Because this is all about me . . . my needs focus on:
‘Geographic’ coverage within the home, vs. high throughput.
Our home use case does not include a lot of data over the wifi. There is an Amazon Fire stick that is occasionally used to stream Netflix and the like, but only occasionally. My main streaming ‘situation’ is wired ethernet to my router which is just a few feet from the Apple TV box and TV.
Given that right now we use 2 Airport Extremes, I figure that a new base, plus two remote access points, should be quite sufficient. MY main question is that if I buy Ubiquite hardware, what’s the best hardware and best way to set that up. I do have the option for ONE remote-from-my-router wired (cat 5) ethernet node that might be able to inject power over, if I want to put a device at that location that requires PoE. That’s the location of my ND555; I COULD hide a little hardware behind my Fraim there.
Bart, I would, given what you say, suggest a consumer mesh setup, the Ubiquiti offer, like many, a limited proprietary mesh like product with their Unifi UAP-AC mesh and UAP-AC mesh Pro products, with two or three nodes.
From what I can see true 802.11s mesh products (which can have many many nodes) are not generally offered to the consumer market, as no doubt over kill for most houses.
If you are reasonably happy with the performance you had from the old Apple base and two remotes, I would suggest simply putting an AC Lite at each of your two existing wiring points and evaluating from there. I found that overall wifi performance in my house with just two AC Lites was far superior to what I had before (using two ASUS routers in AP mode to supplement the built-in wifi from the ISP router): better coverage, better steering, better zone handoff to iPhones as you move about the house. If your router is in a basement and you have the option to string another long wire to the other end of the house downstairs, then maybe put in a third unit, but only if you can really spread them out.
That may well be all you need for what you are doing… heck, a single AC Lite located centrally in your home (beside your N555, eg) might be all you need, as they are much better than Apple or others of that era and ilk.
To be clear, for easy PoE you will need a short Ethernet cable from switch to injector, and a wall socket (the same one with your existing switch would be perfect) to power the injector; then you take the longer Ethernet wire to wherever you mount the AP (in two places, I hid this behind the drywall boards and mounted them up high on the wall; in the third, the cable is still just hanging down like an eyesore waiting to be fixed!). It is not a question of “might be able” to use PoE, it’s putting the single wire connection to the access point device to double duty.
Obviously S-i-S has recommended the opposite, a consumer home mesh kit. You can’t really go wrong in the near term… but note that in his home, Simon also uses the Ubiqiti AC Lite system I use and am suggesting for you! Best wishes whatever you choose, and have fun.
I have concerns over google but I have to say Google wi fi mesh works pretty well. Two ‘negatives’: you have to have a google account to use and no manual switching 2.5 & 5 Ghz band.
Not quite , a PoE power injector (wall wart powersupply) is included, which is effectively a separate small powersupply that you connect your Ethernet to, and instead of a DC lead from the powersupply to the unit, there is a seperate Ethernet lead from the powersupply to the unit, so either way you can power from it’s own powersupply or use a separate PoE switch and not use the provided injector powersupply.
Yes good point but do any wi fi mesh makers actually support this or have come out and siad they will. IO have seen this interoperability offering in a number of spheres but not many deliver as there is not enough support. Don’t get me wrong I welcome it but my past experience makes me worry. I have either wasted money or time in the hope/expectation of delivery in the past - you could be waiting a long time.
I hope to be proved wrong.
@Boris786 Your comments are exactly the motivation for adopting the features specified in Wi-Fi 6. Historically interoperability between vendors regards using mesh capabilities to extend network reach had no defining vendor agnostic standard to overcome limitations and inevitably created problems especially in residential environments.
In terms of product in retail it is in its infancy but they are now becoming available and certainly by the end of this year you should have some choice.
I have Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) Access Points at home under test from my work. I worked directly on the first EasyMesh certified Access Point as well as contributing to the Wi-Fi Alliance working groups regards EasyMesh.
There are many features in the latest Wi-Fi 6 hardware (regardless of vendor) which will show measurable improvements over current offerings not least interoperability but additionally improved throughput and higher client concurrency. The benefits are backwards compatible so you won’t necessarily need a 802.11ax client to see some improvements.
Yes it’s interesting… EasyMesh is a trademark applied a profile of interworking for cooperating access points that adapt and learn to handle Wifi traffic amongst themselves for consumers and homes. If you read the blurb, it appears careful to not say it’s formal Wifi Mesh, which is something rather different which use Nodes. I suspect we will continue to see more true Mesh in commercial and industrial setups where true Wifi meshes have real benefits. In consumer we will perhaps start to see more of these EasyMesh hybrids with their more limited but easier to instal capability when compared to Mesh.
I can’t help in these days of SDN there shouldn’t be a distinction, but perhaps it’s a cost thing… and in consumer it is so often about stripping back costs by limiting to basic or common denominator capability.
If I read between the lines on 892.11ax, it looks like it is intended more for IoT in the home where Zigbee would not be appropriate and 802.11ac too power hungry, as well as infrastructural enhancements over 80.11ac.
11ax gives longer OFDM symbols and 1024QAM which give up to 4x throughput when compared to 11ac. It also has some other tricks to make longer range and small packets more efficient. It’s also better at splitting streams for simultaneous multi-client connections.
It should help with higher density but also with lower user numbers for higher throughput.
Hi
I asked the question earlier in the thread “Can I use An Apple Airport Express To Extend My BT wifi”.
Searching online it seems that the AE cannot “extend” a non Apple routers wifi range but you can use it in bridge mode to “create a new network” in the area you require, connecting it via Ethernet cable using the existing network password and name.
Everything we have is wired via Cat5e and we only use wifi for ipad/iphone access and the range in our kitchen is a bit flaky as the BT router is upstairs and lots of solid walls in a fairly large house.
I tried this and it does fill in the poor reception area perfectly at full speed and when I use my iphone to access the Naim or Sonos app it’s fine in the kitchen but moving upstairs in range of the BT router the apps can’t find the rooms. Does anybody have any ideas how to rectify this?
I was considering adding the BT “Discs” to extend the range but one has to be connected to the router which is a bit impractical and I do have a relatively new AE.
You can do this, but as per my response to your previous post, how you do it will depend on whether your Airport Express is connected to your router via Ethernet or WiFi?
Connected via Ethernet. My concern is the non recognition of rooms and equip by the Naim/Sonos apps when moving from the kitchen to the upstairs level.
I’ve just found that eventually the apps do function but it takes a while for that to happen, I don’t understand why that should be given that it is exactly the same network?
Is it “the same network” if it shares the same SSID but the SSIDs eminate from 2 different sources? I have no idea how that works. With the apple system, I do believe that there really is just “one network.”
Well the AE is not acting as a router as it’s in bridge mode and it’s connected directly to the BT Home Hub via Ethernet cabling so it’s just “transmitting” a WiFi signal of whatever the BT provides I.e. internet access etc.It works splendidly but has this annoying non recognition for a time when moving from the area covered by the AE and entering the BT areas.
Did you set up the AE to ‘create a new network’ rather than extend? Using the exact same network name as the one your BT router uses, and the same SSID? You should then see both WAPs as the same, with reasonably smooth handover as you move from one to the other.
You will see that I have recently opened a thread about a friend’s Android phone running the Naim app. He has a BT HH6 and recently added two new WAPs which work perfectly, but the Naim app won’t see his rooms when his phone connects to the BT hub.
