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Help me fix my dad’s home internet setup. Does my plan make sense? (lemmy.world)

submitted 4 days ago by QuincyPigBoy@lemmy.world to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world

13 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I’m living with my dad for the summer and his internet setup makes no sense. I’m a simple man who uses Ethernet when possible and I’ve never had coverage issues because I’m a poor who lives in apartments. So this mesh network stuff is new to me. He has a 3000sqft house and clearly had coverage issues

His setup: 14 year old Nighthawk router/modem being used as a modem Orbi 50 router with no satellites Eero 6 as a second router …no satellites.

My plan: Buy a proper modem Use the Orbi for the router Turn the Eero into an access point and plug it in upstairs via Ethernet. Buy used Orbi satellites for rest of house

My other option is to sell it all, buy a TP Link AXE5400 router, a modem and a couple mesh satellites so that I can start fresh.

What should I do? We don’t need WiFi 7. We don’t even need blazing fast WiFi speeds. Decent speeds, good coverage and simplicity are priority.

Thanks

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[–] frongt@lemmy.zip 4 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Putting random stuff into AP mode is sketchy, but usually works. Modern equipment in particular usually supports proper roaming, and clients are smart enough to change BSSID based on strength. Old and/or cheap equipment is less reliable because of poor or nonexistent roaming support.

If you want to do it the right way, get a couple real APs and pull Ethernet back to a switch. Ubiquiti is fine for prosumer, and you're less likely to get "help my wifi stopped working and you need to come fix it" calls.

How many APs depends on house layout and what it's built out of.

Most importantly, DON'T get a bunch of standalone mesh repeaters. The cheapest ones literally just rebroadcast your traffic, meaning speed takes a huge hit with each hop. There are better ones, but even then they're nowhere near as good as APs with Ethernet.