Best MESH system for gigabit internet ?

Hi all,

I am upgrading from 400Mbps to 900Mbps on Wednesday [ can't wait :) ] and was just wondering if my current MESH system needs upgrading to well to make full use of the new speed. The NOVAs are a tri-band (IIRC) system and have no hard wired backhaul

We currently have 4 Tenda NOVA MW12s throughout the house (3 downstairs and 1 upstairs); the one furthest from the router, downstairs, which is about 10m away from the main node gets speedtest results of 250Mbps - and this unit is also hardwired (with Cat5e cable) to multple devices including everything in our home office at the bottom of the garden.(where WiFi reach is pretty much non-existent). From a WiFi perspective, mobile devices (by far not the most modern of phones) get speeds between 40Mbps and 80Mbps throughout the property.

Whilst 250Mbps at the furthest ends of the property is fairly good IMHO I can't help but think it can so be so much better especially once I move up to 900Mbps coming into the house.

So a couple of questions:

1) Should a MESH system be showing a 150Mbps drop-off over 10m ? And is that drop-off a constant i.e on a 900Mbps connection should the furthest node be getting 750Mbps ?

2) Will upgrading to 900Mbps lead to an improvement in the speeds our mobiles are getting over WiFi ?

3) On a fairly restrictive budget - let's say no more than £200 - are there any options would be better than the current NOVAs ? I see lots of references to AC... and AX..., MESH systems but am completely lost in the jargon to know if they are any better.than what I have already ?

Oh - and before anyone suggests it - Powerlines are not an option (been there tried that - and they were pretty useless due to the wiring quality in the house and the fact the house has 2 ring mains(?)). Neither, really, unfortunately is laying Ethernet cable throughout the house

the TP-Link Decos seems to get good reviews and they are a pretty good price depending on what ones you go for, but if any wi-fi will hit 1Gb/s is another thing. The ones you have got according to a review I have seen will do 867Mbps in theory on a 5Ghz.

To be honest a desktop computer is always best to connect via Ethernet and games consoles as well, Wi-fi should only be used for stuff that can't be connected to Ethernet.

Powerlines are certainly not an option, they are not great.

Have a look at the TP link Decos. I had a look at them myself, but the problem is they only have three ethernet prots.

To get the most out of 900 Mbps broadband over WiFi along the furthest distance, you will likely need WiFi 6 based WiFi mesh, but from PC Pro magazines reviews in the last 6 months, this doesn't mean the most expensive.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

The ones you have got according to a review I have seen will do 867Mbps in theory on a 5Ghz.

With 802.11ac (a.k.a. "Wi-Fi 5") the raw bitrate is up to 867Mbps, but in my experience the best *actual* throughput you'll get is around half that, even under ideal conditions.

If you run multiple access points to the same router with Cat5e cabling, and the APs are on different channels, then you can have different users on each AP using 400Mbps simultaneously.

But really, for most people I don't think it's worth attempting to tune your wifi to go any faster. 400Mbps is 50MB per second. If you're downloading a large application or software update, at this speed the time to download is already insignificant compared to the time to install it.

Sadly the setup and build materials of the house make fully wired connections out of the question

From the sound of it the NOVAs are WiFi-5 and the next step up would be WiFi-6 ?

What improvements would Wi-Fi 6 give over Wi-Fi 5 ? And presumably (without the wired back haul) I would need to be looking at a tri-band Wi-Fi 6 system ?

As a general rule of thumb, would be correct to say that "AC" refers to Wi-Fi 5 and "AX" refers to Wi-Fi 6 ?

Also, as I said earlier, most of the mobile devices are fairly old - presumably they will still connect to a Wi-Fi 6 system (though may not see any noticeable improvement) ? Though the primary concern is maximising the speed between the ONT/router and the MESH node (which is currently being used as the wired AP for the equipment at the far end of the house and garden)

I've also just remembered that "line of sight" is actually a thing with WiFi (which might explain the 150Mbps drop off) - EDIT: OK - just tried moving the nodes to have perfect line of sight (and unless I needed to reboot the nodes) this made no real difference to speed test results.

The ISP I am moving to offers a MESH system which seems to be this - https://support.plume.com/hc/en-gb/articles/36000529... - [ not sure if it's the WiFi 6 version or not ] for an extra £7pm. Might be worth considering ?

Edited by AdamBrunt (Sun 01-Jan-23 13:25:48)

In reply to a post by AdamBrunt:

From the sound of it the NOVAs are WiFi-5 and the next step up would be WiFi-6 ?

WiFi 6 = AX
WiFi 5 = AC
WiFi 4 = N

Then there are various versions of each type, you see AC1200 and AC2400 for example, generally these numbers are the theoretical max speeds added together (so completely useless) but they give a clue as to the capability of the device. The AC1200 units have less antennas and less capability than AC2400 or AC3600.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

In reply to a post by AdamBrunt:

From the sound of it the NOVAs are WiFi-5 and the next step up would be WiFi-6 ?

WiFi 6 = AX
WiFi 5 = AC
WiFi 4 = N

Then there are various versions of each type, you see AC1200 and AC2400 for example, generally these numbers are the theoretical max speeds added together (so completely useless) but they give a clue as to the capability of the device. The AC1200 units have less antennas and less capability than AC2400 or AC3600.

Thanks - that makes a lot sense.

You would think someone with a 20 year career in IT really ought to know this stuff right ???

In reply to a post by AdamBrunt:

You would think someone with a 20 year career in IT really ought to know this stuff right ???

The amazing thing about IT as a profession is how diverse it is, comparable only to medicine

You may find the US-centric Small Net Builder website and its forum of interest, although US house construction is quite different and WiFi seems to cover many more square meters (sq feet) than in traditional UK house construction.

If you can find a copy of PCPro magazine issue 318 they reviewed the Deco X20 which was the best price/performance WiFi 6 mesh at £270 back then. (The netgear mesh was nearly £500). The review tested range and performance in various rooms of a large suburban UK house, so may be of use.

Edited by jchamier (Sun 01-Jan-23 14:57:15)

Will give the DX20 a look over but it appears to be only dual band [ possibly why it is relatively so cheap ]; not such if that is going to be much of a deal breaker.

I could just get it from Amazon, try it and send it back if it ends up being a backward step from my current NOVAs.

Dual-band WiFi 6 v Tri-band WiFi 5 .... ???