R9000 and EX8000 - add Mesh?

[leonnyan]

Hello,

Did some searching, but still not clear I understand the best approach. My current setup is R9000 with EX8000 range extender. Not super happy with the range extender...I'd like to try mesh. 

1. Should I toss all, and replace all with Nighthawk mesh?
2. Should I keep the R9000? And if I keep R9000, I saw recommendations to run mesh items in "AP" (which I don't get), and possibly not use R9000?
3. Do I add Nighthawk mesh, and then remove EX8000 from the system?

End of the day, I have 2-story home and cable in is one corner - not ideal. I'd like solid coversate across the whole home (and the extender is not great).

Thanks,

--Leon

[plemans]

How big is your home? 

What materials is the interior made of? 

The EX8000 is a pretty solid extender. Its basically an RBS50 in terms of hardware. 

And you have it paired with the R9000 which is also a solid router. 

You said you have the router in one end of the home? Hopefully the extender isn't in the opposite end. 

Have you considering splitting distances? 

Wall   |-----router----------------extender------|    wall

Are you using mesh with the extender? 

What issues are you having with it? 

The reason why recommend having the mesh system in AP (access point) mode if you use the R9000 is to prevent a double nat. 

https://kb.netgear.com/30186/What-is-Double-NAT

And some have used the EX8000 connected to their mesh system. I haven't because I have enough satellites but it works for some.  

I'd probably work at optimizing your current system as well as we can help troubleshoot it. Like I said, you have a solid router and a solid extender. 

[leonnyan]

Thank you - sorry for the delay in replying, I don't seem to be getting notifications on this thread.

My home is 2100 sq ft. The R9000 is in back corner of home, downstairs (where cable comes in to modem). I currently have the EX8000 upstairs in a middle room - which means it is through a wall and ceiling.

I've checked speeds at devices and ping times and both seem OKish (150 down, 14 up, 18-21 pings), but still, games run slow at the far end of the house is the issue. I've been working on the gaming system to see if their server latency, but still, we have other random congestion on, what I think should be, a lot of bandwidth. 

I do not have any mesh components yet. And, based on your note, sounds like I have enough gear to make this single home work. 

If I read correctly, my next steps might be to move the EX8000 to see if removing a wall/celing might help.

I'm also going to check speeds using connected ether over the weekend, see if I should just run cat5 to one end of the house or not.

Thank you. Leon

[plemans]

If you could find a way to centrally locate the router, you might not even need an extender. Most routers can cover 2000-2500sqft depending on what its made from. 

And if you're speedtesting off the extender and getting good speeds/ping, then its probably not your setup. its probably more along the lines of the game your playing. What gaming system is it? Do you have it on the 5ghz? or the 2.4gh? or have you tried hardwiring it in? 

I'd try buying a cheap cat 5e/6 cable and direct connecting the gaming system. Just to test it out. If you get lower pings/good speeds hardwired in, maybe its a congestion issue or the wireless in the gaming console. 

[leonnyan]

Yeah - I'll be honest I've been a bit lazy about trying to get my kit centrally located in the house as my interest in wiring under the home (where I can run cable) is pretty low. But I'll get on it.

I'll get some long CAT5 and try out some tests with direct wired soon.

Getting the kit to middle of the home, is just a wiring pain that I may need to address finally.

Thank you,

--Leon