Cougar

We’ve been knocking’um out for over a hundred years winkle

Maureens pie’n’mash over in Poplar, that there London

Accept no substitutes, deliverys available ;-)

https://maureenspieandmash.co.uk/

In general providers will let you increase your plan even while in contract so I’d always suggest erring on the lower side knowing it’s easy to upgrade should you find it’s a limiting factor.

The real question is what changes are you planning that need greater bandwidth than you have today to ensure you are ‘right’ sizing the service?

To be honest if you have survived with 9Mb/s I can’t see you needing any more than 100Mb/s a single 4K movie stream is ~25Mb/s.

We use Zen solely for the service aspect as up until recently we too were a wfh business

As for the phone line there are ways to convert you existing number to a voip system and have it on you mobile and pc or a hardwired voip phone

Take a look at voipfone.co.uk as one supplier

Thanks for the pointers to Google Sheets it seems to do almost everything he wants bar the versioning not seeming to be granular enough

Lots of folk will suggest what has worked well for them be it TP-Link Decos, Orbi, Google/Nest, Tenda or eero, however what works well in their home may not in yours so you need to consider your home and what your ideal outcome is before buying anything.

First is what is your home like, size, layout, construction and where is your master socket / router located.

Second do you have any dead/slow spots today than need to be resolved.

What are the drivers, cost, speed, latency ,stability or functionality (parental controls, guest networks etc)

These things will drive what solution to use and where you place any mesh nodes.

Another factor is who will be your new ISP, many now want you to use or force you to use their modem/router/ap boxes and won’t let you use a 3rd party unit, others will let you put their modem/router/ap boxes into modem/pass through mode allowing the use of better router/ap’s and mesh systems.

I’d suggest when selecting a new isp having a Google to see if there are reports of using 3rd party units being easy, difficult or not working (Sky, Vodafone and Plusnet? Come to mind as being more difficult).

Depending on your home it maybe that a single higher quality router/ap would suffice and some from TP-Link and Linksys can be upgrade to mesh if you do find they don’t cover the whole home.

Mesh, there are generally three types:

Dual Band – These have two radios in them a 2.4ghz for wifi traffic, a 5ghz one for wifi traffic and also to send the traffic between the satellite nodes and the main/master node connected to your router or modem (the backhaul).

Tri Band – These have three radios in them a 2.4ghz for wifi traffic, a 5ghz one for wifi traffic and a additional 5ghz radio for the backhaul to send the traffic between the satellite nodes and the main/master node connected to your router or modem.

Powerline – These have two radios in them a 2.4ghz for wifi traffic, a 5ghz one for wifi traffic. They use the power connection and your domestic wiring as the backhaul (the performance of these does obviously depend on the state and layout of your ring mains)

Dual Band are often cheaper but offer lower speeds. Tri Band are generally more expensive but offer higher speeds.

In a ideal world you would have your master node centrally in the house to act as a hub and make the satellite units spokes so they can all reach the master, if you chain a number of satellite units together that is where you can see performance hits as the data has to pass through a number of units before getting to the master.

When placing Dual/Tri Band units they have to be close enough to get a strong signal between nodes but not so close that your wifi clients continually hop from node to node, this is more art than science but generally there should be some help in the set-up guides for any system, I try and start as far apart as I can and move satellite nodes closer to the master until I get a stable connection.

Powerline units are more flexible as each unit doesn’t need a strong wifi line to the master as its using the ring main as the backhaul so you can have better placement options to get even coverage over the whole home.

Placement:

I have had success in placing a single router/ap in the loft close to the centre of the hose with the antennas faing into the home, this is because its much easier for wifi to go through floors than walls, I’ve used this in my own 1910’s 3 bed with a gf extention and three bigish steels in the gf, obviously this is not an option for everyone but if you can get power and either the master socket or a either net run to the loft is a option.

If not then try to look at the size / layout of the home and where your dead spots are today and get the router/ap or main node close to the centre.

Depending on size and construction try and split the home into two and put two nodes in the middle of each ‘half’, if its larger then split into three, the main node in the centre of the middle third and the satellites in the centre of the outside thirds, if T shaped then the main node in the join of the T and then depending on dead spots other satellites at the extremes, etc.

Where to Buy:

Well I’d always suggest direct from Amazon because if you find you’ve brought something that doesn’t work they have a great return policy and that allows you flexibility in getting the right system for you.

Tip: When you set up the new devices if you use the same SSID (wifi network name) and password as used by your current router you shouldn’t have to change the login details on your client devices

What to Buy:

Ahh that all depends on the points above, a bit more information and we can get beyond the “I’ve got this and its great!” suggestions.

I had to look at ways round this cgnat challenge some time back for a friend and came across folk using free was/Google servers as vpn devices to create site to site VPN’s and allow access to there home network.

I decided this was far to clunky / fraught with ongoing foc support issues for a mates solution but these posts might give you some insight

https://superuser.com/questions/1579924/site-to-site-vpn-with-cgnat

https://hardforum.com/threads/how-to-bypass-cgnat-using-a-vpn-to-access-my-web-server.2014654/

And you pay for that with the higher prices. I honestly don’t understand why some people have a hard-on for zen.

The ISP that is, not the ancient philosophy.

They are just another ISP.

Because some people value quality of service over price?
Because some folk would rather support a business who keeps call centres in the UK?
Because some folk value the way they resolve issues rather that read scripts?

Anyway OP who is your isp?

I can’t say I disagree with your decision to learn to ski over boarding at 63

I learned to snowboard in my late 20’s and agree from watching friends learn to ski the learning curve for snowboarding is significantly steeper so you take your falls and hits in a shorter timeframe

Don’t forget you’ll still risk coccyx and knee injury’s learning to ski, falling down at increasing speed it’s par for the course

The downside to skiing for me is the shallower learning curve leads to more of the mountain being off limits it takes much more time to gain the skills and confidence to tackle more challenging terrain and can lead you to being tied to the more crowed green and blue slopes, one or two weeks a year will make progression a challenge

No.

CPUs are i7 etc, that’s the family. The model number is after that, like Core i5-2400 which is the CPU in the cheapest refurbs that come up. The one you shared with me earlier was an i7 4770.

So you google for “i7 4770 vs i5 2440” and it’ll bring up loads of geeky benchmark pages. CPU boss is a reasonable one, so you scroll down that page til you get to ‘benchmarks’ then there are a load of bar graphs for various different tests. I don’t know what any of them are, but in this case you can see that that particular i7 is a chunk faster in most of them than the i5. But it’s not clear how important that is. I mean do you want to wait 10 minutes for a video to process or 15? Does it matter? Is it worth paying over twice as much? Hard to say!

A very good rule of thumb is to consider the generation of the cpus too.

In your example above the i7 4770 is a gen 4 i7, the i5 is a gen 2. The first one or two digits if it’s a 5 digit cpu model number are it’s generation.

So you would rightfully expect a two generation newer higher tier cpu to out perform its older lower tier alternative.

The challenge comes when looking at newer but lower tier options

Generally I’d expect a three year newer i5 to out perform a i7 but you should be able to compare them here just take the cpu model numbers from the ads

https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare

Backblaze B2 is likely to be cheaper

This is a reasonable overview of various options

Cloud Backup Showdown: Azure vs Amazon S3 vs Google Cloud vs Backblaze B2

Perhaps take a look at pfsense which can be run on old desktop pcs easily if you get an additional nic card give the option of captive portal or radious server on a per subnet basis iirc. If you don’t have / want to use an old pc then they sell there own turn key solutions

You can also use with a managed switch to limit his wired access to the “restricted” vlan.

I use the tp-link Omada range of switches and access points with my pfsense setup

@easily

AFAIA NAS devices are the start point for these personal clouds and then you either open ports and firewall rules on your router to allow access to your data or the nas sync’s with some cloud storage managed by the nas vendor

If you are looking for secure cloud storage that is encrypted and the cloud provider is incapable of accessing then take a look at spideroak or protonmail

Anybody have any experience with personal cloud devices (there’s probably an official name for them, but I don’t know it)? I’ve heard about them but don’t know anybody who has actually tried one.
I like the idea, but don’t know where to start.

Have a read of this…

Help! Qnap NAS hacked and files locked

The other question is where else are the photos backed up?

As per the poster on here who had his local nas drive compromised and lost all his photos, with no backup.

Now you might say that Google or Microsoft will backup the cloud for me and they will, but what about if they cancel your contract?

There was a chap on PistonHeads who had his Microsoft account cancelled without warning or ability to download his data, he believes it’s because of some photos of his kids in the bath raising some flags so unlikely for many but why put yourself in that risk position

It were wicked son…

Wipe it install the latest firmware and restore your data from your latest backup.

if the latter, at VW prices that’s at least £600.
Cam belt is a VW fixed price on older cars roughly £450 IIRC, water pump may be extra.
The fuel filler cap issue may be the solenoid, an easy DIY fix for roughly £40 if the part bought from a motor factor, or VW would charge about £100

I think he came to £600 at main dealer pricing, I thought that was quite clear

Don’t forget to invoice them for your time in resolving their error.

A pre-reg petrol Dacia duster would likely fit the bill and give you a new car warranty to boot, lots of folks happy with there’s over on piston heads.

Have a read before dismissing
https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=47&t=1900473

Normally depends on the dealer, if they still have it or have moved it on.

Personally I’d be more focused on getting the refund but can understand if your left without transport getting the trade in back could help.

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

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

My job here is done

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

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

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.

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.

@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.

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

I see in PMQ today our Sub-Prime has refused to deny there were partys in no10 last Christmas while the rest of the country were under lockdown.

Rember to follow the rules and save the nhs, unless your one of “us” obviously…

#stayelite

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/dec/01/boris-johnson-accused-of-flouting-covid-rules-with-no-10-parties-last-christmas?fbclid=IwAR2c_kUoRsk-2Jj9gXnMddnI–U-l94pGG9GPEVs7e_rzB7TMSxbT5boXIE

Hear really great things about this place

https://paultonspark.co.uk/themed-worlds/peppa-pig-world

Careful with advice like that, they are fine until you hit a web application that doesnt like Safari, then you are stuffed as thats the only browser allowed.

Safari is the only browser allowed on a iPad by who?

I’m typing this in Chrome on a iPad

So we get international mens day and Steak & BJ day (14th March 22) too, woo-hoo it’s great to be a man!

This video indicates around £4K +vat for a 8kw battery install and estimates ~4 yrs payback, might be worth a look.

I was going to suggest the water rower, I used to use c2’s at the gym but managed to get a s/h one just before the first lockdown, it needed a repair but between my wife and me it’s been used almost daily.

I had to re-seal the water tank, replace some bearings and bungees and clean the computer sensor ~£80 on parts by memory.

I also replaced the handle with one from a c2 as I found those more comfortable.

So if you see a s/h one with leaking tank if it’s only the half way seal that’s gone it could be a bargain.

Note the tanks don’t like to freeze that is often what damages the seal, first thing to ask is has it been stored in the garage / shed

What make and model is the wireless stat?

She’s a single mum, with a special needs child and mental health issues who’s just suffered the ‘trauma’ of a home invasion, she’ll not do a day despite her previous form.