Modified Mesh Network

Can I have a mesh wifi network running behind a homebuilt pfsense router. I currently have a Taotronics mesh network, which I am impressed with, but it has to connect to a modem or a router in modem-only mode. I don't understand what the difference is in a cable coming out of a modem and coming out of a router lan port?

How have you got it setup currently?

Would’ve thought with an external router like the pfSense you could just connect into a LAN port on the Taotronics box (or perhaps the WAN port if you can set it as a pass through connection so it doesn’t do anything unnecessary like it’s own NAT). However I’m not familiar at all with Taotronics or it’s setup.

Looking at the user guide for the Taotronics mesh, seems to be a mesh router combined.

Technally you could connect the pfsence box to the ISPs modem and configure one port and connect it to the wan port on the mesh device, but this could be problematic as you would be trying to use two firewalls, double NAT, ect

what i would say to look at is if you can set the dhcp options on the mesh device, if you can disable DHCP then you could connect the mesh device to Pfsence Lan to Lan or if you can change the gateway to the pfsence box on the mesh and disable dhcp on pfsence.

the mesh router may not give you the correct lights but the wifi should still work.

hope it helps

I'm using three BT Whole Home WiFi discs to provide mesh networking around our house.

I have Zen Internet who supplied a Fritz!Box 7350 but I turned the WiFi on that off and, via a switch connected the BT discs. The BT discs provide mesh networking and Internet access via the Fritz!Box. It's worked very well for me.