Mesh Network Puns

Hi guys,

I'm currently planning to upgrade my home wifi system. It's currently being serviced by a single AC86U right smack in the centre of the house, with rather decent range. I'm quite proud of my planning and set up, and it's worked decently so far. Previously it was an AC87U in the same spot, shitty router though, kept overheating and throttling plus that 5GHz radio was horrible.

However, the AC86U is crawling a bit at times due to my rather heavy-handed IOT setup. I have several wifi CCTVs and various smart switches set up around the house. I have plans to add more.

I'm now flirting with the possibility of spending just a few hundred dollars to install some Cat 6 / 6a ethernet cables around the house to set up a wireless mesh network with ethernet backhaul.

There's recently a lot of talk about wifi 6 and how it supports a vastly superior MU-MIMO for communicating multiple devices.

However, as I understand, this MIMO limit seems to be per radio as I understand it.

Would an ethernet backhaul mesh network (with a lot more radios due to having a lot more routers) also alleviate this problem of having too many devices? Of course if I get new routers I may well get some AX routers, but just trying to account for my future devices.

My current devices aren't Wifi 6 compatible either in any event so I'm purely thinking ahead. Also this means that a single AC->AX router replacement is out of the question for me as my current devices would still operate on AC at best.

For meshing, I'm also looking at getting multiple Xiaomi Ax3600 units to leave around the house at various spots to alleviate simultaneous traffic as these seem to be decent for its price range. Alternatively, some cheap China Asus units.

Use case

I have a number of friends who all use Radarr to find movies of their liking

In a lot of the cases our libraries overlap, 4 of the 7 may want a copy of Spiderman while the rest don't care.

Wouldn't it be nice if we could create a mesh network that joins the Radar's together.... Identifies overlapping movies and monitors to see if your mesh network has a copy, if someone does retrieve it otherwise monitor Usenet or torrent sites as usual.

The mesh can easily be achieved by using tailscale or zerotier

Feedback?

hey forks,

so after doing a little more research, I'm trying to figure out the best way to upgrade wifi in a house with basement, main floor with living room/kitchen and top floor with bedrooms. We have WOW internet with an SB8200 Gigabit modem and matching plan. The house is an average midwestern house in terms of build composition. (think ohio)

I'm trying to decided between mesh network (linksys velop, netgear orbi, ubiquiti, etc) or individual APs. Based on my understanding, mesh network would have the same SSID throughout the house, but would handoff to different nodes depending on signal strength to the nearest node. Parent Node would be the "router node" and wired to an unmanaged network switch, and child nodes would be directly wired into the switch as well for best performance. according to different articles, this could be good or bad, depending on the hardware. i currently have a linksys velop (mixture of v1 and v2 hardware) and get occasional reboots, sometimes the node switching is a little wonky. i've also heard good things about orbi and ubiquiti hardware.

The second option appears to be individual APs, which would have the modem connected to a network switch, then individual APs wired into the switch that would each have a different SSID (WiFi-1, Wifi-2, etc). I'm not sure what hardware to pick for this one, and also am wondering if the different SSIDs would cause local devices to not see each other as easily, or how it will be for a convenience factor to constantly switch wifi networks when going from the basement to the main floor or Top Floor.

can anyone recommend a good course of action, and hardware to pick? we don't have any Wi-Fi 6 devices (wouldn't be against WiFi 6 hardware for future proofing), and the house has lots of gamers and 4K streamers, so I'd like a reliable solution that doesn't cost enterprise money (but am not unreasonable in terms of budget, would spend more for the right solution). Thanks everyone, appreciate your help in advance.

I have a Virgin Media Home Hub 3.0 and 500MB service. We've been using a 4 node Asus ZenWifi CT8 mesh setup which has been the biggest nightmare - constantly disconnecting itself and doing silly things. After days wasted fixing it over the year I'm looking to replace it.

What mesh systems have people found work well with Home Hub 3? The Asus experience was so bad I'm reluctant to buy another. Currently looking at the Orbi RBK753 but again it has mixed reviews on stability.

Our minimum requirement is a 1 node 2 satellite setup.

Thanks for your thoughts!

So I recently switched from using a Linksys Velop Mesh thing to pfSense and ended up switching the Linksys thing to bridge mode so they only act as APs but every since then I've been getting tons of PTR requests from the IPs of 2 of the nodes (not the main node with a wired connection, but the others that are wireless).

I have the primary DNS for the DHCP server on pfSense pointing to the PiHole (so it pushes that to all the clients).

I saw suggestions to disable conditional forwarding on the pihole (which wasn't enabled) and make sure to not use pihole as pfSense's WAN interface DNS server (which it's not, wan is DHCP).

I've also already turned on the option to log only A & AAAA requests so they aren't included in the statistics but it still makes up 93% of requests, I'm wondering why there are so many requests.

I'm intending to access a PS4 for remote play. Simple but not that simple.

I have full internet access to a wifi network (named WIFI_BASE), requiring a username/ password. Of course, I don't have access to the router(s) of this network otherwise it would be too easy.

Problem 1: the PS4 can't connect to internet using this WIFI_BASE (OS limitation)

Solution 1: I created a wifi hotspot (named WIFI_HS) on a debian base computer (COMP_1), which is connected to this network, via Ethernet and MAC authentication. The PS4 connects successfully to this WIFI_HS

At this stage, I can remote play the PS4 with my android device (and the chiaki app) only if only if my android device is connected to WIFI_HS since they're both on the same network. If my android device is on the WIFI_BASE, it can't see the PS4.

The issue is that I don't live in a house, and would love to play Bloodborne remotely on my phone. I thought of using a mesh vpn (tailscale) to connect to the computer which is hosting the hotspot. This works fine. I can ssh to this computer (COMP_1) easy from my phone since they're on the same network. However, how could I "forward" the WFI_HS network to the tailscale network so the PS4 would somehow get an IP address in the tailscale network. I know this latest sentence is not possible and doesn't make sense, but basically how to have a network where both the tailscale and the WIFI_HS networks are visible to each others so that the PS4 becomes visible remotely.

FYI, my PS4 is not yet jailbroken. It's running the 9.00 firmware.

I'm opened to suggestions and keen to learn more wizardry!

I am looking at getting the S7 and am reading mixed reviews if this will work with my network. To be honest, it seems most of the vacuums have trouble with these mesh networks. Does anyone have experience connecting to the Orbi Network?

Thanks

Hello everyone!

I am looking for a "wired" seamless WiFi mesh solution, preferably with 1x router + 1x AP or 2x router. Each should be <120$ /
Each device should use the LAN connection as an up-/downlink - Which might be called "LAN backlink" if I understood some articles correctly.

What I dont want is any kind of repeater network. I want each router to use its LAN connection as the up-/downlink and only manage the clients and the roaming / handoff via WiFi.

I have read that the ASUS AiMesh could be set up in such a way.
Now I am looking to buy a AX56U and a ZenWiFi CD6. Would that be the right call?

Hey guys!

I am trying to add a wifi mesh network to a property which has a length much greater than its breadth. It's for a small business and the mesh needs to be completely wireless backhauled due to concerns about workers breaking cables (Our cameras will work on this network)(I live in India)

We have 1 connection coming in from the ISP via fibre(100mbit) and it is hooked up to an ISP provided router(with modem) with not a lot of functionality. It's at the centre of the property routers need to be added along each side to get coverage.

Most options are very expensive including wifi mesh sets(Deco, Orbi etc), especially during covid. Business solutions are also out of the question, they are absurdly expensive.

I was thinking of buying multiple OpenWRT compatible routers and manually creating a network by setting each as a repeater but I am concerned about the feasibility, considering that we will need 2-4 routers each side for effective coverage. I also need port forwarding to work nice and smoothly because our cameras are also wireless and work on RTSP/ONVIF. (Tapo C200s)

How would you recommend going about this, considering the options available on amazon.in? My budget is max 1000-2000INR/router. Latency isnt really a concern as long as it's not unusable, but I need the internet speed to be atleast 10-20mbit.

Thanks for the help!

Edit: Another thing I forgot to mention, there is no need for a 5Ghz network or ethernet ports and the like.

i dont have enough ports in my room so i need to buy a network switch, i need a switch with 4 ports minimum, what switch do you guys recommend?

First time poster, go easy folks!

I worked as a "technician" that would work in shop and be sent out to a customer's address to help with IT related things. Sometimes this would entail fixing an issue or setting something up. One day I get a ticket stating the customer needs a mesh network setup, and I'm provided no other information. After waiting outside for around 25 minutes, the customer rolls into the driveway, and we get down to business. The conversation was something like this:

Customer: Hey, sorry for being late. I need a mesh network hooked up because the internet is too slow.

Me: What exactly is slow? I'd like to get an idea of what exactly you are noticing.

Customer: Well, we can't watch 4K movies, it just buffers the entire time on the Television.

I take a speed test and the speed is some of the slowest I've seen, it was around a 2mbps down, and a .7 up. I advised her of this, and strongly recommended to speak with her ISP. I told her that the mesh network is mainly for coverage, and wouldn't make any noticeable difference on the speed. I mentioned she could return the item, and if needed we could have another look after the ISP had a look at their equipment. The customer apparently came back to the shop, and reamed out the sales team as she was sold an item she didn't need, and word got back to me and bingo. Let go. I always felt I did the right thing, but according to the company I lost the sale, oops.

TLDR: Talked customer out of buying a mesh network due to poor network speed, got the boot from company.

I have a microtik router and a net gear range extender/ ap for wi-fi throughout my home, but i have to change networks depending on where i am in the house

Is there anything i can do with my ISP router, the micro tik router, and the range extender?

I am mildly comfortable with the backend setup of home routers but am no pro.

plz help

I have all Eero Pro 6 units. I have a guest house and game room attached to my garage, which is separate from the main house. I have used MoCA 2.5 with Motorola MoCA adapters to backhaul my main router (attached to the modem) to 3 points in my main house as well as the apartment above the garage in a separate unit. I put a wireless mesh’d Eero Pro 6 in the game room, which connects to the backhaul’d Eero Pro 6 in my “apartment”.

In total I have:

1. Main Eero Pro 6 attached to modem
2. Family room eero pro 6 backhauled with MoCA 2.5
3. Master bedroom eero pro 6 backhauled with MoCA 2.5
4. Kids room eero pro 6 backhauled with MoCA 2.5
5. Apartment eero pro 6 backhauled with MoCA 2.5
6. Living Room Eero Pro 6 connected wirelessly (directly underneath master bedroom)
7. Gameroom eero pro 6 connected wirelessly (closest to the apartment)

I can use any of the Eero pro 6s in the main house or apartment without an issue. I get 900Mbps+ on wired and backhauled devices and 400-500Mbps wireless.

However, when I use the eero pro 6 in the gameroom - it takes down everything. None of the wired or wireless connections anywhere else in the house work reliably anymore (super slow speeds or none at all). The only way to recover is to unplug all eeros, MoCA adapters, and my modem. I then need to plug it all back in in order. The order is main Eero, then modem. Main MoCA, then the rest of the MoCAs, then the rest of the Eeros. Tonight I even had to have xfinity restart my modem remotely as well to get it all back.

What’s going on with that one wirelessly connected Eero in my gameroom!?

Thanks, Jeff

gf's family's house is 3 stories with concrete walls and floors. As well as (probably) being able to withstand a small nuclear blast, it's really good at blocking wifi signals. Signal strength is garbage if down the hall way.

Currently their setup consists of a couple of cheap ISP routers, one being on the top floor and one on the bottom, both with seperate SSIDs. Ultimately I think some better placement + more AP's are required. Ideally this will be one network so that going between floors/ends of the house doesn't cause any issues.

I've looked at some consumer options and found things like Google nest, which seems like it would work (just home network across multiple AP's, one SSID) but seems rather expensive for what they are:

https://preview.redd.it/h98litzybea81.png?width=1397&format=png&auto=webp&s=4837cf7a1b3c82269a211aaf15b67766879ec0e4

Then I started looking around at some older, ex-commercial stuff and found things like these, for far cheaper than Google's offering:

https://preview.redd.it/spr9rtvecea81.png?width=1431&format=png&auto=webp&s=e8d76a1b54c10958d7b75500723853d100f7553a

I understand that they're PoE but I have a switch to handle that, so is buying these a better option?
Could I just stick a bunch of these on roofs throughout the house, send them power through a PoE switch, and connect them to the modem? Or am I vastly oversimplifying things and need to get a serious router?

By way of background, I currently live in a 3-floor townhome (3300 square ft) serviced by Verizon FiOS entering my house via an ONT which is connected to a Quantum Router. My house is hardwired to most rooms with Cat5e cabling that terminate at a panel in the garage where my Quantum Router resides. The Quantum Router has 5 ethernet ports which are connected to the 5 ethernet ports in the panel. My current setup has been to attach two Asus Routers on my middle and top floors, respectively, by plugging them into an Ethernet port on each floor and setting up each to broadcast it's own SSID. As a result I have 2 SSIDs broadcasted in my house labelled "Top" and "Middle" (I turned off the Quantum Router's own SSID broadcast).  This has been a real pain when moving up and down the house and Asus's Mesh offering is incredibly cumbersome, so much so, that I simply couldn't make it work, even after flashing custom firmware to the routers and speaking with Asus Support. Google's mesh system was appealingly simple so when I saw a good deal on a "Nest Wifi Router and Point" package, I purchased two of these, giving me a total of 2 Nest Wifi Routers and 2 points for $269.

I haven't yet sought to setup the Nest system, since I can't afford a lot of network downtime, and thought to reach out here, before I do. My principal question is how can I best set up a mesh network? I suspect that I can't simply swap out the current Asus Routers with the Nest WiFi routers and achieve a mesh network, as I'll have two Nest Wifi Routers each wired back to the Quantum Gateway Router. Alternatively, can I simply remove the Quantum Router entirely and stick a Nest Wifi Router in its place? This leaves me with the question of how to populate the panel that services all the wired connections up through the house.

I apologize if what I have explained above is confusing and am happy to provide more detail. Believe it or not, I consider myself somewhat savvy with technology -- I've built my own computer, etc -- but conceiving of the setup of the Nest Wifi routers and points to ensure a mesh network, for some reason, is proving confounding.

Many thanks in advance for any information you can provide!

EDIT: Installation was an absolute breeze. I ended up only needing two routers and one point. I removed the Quantum Gateway entirely and put in the 1st Nest Wifi Router (1st floor/garage). I connected the router to an 8-port TP Link switch I had laying around which then populates the pa

Anyone able to help. My miner is in relay and I can’t figure out how to get it out. I added the tcp port 44158 to the minder under settings but don’t think that fixed anything unless it takes a few hours or so. Thanks!

I currently have a collection of Google's Nest Wi-Fi pucks and it is absolutely terrible.

Google thinks that the average user is too stupid to know how to work a Wi-Fi system, so they don't give you access to much in the way of advanced network tools.

In addition, my main hub frequently overheats. When it does, it takes out my entire mesh Wi-Fi. I have to unplug it and let it cool down for 5 minutes before plugging it back in. This is the third hub I've bought that does this, and I'm getting sick of it.

I've heard of Eero before and I've heard rumors that they could be used as dual-purpose Wi-Fi routers and ZigBee repeaters. However, I'm not sure if they'll work with ZHA and from what I can tell online it looks like they need to do it through Alexa? I don't own a single Alexa device, and I'd rather not switch.

Any tips or suggestions? I would rather not homebrew my own routers, since this all has to pass the girlfriend test. Thanks!

Is it possible to run crypto's and Bitcoin on a "Ham Radio Network", incase the internet goes OFFLINE...

I do believe Ham Radio's are essential in an emergency or disaster situation when the normal infrastructure, electrical power, telephone service, cell service, internet, may fail... Ham Radio's have multiple antennas to reduce interference and improve transmission and reception of signals. For example,. There are 11 channels in 802.11b and g networks in the United States and Canada;. Channels typically have a bandwidth and the higher bandwidth, the greater the potential throughput... Ham Mesh data can be set to 5 MHz, 10 MHz, and 20 MHz..... This essentially can become a "Private Wifi" Network

Related to the persistent issue with Chromecasts on mesh networks:

I have Chromecasts around the house, and they are set to not switch the mesh unit they connect to, ever. But my phone of course roams between units as I walk around the house. This causes me to lose control over the Chromecast from time to time, and the solution ranges from force stopping the casting app (Spotify, Plex), force stopping the Home app, turning the phone's WiFi off/on, and finally, in the rare occasion none of the former options work, unplugging the Chromecast from power to force a reboot (this last one is rare and I think it's just a Chromecast bug, not related to this issue).

The solution is to disable fast roaming on your Access Point/Mesh Network router.

TLDR: Fast Roaming is only needed and regardless most likely will only work properly when using WPA Enterprise (WPA-802.1x, RADIUS). Unless you know what this means exactly, your home is using WPA Personal, not Enterprise.

Long explanation: https://www.networkcomputing.com/wireless-infrastructure/wifi-fast-roaming-simplified

I only have guesses as to why exactly the Chromecast/Home app system doesn't work with Fast Roaming: something to do with the interaction between Multicast and Fast Roaming.

Hello, I need to make a mesh network using ESP-NOW. Is there any examples of it? I don't need to Traditional Wi-Fi Network Architecture, so a painless network library won't help me either.

Hey /r/Perth, for anyone who doesn’t know who we are Pentanet is a local ISP that believes Perth deserves better internet. We’ve been operating our own Fixed Wireless network across the metro for a few years and are now gearing up for the launch of a new gigabit wireless mesh network we’re calling neXus.

There are tons of cool hi-tech things about neXus but we don’t want to get into the marketing stuff here. Just thought we’d jump on reddit to give everyone a heads up that registrations are now open for early access to the network, if you’d like you can register here: pentanet.com.au/nexus/

We’re really excited about what neXus means for the future of internet in Perth and we’re keen to  answer any questions you might have about how this is all going to work.

I have just installed a mesh wifi router (TP-Link Deco X60) x 3 units as my home network and it works really well with one unexpected issue.

Airplay and other activities that require all devices to be on the same network don't connect properly with say the HomePod speakers connecting to different satellite routers to the Apple TV for example. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't depending on which wifi unit they are linking to.
"AirPlay 2 requires all devices be on the same network. While a mesh network technically is the same network, with multiple access points it may cause the AirPlay 2 feature to sometimes act unexpectedly."

I have looked for solutions with the only one being to isolate airplay devices to a separate, different single network but that isn't ideal. Its not just airplay either but online games that require same network are also impacted.

I have thought about backhauling the mesh units with ethernet but I don't know if that would solve the problem - I'm definitely no expert in networking - any suggestions greatly appreciated.

I would greatly appreciate any help that I could get.

We have installed a mesh network from tp-link consisting of three nodes of Deco M5. Our town house has tree floors, and there is an aluminum layer in the floor to spread the heat so it's no surprise that the wifi signals do not travel to all floors from the router (which is on the bottom floor). We have therefore connected three nodes of tp-link so that they can connect - more or less - through a line of sight through the stairwell from the bottom, to the middle and to the top floor.

We have found that the data rate on the mesh network varies greatly. One day it's 3Mbit/s, the next it's 30Mbit/s, whereas we have 250 Mbit when connecting directly to the router with an ethernet cable. Before using the smart TV on the top floor, we usually disconnect and re-connect to the mesh network. This always improves the data rate from a few Mbit per second to about 40 Mbit per second.

A week ago I updated the firmware in the nodes, and the first half hour after this operation we had 80-90 Mbit per second everywhere on the second floor, where we usually have a few Mbit per second. But after half an hour, we once again had a few Mbit per second.

One more detail. Since we live in a chain house, we also "see" lots of our neighbors networks. I wonder if this could be part of the explanation, i.e. that we are all competing for the same wifi frequencies?

I would be very grateful is someone could suggest a way to improve the stability of the data rate in our mesh network. I have been thinking about buying a wifi 6 mesh system, but I'm unsure if this would improve the stability or if would just be a waste of money.

If you didn't know yet, this sub is practically outgrowing reddit itself and the powers that be are spinning it down.

Is anyone working on another site for this exact type of content? The conversations and thought exchange that are happening on this sub are IMO critical to bringing solidarity to the masses and truly redistributing power to the people. There's been many revolutionary moments in history, but the only difference now is our speed of communication, which is almost exclusively owned.

Call me tin foil, but I think at some point the internet will be attacked, and not just with massive disinformation campaigns. I think it'll get to a point where if you can't afford your own satellite/network you're fucked, and the people need to be ready. Does it make more sense to just keep feeding disproportionately more disinformation than to render the internet useless? Thoughts? Do I need to take a chill pill?

If the internet somehow became useless..

Is there a way to create a large enough publicly owned mesh network? Perhaps getting people to crowdfund a standardized mesh network device? It wouldn't have to carry loads of data, just the essential bit of reliable information, blockchain? It can be the first version of many to have a robust, publicly owned, decentralized, affordable, and secure mode of backup communication. Can't it just be a high capacity drive and network repeater (Ik I'm not using that term correctly in the IT sense, bite me) that gets updated when it's in range of other devices while repeating the data flowing though it? Idk, it's beyond me and I'm sure someone's already working on something like this and if so, I'd appreciate links :) If not, someone should make this!

I got my 5G gateway yesterday and when connected through ethernet I was rocking 200mbit. I put it in the attic and have seen above 300mbit. I'm about 1/2 a mile from the tower. It's been pretty darn reliable. What's sad to see though I when I'm pulling about 260mbit down on the gateways wifi if I switch over to my Google network I'll get half that sitting in the same spot. Any tips on how to fix this? maybe I should reset my google network? Thanks for any help.

Just tested on the gateway's wifi network; Blazing!:

https://preview.redd.it/n5am9b66zf381.png?width=1478&amp;format=png&amp;auto=webp&amp;s=7d060fba8d2268d8ca6bc585419b7a47362a3344

Test on Google Mesh Network 3 minutes later

https://preview.redd.it/oc7ycnglzf381.png?width=1494&amp;format=png&amp;auto=webp&amp;s=588c0324a3502fc3e464c6348c7a132b8d5b9165

This behavior is very consistent.

UPDATE: thanks to /DrButtPlug I turned off all broad cast from the trashcan and that didn’t fix it. I did a speed test built into the google router and got a great speed result. This seems like a google router issue and not a T-Mobile issue. I’ve probably been getting slowed speeds from my old ISP and didn’t even realize

I have a single 10m/30ft run of Cat6 cable to a detached garage office and workshop, which I’m looking to upgrade.

It’s been fine for a single POE+ AP I have out there, but I have a growing assortment of gear building up inside the house, including VDSL, modem, gateway, POE switch, NAS Pi, NUC and access points.

I’m planning to move it all to a swing frame in the garage, which will allow me to upgrade to some more capable gear requiring better air flow and power.

The VDSL line is in the house, so I’m hamstrung in terms of running a back haul for the APs in the house.

The conduit is only 20mm (3/4”) and has four soft right angles in it, so I’m not confident that I’d be able to feed another run of cat6 through it.

I’ve considered:

1. Run an AirFibre link between the buildings, which seems hilarious for a 5m/15ft gap, but might actually end up being more time- and cost-effective than digging up and relaying new cable.
2. Feed the WAN link straight to the new rack, and saturate the house with a decent 4x4 mesh network from the garage to support the various wireless clients (gaming consoles, TVs, phones, tablets, laptop, IOT junk, etc.)
3. Dig up the conduit and install new cables. I could get away with just running a second cable to run a POE++ switch back to the house for the household APs, but could add more to play around with aggregate links.
4. … suck a draw line through the existing conduit and pull some greased up cable through it?

So, any opinions, experiences and recommendations with short haul runs like this? Are there any other possible options?