Afternoon all, so i want to boost the WIFI in my house as downstairs its fine but upstairs it starts to get a bit dodgy the further i get away, also the garage signal is a bit hit or miss and this need to be a bit more consistent now i am running apple TV.

So knowing not that much about this sort of stuff, i need something simple, thinking 3 hubs or maybe 4, budget isnt really an issue id rather pay a bit more for something decent but dont want to be paying thousands.

So good old STW what you got and what would you recommend?

Tenda mw3 here. 4 of them in a large 3 bed stone house. I’m not it expert but it has made a huge difference.

I had a few niggles getting things like my sonos to play but other than that easy as. I’m on a 4g data router as local broadband is woeful with 30mb average speed. If you have capacity to work at higher speeds or you move large files around your network lots you might want better but otherwise – good enough.

Sadly I remember seeing a black friday offer for these for pennies that I suspect you have probably missed.

I bought the Google Wi-Fi in the Black Friday sale, the 3 pack and 1 single. It’s absolutely tremendous whole house is now covered and into the garden.

TP-Deco here. It’s been faultless.

yes the MW3 2 pack for £20 is gone but the 3 pack for £40 is still there

https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/computing-accessories/networking/whole-home-wi-fi-systems/tenda-nova-mw3-whole-home-wifi-system-triple-pack-10184407-pdt.html?awc=1599_1638543761_fd0b43ae0b27882789f7c4b8368553e9&srcid=369&xtor=AL-1&cmpid=aff~Skimlinks~Sub+Networks~78888~Skimlinks

I got the 3 pack and out of the box, the signal from the first node I conncted was way stronger than the signal from the router. I;ve set up a second node but not bothered with the third as yet, what I have now seesm to be ebough to cover the whole house (three stories)

If you have mega fast broadband you might want to consider something that will handle higher speeds as the wired connection on these will only handle up to 100mb.

i bought the 2 x 2for£20 offer on the MW3’s.

mostly good would be my current assessment, when they work they work but I’ve wanted to throw them out the window a couple of times in the last few days.

current issues:

in DHCP mode, the MW3’s setup a subnet that can access the internet, but not other subnets. so if you have wired devices into your modem/router as well, you can’t see these over the mesh for services like airplay or sonos. You can run the MW3’s in bridge mode that lets the modem/router do all the IP assignment etc but this seemed to cause a heap of other issues so I’ve reverted to DHCP mode and brought the previously wired devices into the MW3 subnet by using the lan ports on the MW3’s.

iOS devices using private address function don’t seem to hand over between nodes very effectively.

I got BT whole home mini last year based on STW recommendation. It’s been great, super easy to set up and not gone wrong at all. I had to download an app that basically tells you the best place to put each hub based on signal/location. I went from barely having signal at the back of my house to having it the whole way down the garden

TP-Deco here. It’s been pretty much faultless.

We have five units in total, split across two separate stone-walled buildings. Given the construction and layout of the place, it’s been pretty brill. Occasionally drops out, but I’ll forgive it that for what it’s having to cope with.

Can the mesh nodes have seperate SSID’s for the 2.4 and 5ghz bands?

I’m wondering whether to get some mesh things, or just get a 30m ethernet cable and stick the router in a more central location.

I don’t like in a massive house btw, I just can’t be @rsed drilling through the walls as they are all brick, which I suspect is the cause of the poor wifi.

Can the mesh nodes have seperate SSID’s for the 2.4 and 5ghz bands?

the MW3’s don’t.

I have five Deco discs. Brilliant, and the app means I can monitor and control all the items/PCs/phones/etc. on the system, which is dead handy if you have kids (addicted to smartphones).

I have five Deco discs. Brilliant, and the app means I can monitor and control all the items/PCs/phones/etc. on the system, which is dead handy if you have kids (addicted to smartphones).

Agreed – I like that each user has their own profile so I can isolate a single user’s permissions, filter inappropriate content, set usage limits, pause connection etc. It worked just last night when one of the kids ignored repeated requests to come down for their dinner – one click later and they came out saying ‘the internet has stopped working’.

Thanks all, im aware i missed out on the black friday deals, but i probably wont be looking to buy until the new year anyway, i just needed a starting point and some real world experience.

Not got super fast broadband and no hard wired connections so that shouldn’t be an issue.

I’ll look into all the suggestions.

Cheers

Tenda MW set up here. Works well. I’ve got 3 MW5s and 2 MW3s but that covers the house and the outbuildings and is a little overkill.

Not a huge amount of control over things (similar to a router you’d get from your ISP) but it works for me (browsing, couple of smart home devices and a Plex server).

MW5 is the MW3 but with a higher speed ethernet port

I bought a Tenda MW12 mesh system. It was dogshit. I sent it back. My saga was well documented on STW and indeed there was a thread like two days ago.

I like that each user has their own profile so I can isolate a single user’s permissions, filter inappropriate content, set usage limits, pause connection etc

In the interests of avoiding making it all sound complicated, it’s probably worth saying that each user can have their own profile, but you don’t have to mess about with that stuff if you don’t want to.

^^ True

Who is your current bb provider this can have implications for what system to use.

Eh?

I’ve got 2x Tenda MW3 in the house which seem to be working fine and get coverage all over.

I bought 2 twin packs so 4 units in total but just initially started with 2. Is there any advantage in connecting the other 2 if it’s already working ok? It’s a 3 storey house so thought I’d need all 4 of them. If no advantage I’ll return them to Amazon.

I have a TP deco s4. A 3 unit box but we’ve only got 2 set up so far. Works fine. No faults to report.

@Cougar

Sky routers have difficulties in being put into modem mode, I believe that newer bt home hubs have a similar issue as may some others.

That can have a impact in what mesh system you’d use.

What mesh system works best with Sky?

Sky routers have difficulties in being put into modem mode

Don’t do that then?

An Ethernet port is an Ethernet port, it’s a standard. If you’ve got an arsey ISP-supplied router then switch off all the DHCP etc cleverness that might be on the mesh routers and just extend out from that point.

I’ve got a pair of Tenda MW5s bought in recent sales. I did buy 4 but the pair seem to have solved all the hassles we had before, so a mate will have the others. They were super easy to set up, literally working after 5 minutes out of the box. I’d definitely recommend them. I’m on Plusnet using their standard modem-router.

Cougar

Don’t do that then?

An Ethernet port is an Ethernet port, it’s a standard. If you’ve got an arsey ISP-supplied router then switch off all the DHCP etc cleverness that might be on the mesh routers and just extend out from that point.

Is it the 10mb, the 100mb, 1gb, 2.5gb or the 10gb standard you are talking about?

What would one do if they wanted all that “cleverness” in the mesh system?

What would one do if the router that vendor supplied is a one that purportedly struggles with routing 30 or so devices?

It’s all to easy to say buy a mesh and connect it to your router and be done but as you acknowledged yourself with your tenda experience things are more nuanced that that and following the STW way of simply recommending what you have isn’t necessarily the right answer.

BillMC

What mesh system works best with Sky?

Not as simple as that, sorry.

Sky or SkyQ?
Is the incoming connection fttc or fttp?
What issues are you trying to resolve
How big is your property
How many floors
What’s the construction like e.g. solid or stud internal walls?
Do you have any hard wired devices pc, laptops, nas, smart tv etc.

For those on Zen and wishing to go Mesh then I have discovered that you can pick up Fritz.box 3490 modems for around £20 each and these can be put in to Mesh slave mode and hooked in to the main Fritz router Zen provide very easily.

At £20 a pop it is trivial to get a few dotted around the house 🙂

What would one do if they wanted all that “cleverness” in the mesh system?

If the MW3/5s are the same as the MW12s, there isn’t any. 😁

I take your point, and of course if you’re replacing the ISP router in its entirety then whatever you buy will need to be compatible with whatever form the WAN presentation takes. But if you aren’t then any problem inherent in the router isn’t going to dictate mesh system A over mesh system B. With Sky for example (regular Sky, I’ve never touched Sky Q) you cannot readily swap out their router, you have to use the one provided.

Capt, stone walls, 3 storey, SkyQ. More than that I know not. It’s arriving on Tuesday but I thought I’d ask an anticipatory question.

But if you aren’t then any problem inherent in the router isn’t going to dictate mesh system A over mesh system B.

Kinda yeah I guess, if you are going down the route of using the router/ap mesh system as just ap’s’ then it’s much more important to confirm if any features you want to use such as parental control still work in that mode.

With Sky for example (regular Sky, I’ve never touched Sky Q) you cannot readily swap out their router, you have to use the one provided.

There are a number of ways to replace the pony Sky modem/router/ap boxes, you need a replacement that can authenticate via dhcp option61 rather than pppoe, Asus, TP-Link and Draytek are some of the options.

https://helpforum.sky.com/t5/Broadband/Settings-to-configure-alternative-router-to-work-with-Sky-Fibre-DHCP-Option-61/td-p/3467981

BillMC

Capt, stone walls, 3 storey, SkyQ. More than that I know not. It’s arriving on Tuesday but I thought I’d ask an anticipatory question.

Hmmmmm, lots of folk get on with the SkyQ system okay, let’s hope you’re one of those 😉

More seriously get it in and try it first as it’s a pain to swap out, the mini Q units act as wifi mesh nodes so you might be okay if not this is the experience of a Sky user cutting over from Sky Q to his own mesh

https://helpforum.sky.com/t5/Broadband/Configuring-Sky-Broadband-on-a-3rd-Party-Mesh-My-story/td-p/3576534

There are a number of ways to replace the pony Sky modem/router/ap boxes, you need a replacement that can authenticate via dhcp option61 rather than pppoe, Asus, TP-Link and Draytek are some of the options.

Ah, that’s changed since I last looked at it. Time was there was a web page you could stick the serial number into and it’d decode your WAN credentials. I believe this worked but Sky wouldn’t support it – ie if you had a problem then step 1 was to reconnect your old router. There was a rumour that Sky would disconnect you if they caught you but I rather suspect that’s an urban myth.

From that forum, it looks like OFCOM gave them a slap on the wrist for it.

you need a replacement that can authenticate via dhcp option61 rather than pppoe,

Aha, it sounds like that’s specifically for Sky Fibre rather than DSL.

Aha, it sounds like that’s specifically for Sky Fibre rather than DSL.

It’s for fttc/vdsl2 and fttp, it’s been a long time since I dabbled with a adsl connection but memory tells me the user & pw needed could be extracted from the original unit

Keeping an eye on this but it’s now gone past my understanding. Tbf, it did after about ten posts.

I have a Vodafone router in front master bedroom. All works fine but we’ve had an extension on the back of the house in which we’ll inevitably spend most of our time. Victorian house and wifi works fine vertically down to tv/games console. But non-existent in back of house.

What would be the best system? I NEED TO CONNECT MY SMART OVENS! 😂

No, but seriously, just for Sonos and general shizzle.

deadlydarcy

Keeping an eye on this but it’s now gone past my understanding. Tbf, it did after about ten posts.

I have a Vodafone router in front master bedroom. All works fine but we’ve had an extension on the back of the house in which we’ll inevitably spend most of our time. Victorian house and wifi works fine vertically down to tv/games console. But non-existent in back of house.

What would be the best system? I NEED TO CONNECT MY SMART OVENS! 😂

No, but seriously, just for Sonos and general shizzle.

Vodafone are another bunch of……

But for this I’m assuming you have a fttc service not a fttp one, in other words the cable thing coming out the wall is copper not a fibre optic cable.

First and cheapest is to move router into a more central position and see if you get coverage then if not then you can look at a mesh system.

If you care about speed then you would look at a tri-band system this means you have a wifi band dedicated to the connection between the nodes and better performance but more cost, the second option is a dual band where you’ll see a lower but still more than adequate for your oven to tell you dinners ready 😉

Tri-band I like the Linksys veloop WHW0302 or TP-Link deco m9 plus
Dual-band Linksys veloop WHW0102 or TP-Link deco m5

Lots of folk on here seem to like the tenda but I’ve not used them so can’t say.

Vodafone are one of those crap providers that try and force you to use their hardware which is often carp so you either turn off the wifi on their unit and set your mesh system up as access points only.

The downside of this is you’ll lose some advanced features like parental controls, firewalls etc, this may not be a issue to you.

The other option is to contact Vodafone support & insist they give you your broadband username/password buy a cheap bt vdsl modem (search “VDSL Fibre Modem” on eBay) junk the Vodafone pos box, set the mesh system up as a router and put in the username/password into the pppoe field in the mesh configuration app.

Simple eh

Edit: When I said junk I meant store safely as if you have line faults at some point Vodafone will make you reinstall the pos box to troubleshoot

I’ve got a Vodafone router and the Tenda MW3s and MW5s.
Works fine. The router does all the, em routing? Assigns IP addresses etc. The Tenda units do the wireless network part.

Thanks guys.

Vodafone here you with FTTP simply plugged in the Google Wi-Fi base unit job done.