Wired vs Wireless

Wired backhaul is nearly always faster than WiFi backhaul.  Suppose, for example, that two satellites each have a gigabit Ethernet connection to one of the router LAN ports.  Both of those Ethernet links can operate in Full Duplex at the same time.  With WiFi backhaul, only one of the three devices can broadcast while the other two "listen".  Ethernet has very low overhead.  It is common to achieve 950Mbps of data transmission in both directions over gigabit Ethernet.  WiFi, on the other hand, loses much more potential capacity to gaps between packets.  Some capacity is lost to "management frames" (overhead).  WiFi backhaul is also distance sensitive. The farther apart WiFi devices are, the lower the actual Link Rate between them.  My ancient RBR50/RBS50 system has a theoretical Link Rate of 1,733Mbps. Yet my router and satellite actually achieve under 800Mbps Link Rate and they are only 25-30 ft. apart.  Ethernet connections maintain full capability to a distance of 90 meters. (about 295 ft.)

The WiFi7 Orbi is a weird product.

• It has 2.5GB Ethernet LAN ports, so a wired backhaul has huge capacity.
• The WiFi7 Orbi claims to combine a dedicated 5G WiFi backhaul channel with use of the 6G WiFi capability to achieve a claimed 10G capacity.  As mentioned above, that theoretical 10G (a) diminishes with distance, and (b) remains inherently a "shared medium" with WiFi overhead.

In practical terms, a WiFi7 Orbi system with only a couple of satellites that are not too far apart will have more than enough backhaul capacity for most users.  While a 'wired' backhaul may be superior, who in the world is going to notice?

Wired will always be more stable than WiFi. 

10Gb is supported for ethernet backhaul as well on the 970 series. 

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ggralpy wrote:
Is it faster to go wired backhaul or just stay wireless with wifi7?

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