Greg Hook
Moderator & Reviewer
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2001
- Messages
- 29,712
- Reaction score
- 20,611
- Points
- 8,213
I was interested till I went to Mr Bezoz site and saw it's now £423 more than a bit of a jump from the £235 posted at the end of the review
Amazon product ASIN B0041JNUAI
I suspect it is also because Amazon have (or had yesterday) their own brand of Mesh units on deep discount.Amazon pricing fluctuates a lot, it will be because they’re selling out, Currys, Very, all the usual suspects had them at £229 (but all currently out of stock)
really good timing on this review thanks. I am quite keen on a mesh system however it seems the vast majority of uk isps dont allow you to put their router in bridge mode, and my understanding is if you set up with such a router having a double NAT will cause grief.
I am no expert on these so am wondering if anyone can give their thoughts. I currently have a vodafone fibre modem router but am considering going to sky.
indeed I think virgin are one of the few who do allow it (and I cant get cable where i live)
ideally would rather not have to buy a new modem, as well as one of these, esp as most ISPs wont offer support then.
These can be set as access points from within the app, so they will play happily with most routers. They are designed for home use, so I wouldn't be too concerned about their operation. We have had no difficulty connecting between wired and wireless devices using the Decos.really good timing on this review thanks. I am quite keen on a mesh system however it seems the vast majority of uk isps dont allow you to put their router in bridge mode, and my understanding is if you set up with such a router having a double NAT will cause grief.
I am no expert on these so am wondering if anyone can give their thoughts. I currently have a vodafone fibre modem router but am considering going to sky.
indeed I think virgin are one of the few who do allow it (and I cant get cable where i live)
ideally would rather not have to buy a new modem, as well as one of these, esp as most ISPs wont offer support then.
Are you sure about the capabilities of that wifi extender you linked to? I have one somewhere and it caused more trouble than anything else. I thought it only support Bridge mode - where the Ethernet port can be connected to wired devices, not back to the router. I never found a way to change this.No wired backhaul! - major downside.
Roaming between WAPs (wireless access points) is dependent on so many factors - the biggest factor being the wireless device you are using. Some devices will cling onto their current WAP long after they can see a much stronger signal from a neighbouring WAP. How this is handled and when they will let go, is outside of your control - it's down to the wireless chipset and OS.
I continue to be a strong advocate for installing CAT 5e around the house and using a wired connection whenever possible. If you can limit Wi-fi usage to things like 'phones, tablets & home assistants that is by far the most reliable method.
An inexpensive device such as a TP-Link TL-WA850RE (£15.99) works really well as a WAP.
It fully supports wired backhaul, and provides 300 Megabits per second (2.4 GHz). A few of these around the house and you've got a very reliable solution for a fraction of price of a mesh system.
Many of the 5 GHz Wi-fi speed advantages aren't usually realised due to its very poor ability to penetrate walls and ceiling.
All the Home Mesh solutions are expensive for what they offer.
Regards,
James.
Agreed. Used to have this kind of setup at my parent’s house, it cause them (and thus me!) a whole lot of trouble.Are you sure about the capabilities of that wifi extender you linked to? I have one somewhere and it caused more trouble than anything else. I thought it only support Bridge mode - where the Ethernet port can be connected to wired devices, not back to the router. I never found a way to change this.
My experience is that the Decos do give a significant performance and reliability increase over using off the shelf WAPs. I know that some of them use beamforming and packet forwarding only to the AP the device is using, so the bandwidth overhead is reduced. They also seem to do a better job of handing off devices from 1 AP to the other, but I have no proof of that.
I had a network of Waps prior to moving over to Mesh. This consisted of a number of Netgear and TP-link routers (5 in all) set in AP mode and connected via Powerline and wired connections back to the router. It was complex to configure, reliability was poor and devices refused to roam, despite SSID, passwords and frequency bands being set the same. Mesh cured all of these and I really would never go back.
*Edit: The reviewed devices do have wired backhaul, they are just not tri-band wireless with dedicated wireless backhaul. My experience is that with just 3 units, this does not cause any slow down. We have a symmetric 100Mb internet pipe at work and even with 40 people connected and using the system, I was still measuring a wireless speed of 90Mb 20' from the nearest AP!