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Forum Discussion
ORBI topology?
I have a 4500 SF two story home - ground floor is about 3,000 SF with the balance on the 2nd story. I have a 3000 SF shop (metal building) that is approximately 100' from the house (line-of-site). ...
A metal shop building is sort of a "worst case scenario". WiFi signals do not penetrate metal walls very well. So, "no". An Orbi unit inside the house is highly unlikely to be usable inside the metal shop building.
The best performing solution is to run a Cat6 ethernet cable from the house to the shop inside a PVC conduit. Cat6 supports gigabit connections up to 328 ft. (including patch cables), so the shop building is well within that limit even if the cable cannot "go in a straight line" from house to shop. While the cable itself is not expensive, the cost to create the conduit pathway can be considerable.
Yes, Netgear does sell an "outdoor rated" unit, the RBS50Y. Placing it "half way" runs into the same issues with the metal building.
Depending on how the house and shop are connected at the transformer/electrical panel, you might be able to use Powerline adapters. It would be an easy experiment to set up.
The most convenient method of bridging such a gap is to install a pair of WiFi "bridge" units to create a point-to-point link. Every major WiFi vendor offers one or more such products. Devices on each end of the link think they are connected to a regular ethernet cable. Although most bridge units are designed for outdoor mounting, they also can be installed inside, for example stuck to a window.
Thanks. You're not telling me anything I didn't expect to hear. I considered the wireless 'bridge' but from what I can tell the speeds are considerbly slower than a Mesh Network. Since I expect to 'steam' events (football games and Nascar races) in the shop (man cave), I'm concerned about speed. Do you think connecting the house to the shop via 'wireless bridge' would be fast enough to support streaming of live events? Can the wireless bridge support a seamless network between the house and the shop or would have have to set up a seperate WiFi network in the shop?
I would recommend CrimpOns suggestion of running a buried LAN cable out to the shop, then install a RBS there on the LAN cable and run the RBS as wired satellite. This will be like a wired AP with singals available at the shop. You should have signals inside the shop however signals outside will be limited.
BRS918 wrote:Do you think connecting the house to the shop via 'wireless bridge' would be fast enough to support streaming of live events? Can the wireless bridge support a seamless network between the house and the shop or would have have to set up a seperate WiFi network in the shop?
To have multiple connections inside the shop (TV, smartphone, computer, etc.) there needs to be some kind of access point inside the shop buildiing. If it is an Orbi satellite, then this will create a "seamless" network compatible with the main house network. The question is how to get that satellite connected to the main house.
WiFi bridges come in various capacities. Ubiquiti's NanoStation AC supports "up to 450mbs". Considering that streaming HD video takes 15-25mbs, this would probably stream more than 10 TV's at the same time. Not bad for about $150USD
I assume the wireless bridge components would be installed on the outside of the buildings, facing one another? Then hard-wired to the rounter in the house and the satellite in the shop (metal building)? If so, is there any advantage to installing a mesh network with a 'satellite' in the shop (hard wired to the wireless bidge) vs an off-the-shelf range extender on the esisting wirless network?
An "off the shelf" range extender suffers from the same disadvantages as locating an Orbi satellite inside the shop building
- Most of them are not rated for "outdoor", so the WiFi signal from the house will be too faint to provide the range extender a good signal.
- The shop will not have a "seamless" WiFi system with the house. Whether that is important is a question only the user can decide.
- The range extender most likely has omnidirectional antennas, which does not help "bridge the gap".
It would be considerably less expensive to attach a "regular $50 access point" to the WiFi bridge at the shop. Not "seamless", but that may not matter.
Wireless bridge units are rated in terms of kilometers, so it is common to place them indoors or stuck to windows to eliminate the hassle of drilling holes in the wall and exterior mounting. If the shop has no windows that face the house, of course, that bridge unit needs to be placed outside.
Honestly? Forget consumer mesh Orbi or prosumer mesh like Orbi Pro.
Create a real SMB network based on Netgear Insight, consider the installation of a fiber pair (Multimode, basically inexpensive, but you need some pro support for splicing in a patch box), two switches (e.g. with 1G or with 10G SFP for the link between the building, like a GC728XP), some Network cables installed (free flight wiring, or with a small patch panel and wall outlets), to the locations you need reliable connections (for wireless access points, where you might want to install some NAS, office computers, ...). The investment in fiber and cabling will last for a much longer time (10..25 years), possible bandwidth and reliability will pay back from the first day of the set-up. Desperately have some locations where no wiring is possible this can be done binding a WAC564 wirelessly to a wired WAC540. Needless to say, all these access points offer seamless roaming. And thanks to the higher bandwidth you won't have to replace the Mesh system devices in three years once the next WiFi technology will pop-up.
