Nighthawk AC1900 EX7000 or Orbi in lath and plaster house

[RobS10]

I have a pretty typical scenero,a 1400 sq ft house, built in 1936, so lath and plaster walls throughout. Most of the living space is on 1 floor, but there is a room in the garage where we'd like to get WiFi, and possiby the back yard. The coax cable from my provider (Comcast) is in the front and back of the house with nothing in between. I also have CAT6 connecting the front and back. The main modem/router gateway is in the living room, and only coveres 1/2 the house due to the plaster walls (I get wifi 1/2 way down the block through the front window just fine). The devices connected are a two laptops, one printer, two TVs and three smart phones. We stream some movies, but not huge users of bandwidth.

I was origininally going to just add a simple Nighthawk router in the back but realized I would end up with another network to connect to and maintain. The idea of the Orbi system sounded great, but  a little expensive for us. Would the Nighthawk Mesh extender accomplish this? Seems like the same setup as the Orbi but much cheaper. What is the drawback? 

This is the Mesh extender I'm looking at...

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B00R92CLD6/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_1?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1

[RobS10]

Anyone?

[apil1]

Orbi is a true peer-to-peer mesh where the satellites will daisy chain depending on what the strongest signal they can get is. Nighthawk is an add-on mesh component and is designed to prefer connecting directly to the router if it is within broadcast range even if another signal is stronger. If you are only adding a single extender this won't come into play. Nighthawk has more advanced user features than the Orbi. You may find a feature you want is not available on Orbi. If you want to create a One WiFi Name mesh network with a Nighthawk extender, make sure you are getting one that states mesh extender and not just range extender.

[RobS10]

Thanks Apil1,

Just looking for an affordable way to get the whole house on one network, from living room to back of house, including garage (about 60 ft.). Will the Mesh extender do that? Do either the Mesh extender of Orbi still allow the Comcast Gateway router to work where it's the closest (best signal), or do they "take over" and become the router instead, and if so, do they work well enough through plater walls? I want to connect either drvice in the back bedroom and want to be sure I will still get strong WiFi in the front of the house (since the Comcast router can't cover that entire area due to the plaster walls).

[apil1]

Both mesh extender and Orbi can work off a single WiFi name to extend the range of the signal further than the base reaches by itself. Mesh extender needs to select One WiFi Name mode or else it is in standard extender mode where it creates new wireless network ID instead.

Mesh extender will add onto any standard wireless router to extend the signal from the router.

Orbi would be a complete system replacement. If your ISP requires their router to support any of their services, you would have to change their router into bridge mode in order to connect the Orbi base. The Orbi base would take over as the router and WiFi, but the satellites work with the base to create the mesh network.

With either mesh system, it's up to the client to decide which radio it wants to connect to and whether it properly roams between radios as the signal strength changes. Newer devices are more likely to support roaming than older ones. At minimum it will fill in deadspots with the extender or satellite placed between the device and the router for the device to connect to.

[RobS10]

Would you say the EX7000 Mesh Extender, connected to the main Comcast Gateway via CAT6 cable, would be the best bet to "cover" my existing network (both the 2.4GHz and 5 GHz frequencies) in the back part of the house that the main Gateway can't reach? I believe the Comcast Gateway helps the main DVR in the living room communicate with the smaller cable box in the back bedroom for recorded programs, and maybe the Orbi taking over would cause problems unless I bought the really expensive Orbi that has a modem and phone built in?

[apil1]

That would put the extender into AP mode which would create a new wireless network. You have to connect the extener by WiFi and enable One WiFi Name to use the mesh feature, and place the extender far enough where it can still get signal from the router and also create coverage in the dead spot.

You can have the Comcast gateway in place and still have another router if you wanted. You would have to put the Comcast gateway into bridge mode which would turn off the routing and wireless. Then you would be able to attach a different router to the Comcast gateway to broadcast the wireless. Of course the other option is if Comcast allowed bring-your-own-modem and still provide DVR service you could replace the whole thing, but it is generally recommended to buy a modem separate from the router not a 2-in-1. This allows you to replace or upgrade each one seprately if needed later. Cheapest solution would be to just add a single extender between the router and dead spot. Check signal strength with a wireless analyzer app to see if you can find good signal about halfway. It depends on the house layout if it will truly work, but would be the least costly way to fail.

[RobS10]

Apil1,

Thanks again for the info! After already doing some research, I am finally learning something here about how this all functions :-).

Do you have any idea how well the Nighthawk Mesh Extenders like I'm looking at do with lath and plaster walls?  The only place I can locate the extender that's mid point to the dead zone is in our breakfast room, but there are still some walls to get to the back bedrooms, than add the foor if we want the downstairs room. I guess another option would be the Comcast xFi Pod Mesh Extenders for about the same price. I'm sure they would work well with the Comcast Gateway, but not sure how well the little puchs would be with walls either. The Nighthawk looks like it has a lot more power, but maybe scattering the three pucks in the breakfast room and back bedroom and garage makes the power unnecessary?

[apil1]

With any setup it comes down to interference, what else is in the area broadcasting in the same channels and what is physically in between that will weaken the signal. If each one can get a signal strong enough to send to the next one, but that would be for any system you put in place. Describing the physical attributes can't guarantee one way or the other whether extenders will fill in dead spots or not, theres a lot of variables and sometimes you just have to try it and adjust to get the optimal setup.

The Comcast extenders are the same price for the set as one Nighthawk extender you are looking at? It may be worth a try to see if they can be spread out to reach more nooks than a single Nighthawk extender. A single Nighthawk extender may be able to be placed to reach all nexessary areas, but if not you would have to set up more to get everywhere.