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Forum Discussion
Wired home - Orbi vs. Router + ?
(tl;dr, mesh or traditional in a wire house?)
Hey all,
When I moved into my house, I made sure we ran ethernet to all rooms. It's a 2,400 sq foot home, minus the basement (which is ... 1,200 I believe).
I've had a few different setups through the years between dual routers, router + ap, router + repeater and just a really expensive router. Sadly, to date, I seem to one way or another, have issues.
Currently, I am running an Asus AC5300 and it covers most of the house and parts of the outside relatively well. As of late, I seem to continually have issues adding new devices (4 in the past week), in that they simply won't connect. This issue may unrelated all together, but, I do want/need better WiFi on 1st and 2nd floors. Recently started playing with baby monitors due to newborn, and solid WiFi is a must right now. I have issues getting a solid connection to 5ghz when on 2nd floor and outside. Streaming videos over WiFi is a hit or miss ... sometimes great, other times awful. This is why I largely rely on everything being wired.
Reality is, just ... frustrated with several failed routers through the years. They've all been Asus, perhaps that's my core issue. Or, I'm just stupid and missing something all together.
Anyway, I just started looking into these new mesh networks and they appear to be very appealing on paper. Quite a few competitors and right now appears Orbi is the best option. Yet, being that I do have ethernet run to pretty much every room, is this a dumb investment? Should I be looking at a different option?
I just pulled the trigger on the Netgear RBK50 + RBS50. It won't be here until next week as they're Warehouse Deals, so I have some time to cancel if this isn't the best choice. Being that I have less than 4k square foot, do I really need that third satellite? I figured, better safe than sorry ... or is that just dumb? Will try without the third on setup to determine if needed.
One last note, we are planning to move in a couple years. No idea if it'll be a new home or not and if the later, what options will exist to run lines. Hard to take that into consideration given the unknown, but part of me does say it leans a little towards the Orbi.
Any feedback is most welcome.
Thanks
11 Replies
I'm no expert but if you already have ethernet to all your rooms, why not use it? I do understand that alot of newer devices only allow connections via wifi. However, if you install a wifi access point (AP) or two (depending on coverage needed) you'll be using your ethernet to transistion to wifi in the "dead zones". Configuring the APs can be a challenge but this type of wireless network has been used in commercial settings (hotels, airport terminals, hospitals, etc.) for years. Ubiquiti and Engenius are two brands that have lots of low/moderate cost solutions.
I'm not against using AP's, as yes, using my existing Ethernet would be most ideal. Just not entirely certain on best options. Ubiquiti's are great and all, but I don't want to ceiling mount, nor do I truly understand how to implement. I'd assume I disable wireless broadcasting on my current router to avoid interuptions in handshakes correct? (Last time I trierd to use an AP with my router and kept them both broadcasting, I just had all kinds of issues).Then implement some form of AP(s) that allow for a single SSID with ease of handshake/handoff?
Obviously the appeal with Orbi, Google, Eero, etc. are to avoid the headache and confusion ... but I'd probably have a better setup If I leveraged my hard lines appropriately.
Open to feedback!
Thanks
I understand your reluctance to use APs as it can be a problem to implement over an existing wifi system. Here's a link to an article (albeit a few years old) that may help: https://www.howtogeek.com/104469/how-to-extend-your-wi-fi-network-with-simple-access-points/. It's worth a reda to give you ideas on how to go about APs witn minimal disruption. Good luck!
Multiple wired APs would be the best approach, from a technical perspective, when you have wires to every room already installed. But, you must configure everything properly.
To setup you generally just need to:
1) Put adjacent APs on non-overlapping channels. This applies to both 2.4 and 5G bands.
2) Use 20 Mhz bandwidth and use only channels 1, 6, or 11 on 2.4G.
3) Use a single SSID.
4) Adjust power levels to reduce overlap between APs. That's usually high on 5G and medium on 2.4G.
You can use Ubiquiti APs without cieling mounting (with some loss of coverage.) I have mine sitting on top of furniture and they work fine for me.
Orbi should be fine also--provided it works for you. But, Orbi gives you almost no configuration options, which is problematic if you encounter interference from neighorbing APs or other sources. You cannot do 1, 2, and 4 above. Orbi aso gives you almost no information to diagnose what's happening.
st_shaw - thanks. While I want to say I'm OK giving up control and stats, I'm not. The Orbi does leave much to be desired in regards to control and ... it just feels flakey. So many little oddities I've experienced within the web app and my confidence is low in the stability of the platform given the past several hours of frustration.
Still, my Asus AC5300 in itself may be problematic. Hard to rule that out as of now; however ... perhaps I should just look at a whole new system using Ubiquiti instead.
Question for you, or anyone. Does PoE carry over a keystone? In that, If I put a PoE switch in my basement (central termination for everything), will the power run through the patch cables that connect to each room's keystone? So If I plug into any of those ports, will I still get power there?
Thanks
Yikes, a full Ubi setup is more expensive than originally thought (Gateway, Switch, 2x AP's, Cloud Key) = $600 (several pieces being warehouse deals too).
