Mesh Wifi

mrmistoffelees · 01-04-2019, 10:39

My trusty old AC66u unfortunately does not provide great whole house wireless coverage.

I've been looking at either the Asus Lyra or the Linksys Velop

Not sure if the Lyra is compatible with my router?

Anyone own/used either of the above or can suggest alternatives?

Mr_love_monkey · 01-04-2019, 14:50

Depends how you want to do it, and how many cables you want to run

I got one of these a while ago : https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It's POE - so a single cable going to it (it comes with a poe injector if you don't have a POE switch).
Gives me better wifi than my router did, plus does other stuff (like a guest network).
At the moment it's just sitting on my desk, but I'm aiming to mount it somewhere - and possibly buy another one for another part of the house.

... but it is a commercial grade AP - so set up isn't as straight forward (there's an app you need to use) - and then you need a controller - which can either be running on your desk top (but you lose reporting facilities if your desk top isn't on) - or (as I'm doing) run the controller on a raspberry pi - which then gives you a web front end for reporting, and controlling the guest network

Ramrod · 01-04-2019, 15:36

I'm using BT's mesh offering at work and it works really well. I'm tempted to use the ASUS version at home as I have a ASUS router but the cost is a little eyewatering and my finance dept would probably veto the idea

**Hugh** · 01-04-2019, 17:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ramrod

I'm using BT's mesh offering at work and it works really well. I'm tempted to use the ASUS version at home as I have a ASUS router but the cost is a little eyewatering and my finance dept would probably veto the idea

Even if you bought her something nice?

ianch99 · 01-04-2019, 17:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrmistoffelees

My trusty old AC66u unfortunately does not provide great whole house wireless coverage.

I've been looking at either the Asus Lyra or the Linksys Velop

Not sure if the Lyra is compatible with my router?

Anyone own/used either of the above or can suggest alternatives?

I have a Asus Mesh solution which is working well, fast and reliable. I sold my AC66U and bought 3 second hand AC68U on eBay. These all use a Cat6 backhaul and provide WiFi throughout the house, one on each floor. The latest ASUS firmware seem solid in the Mesh configuration. On my iPhone I can get my full broadband speed over wifi: 382/21 so the AC68U although a few years old seems more than capable enough.

A friend tried the low end Tenda MW3 3 pack solution at ~£80 from Amazon. He seems very happy with it. Only a 100MHz LAN port but if this is fine then a good cheap house-wide mesh solution. Their MW6 is the next step up but is approx £150 ..

mrmistoffelees · 01-04-2019, 17:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr_love_monkey

Depends how you want to do it, and how many cables you want to run

I got one of these a while ago : https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It's POE - so a single cable going to it (it comes with a poe injector if you don't have a POE switch).
Gives me better wifi than my router did, plus does other stuff (like a guest network).
At the moment it's just sitting on my desk, but I'm aiming to mount it somewhere - and possibly buy another one for another part of the house.

... but it is a commercial grade AP - so set up isn't as straight forward (there's an app you need to use) - and then you need a controller - which can either be running on your desk top (but you lose reporting facilities if your desk top isn't on) - or (as I'm doing) run the controller on a raspberry pi - which then gives you a web front end for reporting, and controlling the guest network

I could go commercial as i have a ton of meraki stuff and licensing

Mr_love_monkey · 01-04-2019, 18:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by mrmistoffelees

I could go commercial as i have a ton of meraki stuff and licensing

You've changed man, it used to be just about the wifi, and now you've gone all commercial....I don't even know who you are anymore.

Meraki I hear is good, but after the licensing runs out you're left with an expensive paperweight.

mrmistoffelees · 01-04-2019, 19:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr_love_monkey

You've changed man, it used to be just about the wifi, and now you've gone all commercial....I don't even know who you are anymore.

Meraki I hear is good, but after the licensing runs out you're left with an expensive paperweight.

We just changed over to new hardware despite renewing Meraki licensing for 3yrs (because interfering from the heavens...) so I have loads of time the merakis can be sideloaded as well

I wasn’t sure if the Lyra and velop acted as repeaters and without cabling but if each unit needs a cable then I’ll go commercial because SSID block/spoofing etc

General Maximus · 05-04-2019, 18:55

If you are happy with Asus then you just need to upgrade to a mesh wifi option

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ASUS-RT-AC6...36&sr=8-2&th=1

ianch99 · 05-04-2019, 20:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by General Maximus

If you are happy with Asus then you just need to upgrade to a mesh wifi option

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ASUS-RT-AC6...36&sr=8-2&th=1

I mentioned this above but I do not think he is interested.

General Maximus · 05-04-2019, 20:51

Sorry i missed it. I was new to thread and read top and bottom skipped the middle.

mrmistoffelees · 10-04-2019, 10:26

sorry both, my apologies for missing posts...

I have an AC66u so dont really want to buy a new router.

I was hoping the lyra or velop would need only cable for the first unit...

**Hugh** · 23-04-2019, 08:37

Did you get a solution?

I’m thinking of buying this -

https://www.expertreviews.co.uk/netw...ue-mesh-system

ianch99 · 23-04-2019, 12:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hugh

Did you get a solution?

I’m thinking of buying this -

https://www.expertreviews.co.uk/netw...ue-mesh-system

Friend of mine has the MW3 model and he is very pleased with it. The MW6 seems to use a single 5MHz channel for backhaul and client traffic but I doubt this will be a real world issue for most people.

If you are quick, Amazon have a "used" one for £129:

https://smile.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-...condition=used

jonbxx · 24-04-2019, 10:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hugh

Did you get a solution?

I’m thinking of buying this -

https://www.expertreviews.co.uk/netw...ue-mesh-system

I've got this system and it works well. It's very easy to set up - you plug the first unit in to the router, set this up and the other units connect almost immediately. I currently have 19 devices connected (5 wired, 14 wireless including a V6 box) and it's totally stable, giving an 100Mb wireless connection for my phone using SpeedTest.

Any downsides? I once had the two satellites lose connection and had to reboot everything but this was once in a year. There isn't a web setup utility, you have to use a slightly clunky app but it covers most things. I had a small problem connecting a 2.4g kitchen device (Sous Vide Cooker - first world problems) but that was due to the phone I used to connect being on 5g. Once I sorted that, it was all good.