500MB/250MB Open Serve over Wifi- Do I Need A Mesh Solution?

[genius7129]

Greetings,

I recently upgraded from my Fibre line to 500MB download & 250MB Upload.

When using a Lan Cable, I seem to be getting just over 500MB download and around 24MB upload consistently.

Here is my problem:
All our devices use Wifi.
About 5 Devices uses 2.4GHZ, and 2 Devices 5GHZ.
The Wifi Coverage/Connection to all the devices is not good at all. Even if I stand next to the router, speed is below 250MB. (download), with only one 5GHZ device on the network.

Question:
See attached for my router settings
I am using a Cat 5e cable and have tried to play around with the settings via the router, but was unsuccessful.

How can I improve the Wifi Signal (full 500 MB download speed) throughout our 3bedroom home? ( It is not that big)
Can this Mesh System help: Click here or This?
Should I upgrade my router?
Am I missing something?

Any guidance or advice would be highly appreciated.

Thank you in advance.


P.S: I did go through most of the posts on the forum, but could not find a conclusive answer to my question.

 

[Mike Hoxbig]

I would definitely consider a mesh solution if you want the best speeds while keeping the same SSID.

I actually faced a choice of which mesh to get, and ended up with the Deco X20. You don't need something that expensive, the M4 should do just fine. I just wanted something with WiFi 6. You can get the M4 for around R3.5k for a pack of 3.

You don't want the E4. That only has a 100 Mbps LAN port, so if you use Ethernet backhaul, you will be limited to 100 Mbps.

You can check the thread here.

Another Mesh thread - Deco M4 or Deco X20?

Will be moving soon and I'll be needing a mesh due to the space of the new place. I already had the M4 in mind, but then came across the X20. The X20 supports Wifi 6. So I can either get 3 x X20's, or for the same price, 6 x M4's. What would you guys do?

mybroadband.co.za

Keep in mind this is using WiFi backhaul. To get the best speed you should use Ethernet backhaul to connect the nodes to each other..

 

[genius7129]

I would definitely consider a mesh solution if you want the best speeds while keeping the same SSID.

I actually faced a choice of which mesh to get, and ended up with the Deco X20. You don't need something that expensive, the M4 should do just fine. I just wanted something with WiFi 6. You can get the M4 for around R3.5k for a pack of 3.

You don't want the E4. That only has a 100 Mbps LAN port, so if you use Ethernet backhaul, you will be limited to 100 Mbps.

You can check the thread here.

Another Mesh thread - Deco M4 or Deco X20?

Will be moving soon and I'll be needing a mesh due to the space of the new place. I already had the M4 in mind, but then came across the X20. The X20 supports Wifi 6. So I can either get 3 x X20's, or for the same price, 6 x M4's. What would you guys do?

mybroadband.co.za

Keep in mind this is using WiFi backhaul. To get the best speed you should use Ethernet backhaul to connect the nodes to each other..

Thank you very much, Mike.

E4 - In retrospect, definitely not an option anymore.
M4- I am considering the promo at Incredible for R2k
X20 - It would've been even better but a bit of my budget for now.

 

[DA-LION-619]

Here is my problem:
All our devices use Wifi.
About 5 Devices uses 2.4GHZ, and 2 Devices 5GHZ.
The Wifi Coverage/Connection to all the devices is not good at all. Even if I stand next to the router, speed is below 250MB. (download), with only one 5GHZ device on the network.

That actually isn’t bad performance for your Wi-Fi.
Assuming 2x2 at 40mhz on WiFi-5, your link speed would be around 400Mbps, with an actual performance around 40-60% due to interference etc. You have 250Mbps.

How can I improve the Wifi Signal (full 500 MB download speed) throughout our 3bedroom home? ( It is not that big)

2.4Ghz will give you better range but terrible quality, a lot more interference, packet loss etc.
5Ghz either WiFi-5(ac) or WiFi-6(ax) can get you close to 500Mbps or over depending on your channel width.
20/40/80Mhz, the wider you go, the better your speed but with the risk of interference.

As per @Mike Hoxbig thread, WiFi-6 is new so there isn’t much interference from other Wi-Fi networks also all the other tech like beam forming etc.
Note that WiFi-6 is available on 2.4Ghz unlike WiFi-5 but rare, the X20 supports 2.4Ghz but I’m unsure if you have devices that support it.

Can this Mesh System help: Click here or This?
Should I upgrade my router?
Am I missing something?

My only concrete advice is have a gigabit backhaul.
Decide if have everyone needs access to 500Mbps wirelessly or that they can use 5Ghz comfortably or even WiFi-6.
Lastly 2x2 = 2 transmitting + 2 receiving = 4 antennas, I know you said your place isn’t big so if your router is 2x2 and one device is 2x2 you might just need a single device with more antennas.

 

[Mike Hoxbig]

The other thing is that even with Ethernet backhaul, don't expect full speed. It depends on various factors like @DA-LION-619 mentioned, even if you're standing next to the thing. It also depends on what your devices are capable of.

Then you have to factor in walls. With each wall that it has to pass through, you're going to take a hit.

If you want a consistent 500+ Mbps throughout your house, you're going to have to upgrade to a gigabit fibre package. On your current package, you can expect a consistent 300-350 Mbps which is still very good.

The thing with WiFi is there will always be a trade off between speed and stability. If you can get a stable high speed rather than an unstable max speed, consider that a win...

 

[deesef]

Greetings,

I recently upgraded from my Fibre line to 500MB download & 250MB Upload.

When using a Lan Cable, I seem to be getting just over 500MB download and around 24MB upload consistently.

Here is my problem:
All our devices use Wifi.
About 5 Devices uses 2.4GHZ, and 2 Devices 5GHZ.
The Wifi Coverage/Connection to all the devices is not good at all. Even if I stand next to the router, speed is below 250MB. (download), with only one 5GHZ device on the network.

Question:
See attached for my router settings
I am using a Cat 5e cable and have tried to play around with the settings via the router, but was unsuccessful.

How can I improve the Wifi Signal (full 500 MB download speed) throughout our 3bedroom home? ( It is not that big)
Can this Mesh System help: Click here or This?
Should I upgrade my router?
Am I missing something?

Any guidance or advice would be highly appreciated.

Thank you in advance.


P.S: I did go through most of the posts on the forum, but could not find a conclusive answer to my question.

The first question that should be resolved is what are each of your devices used for and what is the desired WiFi speed for these devices. Note that the 2.4g WiFi devices will max out at about 40meg

f you only have two 5g enabled WiFi devices, ask yourself if it is REALLY necessarily that they need the full 500 meg speed on those 2 devices, to be fed via WiFi. If they are fixed devices (TV, streaming box, PC etc), running a LAN cable would be cheaper and more stable than virtually any WiFi mesh system, at a MUCH lower cost.
.