Hi Simon, thanks for taking the time. Based on my limited fluency on the matter, my Nighthawk EX 7300 doesn’t have either Easy Mesh certification nor 802.11s as per the attached sheet
“Standards
• IEEE® 802.11 b/g/n 2.4GHz
• IEEE® 802.11 a/n/ac 5GHz
• One (1) 10/100/1000 Mbps Gigabit Ethernet port with auto-sensing technology”
Maybe there is a better way of using it although I may also purchase a better one now?
Product sheet
That answer came far too quickly. It should have been only after the thread reached 1000 posts or something!
Best
David
I think that this is a very significant point. My own view is that day to day subtle differences in sound quality from ‘natural’ changes of the type you mention can almost invalidate some of the more ‘exotic’ tweaking that some like to engage in on a regular basis. As Simon states - "it should be largely irrelevant if your system is enjoyable enough’.
Incidentally, I also have 2 ‘Cats’ (both 2960s) but they are located in separate rooms (not installed in sequence) and serve the ethernet requirements in their respective locations.
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And indeed our hearing is not an absolute constants, something seemingly often not recognised comparing things on different occasions. To me a need to continually tweak suggests some lack of satisfaction with the system, maybe warranting a more fundamental review, however for some people it seems that constantly tweaking and re-tweaking and listening for changes is what actually gives pleasure as a hobby, which is another matter entirely.
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Among the variables that are human we can also add the level of fatigue, stress, happiness, health etc.
Ah! but do you know what the question means?
Possibly… flip it access point and plug an Ethernet lead into it from your router… should hopefully work more efficiently then.
Looping back on @Nestor_Burma points on Wi-Fi access points.
The term mesh with respect to Wi-Fi products for consumers has been somewhat ambiguous to date.
The solutions available are typically proprietary to the specific vendor and do not work with similar products from another vendor, as an example if you take a Netgear “mesh” product and add a TP-Link or a ZyXel “mesh” product they won’t interoperate or work as one extended system.
The Wi-Fi Alliance, who own and maintain the Wi-Fi Certified branding and establish and maintain the various Wi-Fi standards that end up in products, realised that the way Wi-Fi was marketed to consumers was very confusing and usually involved a lot of letters and numbers that in reality made little sense to the average consumer. As a result of this they aimed to simplify the naming for various types of Wi-Fi and associated features such that they renamed the types of Wi-Fi to be identified by generation rather than by the underlying standard.
This translates to:
Wi-Fi 4 = 802.11n
Wi-Fi 5 = 802.11ac
Wi-Fi 6 = 802.11ax
Wi-Fi 6E = 802.11ax + 6 GHz band support
Easymesh is the consumer branding for the Multi-AP (MAP) specification which aims to provide a standard certification process and clearer consumer proposition around products that work using multiple Access Points to provide better resiliency, robustness, roaming between Access Points, self healing and traffic management intelligence and importantly a standards based method to improve interoperability between vendors and evolve solutions beyond the current proprietary implementations, of which your Netgear hardware is one example.
If you wanted to look at consumer hardware that gave the best of what is currently available/possible, then look for products that are Wi-Fi 6 certified and also certified for Easymesh (MAP).
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Hi Mr. M, thanks a lot this is much appreciated! One question I would have though is that as we start seeing advertisements for the new wifi 6 routers and mesh (802.11ax) I wonder if the nd555 also has this standard built in? If not then it would not benefit from this step up?
Hi Simon, thanks I will try it over the week end.
Ah, but what is the question….?
Short answer is yes, Wi-Fi 6 improves the efficiency and resiliency of the Wi-Fi network as a whole.
The ND555 Wi-Fi radio is a 2x2 802.11ac (Wi-Fi 5) capable interface.
The use of a Wi-Fi 6 certified access point means the network the ND555 is joining as a client station is able to utilise the RF spectrum, spatial streams and air interface time slots more efficiently than is possible with even Wi-Fi 5. The end result being that the likelihood of your ND having issues with connectivity or transmission or reception of data is reduced and with traffic management capabilities potentially even removed entirely.
Here’s a good detailed summary of the ND555 for reference
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Thanks a lot, I will be looking into this now!
Careful, some of this can be misleading . Under the covers Wi-fi works at many levels or layers. You are citing one particular aspect, the PHYsical layer … that would likely have little impact to the use of Wi-fi extenders.
The basic advice I suggest is to have a multiple access point Wi-fi system of at least two access points that are Ethernet connected to your router or switch, which overlap in the area of maximum usage.
I advise you ensure your access points operate at 802.11ac for 5 GHz operation and a larger number of spatial streams, as well as 802.11n for 2.4 GHz operation for maximum current compatibility.
If you can’t use wired connected access points which is best, use a HomeMesh system, but use all nodes available and try and ensure they all overlap.
Wi-fi 6 is the marketing Wi-fi alliance term for 802.11ax. Apparently they wanted a snappier title… but unless you have 802.11ax devices you won’t get benefit… but some new smartphones are starting to support.
In short the key thing is the overlapping access points. If you can get as Wi-fi 6 access points then great… but if not it will be more important to have overlapping access points offering 802.11ac (Wi-fi 5) and 802.11n.
802.11ax really comes into its own, in my opinion, with very high density of access points (IoT) over a smallish area. It can operate at higher frequencies that the previous standards operating in the ISM bands upto 6 GHz. Those frequencies won’t pass through walls or refract as well. But will be ideal for micro nodes in each room scenarios. However don’t worry wifi6 access points should offer the older protocols for max compatibility and more general domestic performance, as well operate on the 2.4 and 5GHz ISM bands if available and free from other users on that band.
802.11ay is the latest standard coming along… but not heard whether that will be wifi 7. 802.11ay could be the quantum leap in performance in my opinion, but possibly more suited to broadband access use.
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Thanks Simon, some homework for this weekend to figure this all out!
Yes… really I suggest despite the thread… keep it simple.
Two Ethernet connected access points that overlap will be best. It will be fire and forget.
There are many models, but I find the ones from Ubiquiti work well and have been reliable for severeal years as well as offering Power over Ethernet options to reduce clutter with the access point, and I understand Naim have used them in certain fit outs.
Others on the forum have had success with BT EasyMesh discs for Wi-fi connected nodes but I have had no personal experience.
In the spirit of simplicity and knowledge share, and perhaps to add a little context!
Wi-Fi 6 and the upcoming Wi-Fi6E specification differ quite significantly from previous generations of the Wi-Fi standard.
The goal when the work began to create the new standard for Wi-Fi 6 was to solve a number of common problems associated with previous generations including client concurrency, enabling better efficiencies with the available channels and using more efficient modulation (OFDMA)
Distilled down to consumer benefits and aligned with clearer marketing around the various versions and standards you end up with a more capable and resilient Wi-Fi network as a whole that is still friendly and backwards compatible to previous generations.
My contribution to the Naim forum is friendly and informative and I would always share a personal perspective to help guide others and let them make their own informed decisions on the choices they might make with respect to their own systems and environments.
In parallel my day job is working for a device manufacturer that supplies equipment to service providers all around the world, examples in the UK being Virgin Media, BT, TalkTalk and Freesat.
I’m lucky enough over the last 20 years plus to have been directly involved in the development of a number of key technologies including DSL, DOCSIS and of course Wi-Fi and in doing so have contributed to a number of working groups within the various standards bodies including the Broadband Forum, CableLabs and Wi-Fi Alliance, as such it gives me a broad and intimate exposure to the inner workings of the technologies that end up in everyday products, including Hi-Fi ones 
The intention here is to provide accessible and straightforwards information and share experience from a personal perspective, how others interpret that is their own choice ultimately.
At the least I would hope what I share others find of interest and that it will encourage them to do their own research and gain further insight for themselves which may benefit them in their enjoyment of music and the wonderful black boxes we all share a passion for.
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Hi Simon, just a clarifying naive question. The 2 access points are connected by ethernet to the same router I assume. But then they must be relatively close to each other and to the router because you do not think about 5 or 10m ethernet cables. So doesn’t this defeat the purpose of access points to be further away from the router and from each other to extend the coverage? I must be getting something wrong.
Yes they need to be connected to the same network as the router - so either via the router’s LAN switch ports (they often have four such ports) or via a separate switch which in itself is connected to a router LAN switchport.
They don’t have to be that close to each other - though will depend on the design and construction type of your house - you may find 10 to 20 metres apart is fine though your cable runs will often be longer by the time the cable routing is achieved. The key thing is that in the main overlap - your client can connect to each access point… Ultimately think of the Olympic rings.
I find with internal brick walls - putting the access points in landings, halls and stairs work well… and they blend in with the smoke alarms
This way you will be likely building a more robust are optimally performing WLAN.
The thing not to ideally do is to have a single high power access point that everything is trying to connect and communicate with… multiple access points on the same WLAN with low power (which they will do themselves) is usually the key to success and typically allows better management of interference as well.
Best think of wifi like mains electricity - you want to have access of many sockets in your house back to the consumer unit - rather than rely on extension leads and multiway sockets all going into one wall socket. You would use an electrician to put the sockets and cabling in - for proper wifi I would consider it in the same way
Simon
I seem to get worse performance in my home out of the 5 GHz option on my Airport Extremes. The home is very vertical; 4 floors and Extremes located on (from the top) floors 1 and 3. Any reason for this? Or should I give it another chance?