Wifi mesh systems

keano25

I've have a bungalow with cat 6 wired to each room, the WiFi system is not able to reach each end of the house.

I have a ethernet cable going from the router to a switch in the attic driving the ethernet cables.

Would there be any benefit to getting a mesh system for speed or just plug an extender into one of the ethernet cables in the black spots?

Thanks

keano25

keano25 wrote: »

I've have a bungalow with cat 6 wired to each room, the WiFi system is not able to reach each end of the house.

I have a ethernet cable going from the router to a switch in the attic driving the ethernet cables.

Would there be any benefit to getting a mesh system for speed or just plug an extender into one of the ethernet cables in the black spots?

Thanks

Neither, get Ubiquiti Unifi access points

babelfish1990

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Neither, get Ubiquiti Unifi access points

I would second the recommendation for Ubiquiti Unifi access points. You can add as many as you need to cover your house seamlessly. 2 or 3 will cover most homes.

Switch off the WiFi in your ISP router. If your Ethernet switch has POE, you can use this to power each of the APs

keano25

Thanks lads. Unfortunately my switch does not have Poe I think.. it's a TP-Link TL-SG1024D.

What's the advantage of using Ubiquiti Unifi over a Deco M5 system?

babelfish1990

keano25 wrote: »

Thanks lads. Unfortunately my switch does not have Poe I think.. it's a TP-Link TL-SG1024D.

What's the advantage of using Ubiquiti Unifi over a Deco M5 system?

The main advantage is POE - you can install your APs on wall or ceiling without trailing power leads. You can probably still do POE, using the individual power injectors that come with the APs. You also have the possibility of installing a small UPS at your comms hub, which will keep your entire network alive in the event of a power cut.

Deco M5 will also work well in Access Point mode - you can use your wiring for backhaul instead of wasting WiFi bandwidth between APs.

Either way you should get seamless coverage. You are on the pigs back since you have wiring.

irelandspurs

babelfish1990 wrote: »

Leave the F2000 in place. Login to the router and disable 2.4GHz & 5GHz WiFi in it. Plug first Deco into a LAN port on F2000. Use other Decos to provide seamless WiFi across your home. You can continue to use Spare ports on F2000 for wired Ethernet devices.

Thanks, installed them last night and has made a massive difference. Was only getting around an up and down 20mbps over wifi in the best location. Now I'm getting a steady 80mbps over the whole house.
I didn't put the decos in AP mode just turned the wifi off on the F2000 and all seems good. I even had the youngest come in at 11 last night asking what's wrong with the wifi as I turned her stuff off

irelandspurs

irelandspurs wrote: »

Thanks, installed them last night and has made a massive difference. Was only getting around an up and down 20mbps over wifi in the best location. Now I'm getting a steady 80mbps over the whole house.
I didn't put the decos in AP mode just turned the wifi off on the F2000 and all seems good. I even had the youngest come in at 11 last night asking what's wrong with the wifi as I turned her stuff off

This is the dreaded double NAT. You now have 2 routers and 2 firewalls. It can cause issues especially if you use things like VPN, console games, Skype, Zoom etc that use UPNP (universal plug and play) open their ports as the ports will be blocked on the other router. It's not an ideal setup

irelandspurs

[Deleted User] wrote: »

This is the dreaded double NAT. You now have 2 routers and 2 firewalls. It can cause issues especially if you use things like VPN, console games, zoom that use UPNP (universal plug and play) open their ports as the ports will be blocked on the other router. It's not an ideal setup

Just reading about it now so will change it. I tried out the kids Xbox last night and it said NAT open but I don't understand how these things work never mind NAT so I'll take others advice, just a shame to lose the parental control.

irelandspurs

Just put into AP mode but am only getting 40mbps now but was getting 80mbps across the house in router mode.

irelandspurs

irelandspurs wrote: »

Just put into AP mode but am only getting 40mbps now but was getting 80mbps across the house in router mode.

Have you disconnected and reconnected all your devices, they will need to get a new DHCP lease from the f2000 as the TP Link was giving them the lease before this in router mode.

irelandspurs

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Have you disconnected and reconnected all your devices, they will need to get a new DHCP lease from the f2000 as the TP Link was giving them the lease before this in router mode.

Thanks that worked. I had dns settings installed on the f2000 from getflix, will I lose this now?

RangeR

irelandspurs wrote: »

Thanks that worked. I had dns settings installed on the f2000 from getflix, will I lose this now?

If your F2000 is bridged, it would be cleaner to have your TP doing DNS, DHCP, Firewall etc.


Just turn DHCP on on the TP and off on the F2000
You can configure your TP with whatever DNS you like.


Just make sure nothing is plugged into your F2000 other than your TP. Some people are tempted to use the bridged modem as a spare switch. Don't do that. That switch isn't protected.

irelandspurs

RangeR wrote: »

If your F2000 is bridged, it would be cleaner to have your TP doing DNS, DHCP, Firewall etc.


Just turn DHCP on on the TP and off on the F2000
You can configure your TP with whatever DNS you like.


Just make sure nothing is plugged into your F2000 other than your TP. Some people are tempted to use the bridged modem as a spare switch. Don't do that. That switch isn't protected.

I have the hive hub plugged into the f2000 but maybe I can plug that into the deco?

RangeR

irelandspurs wrote: »

I have the hive hub plugged into the f2000 but maybe I can plug that into the deco?

Plug EVERYTHING into the Deco.


The ports on a bridged modem [your F2000] are open on the internet and not protected.

54and56

WLad wrote: »

The only issue you might hit when it's in a simulated bridge mode is double NAT. If your business uses a VPN for anything or has specific port forwarding requirements then you might be in trouble. If you do have these requirements then a workaround is to plug the devices that need a VPN or port forwarding into VM router and not the TT.

As it's a home office I do also host a Plex server for some friends and family and a Minecraft server for my youngest so yes I need port forwarding and I do also use VPN's from time to time for various Geo lock get arounds.

I see that UPnP is enabled in both the VM Hitron Modem and separately in the TT Router Admin app. Should I disable UPnP in the VM Modem and let the TT manage it?

WLad

You'll definitely need only one of them managing it, I'm just not sure which is better. I don't have much experience with UPnP - hopefully someone else will know.

I do know that one concrete way of fixing this is to not use the TT as your router and turn DHCP back on the hitron. If the TT supports access point mode that's what I'd be doing as its waaaay less hassle to just let the router be a router and make the mesh system be your access points.

RangeR

WLad wrote: »

You'll definitely need only one of them managing it, I'm just not sure which is better. I don't have much experience with UPnP - hopefully someone else will know.

I do know that one concrete way of fixing this is to not use the TT as your router and turn DHCP back on the hitron. If the TT supports access point mode that's what I'd be doing as its waaaay less hassle to just let the router be a router and make the mesh system be your access points.

Yes and no. Definitely one router. It doesn't really matter which one it is. If it was me, I'd have the more powerful machine be the router. The Hitron [or most ISP provider routers] isn't known to be a workhorse.


Either way, which ever you choose to be the router, Use that box to be the service provider for all services like DHCP, DNS, uPNP [I always disable that as I deem it a security risk]. It doesn't really matter which box is your DHCP/DNS but it's always easier to know which box to dick around with in 6 months time if something goes wrong. If the Hitron is just your bridge, you always dick around with the DECO settings.



If you choose to have the Hitron to be the modem, disable all services on it. It should just be the bridge to the internet. If you choose the DECO to be just AP, disable all basic network services on it.



Also, on Parental Controls, I believe the DECO has this too.

Sheep Shagger

Anyone come across this, can't see online so before I sit on hold with Virgin....

We have Google WiFi and I read here its recommend you switch the virgin hub to modem mode, the instructions and online it says and show there is 'modem mode on the left hand side of the screen when you log into we don't have it...

RangeR

Sheep Shagger wrote: »

Anyone come across this, can't see online so before I sit on hold with Virgin....

We have Google WiFi and I read here its recommend you switch the virgin hub to modem mode, the instructions and online it says and show there is 'modem mode on the left hand side of the screen when you log into we don't have it...

Yes. Ideally you set the vm router to bridged mode.

Sheep Shagger

RangeR wrote: »

Yes. Ideally you set the vm router to bridged mode.

Yeah it's just not giving me the option,on the videos online its in the list on the left hand side of the screen.....not on mine though (see photo above).


BTW enabling modem mode is what I should do (the same as bridge mode?

babelfish1990

irelandspurs wrote: »

Just reading about it now so will change it. I tried out the kids Xbox last night and it said NAT open but I don't understand how these things work never mind NAT so I'll take others advice, just a shame to lose the parental control.

You can do parental control on the F2000. Maybe not quite as user-friendly as the Deco App - but it works. Some people on this thread are advising to use F2000 as your router, and others advising to use Deco as your router. Very confusing! Either way, you must only have one router. There are pro's and con's to which you choose. I recommend that you use the F2000 as your router, and Deco in AP mode for the following reasons,

- F2000 will be your firewall, and will be managed by your ISP
- Your ISP customer care will be able to access your F2000, and manage it
- You will receive security patches automatically from your ISP
- If you have IPTV from your ISP, it will work without any tweaking
- If you have VOIP from your ISP, it will work no issues
- You can use the spare ports on your F2000, and they will be protected

If you go with the alternative - using the Deco as your router, and F2000 in Bridge Mode, you can use extra features on the Deco, but you really need to know what you are doing, and you can't assume any of the above.

irelandspurs

RangeR wrote: »

If your F2000 is bridged, it would be cleaner to have your TP doing DNS, DHCP, Firewall etc.


Just turn DHCP on on the TP and off on the F2000
You can configure your TP with whatever DNS you like.


Just make sure nothing is plugged into your F2000 other than your TP. Some people are tempted to use the bridged modem as a spare switch. Don't do that. That switch isn't protected.

Right, so this is how I've set up so far. I have my main deco plugged into my F2000 and my hive hub is plugged into the main deco. Second deco is in the new extension where we was getting the main dead spot and 3rd deco is upstairs in bedroom. Deco is AP mode and WiFi is turned off on the F2000. I'm getting a steady 80mbps across the house now which is good compared to what it is.
Is there anything else I should do to the F2000 other than turn WiFi off?

babelfish1990

irelandspurs wrote: »

Right, so this is how I've set up so far. I have my main deco plugged into my F2000 and my hive hub is plugged into the main deco. Second deco is in the new extension where we was getting the main dead spot and 3rd deco is upstairs in bedroom. Deco is AP mode and WiFi is turned off on the F2000. I'm getting a steady 80mbps across the house now which is good compared to what it is.
Is there anything else I should do to the F2000 other than turn WiFi off?

It sounds like you have everything correctly configured. Nothing else required in the F2000 other than turning off WiFi. However, if you want to set up parental controls or change your DNS servers (eg to Google), you need to do this in the F2000. All ISP DNS servers are susceptible to occasional denial-of-service attacks, so I prefer to use Google DNS, but not essential.

irelandspurs

irelandspurs wrote: »

Right, so this is how I've set up so far. I have my main deco plugged into my F2000 and my hive hub is plugged into the main deco. Second deco is in the new extension where we was getting the main dead spot and 3rd deco is upstairs in bedroom. Deco is AP mode and WiFi is turned off on the F2000. I'm getting a steady 80mbps across the house now which is good compared to what it is.
Is there anything else I should do to the F2000 other than turn WiFi off?

No, that's spot on. As you're using the f2000 as your gateway router you can use it's LAN ports, it's firewall protects all your devices (bridge mode which you're not using bypasses the firewall exposing devices)

irelandspurs

Nice one, it's great how it all works, I just don't have a notion of how it does 😂

irelandspurs

irelandspurs wrote: »

Nice one, it's great how it all works, I just don't have a notion of how it does 😂

Enjoy, don't fix it till it's broke!

irelandspurs

I have 1 Deco behind TV, can I plug cable from deco direct into TV and give it wired connection or is this not needed.

irelandspurs

irelandspurs wrote: »

I have 1 Deco behind TV, can I plug cable from deco direct into TV and give it wired connection or is this not needed.

Yes most definitely, you would be daft not to, cable everything that can be cabled, the less things using your WiFi the better it will perform. I would especially try to get media players, consoles, cameras etc on wired Ethernet if possible, keep WiFi for devices that need mobility

GrumPy

Finally got around tho setting up google nest mesh system with virgin media hub 2.0. I turned the wifi off in the virgin settings. Any other config changes I need to consider to avoid things like double NAT?

Sheep Shagger

GrumPy wrote: »

Finally got around tho setting up google nest mesh system with virgin media hub 2.0. I turned the wifi off in the virgin settings. Any other config changes I need to consider to avoid things like double NAT?

Was modem mode an option when you logged in as it wasn't for me? Think I have the hub 4.