resides.
 
I hard wired my silver and mini a couple of weeks ago... I had stability issues with mini (Silver works perfectly) that meant it kept crashing... In all honesty it hasn't made one bit of difference.
 
I hard wired my silver and mini a couple of weeks ago... I had stability issues with mini (Silver works perfectly) that meant it kept crashing... In all honesty it hasn't made one bit of difference.

Did you disable the wifi?
 

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