Need help deciding on a new AP/router solution

[Stahlmann]

So currently i'm still using the ISP provided router and a "Fritz! Wlan repeater" as another AP 2 floors above that. And wifi absolutely sucks in my house. Half of the house (3 floors) doesn't receive a good signal and even when sitting right next to the router/ap i only get around 150 Mbps out of the gigabit connection i have. But also very inconsistently. Sometimes there are 30 seconds or so where i don't receive a single byte, even when sitting right next to the AP.

 

Another issue i have is that my phone always connects to the router when coming home. But when i go to the 3rd floor where i live it still stays on that router because it still has a weak but present signal instead of switching to the AP that is right next to me.

 

So now i'm looking into new solutions that could maybe help with these issues. But i don't even know what kind of budget i should expect to get something decent. Any recommendations would be appreciated.

 

Wifi 6 is not needed as we only have a few devices - mostly phones - that even support it. 2 APs are needed. I don't have ethernet runs to the 2nd floor, only the 1st and 3rd.

[Dreckssackblase]

The simplest good solution should be to just install 2 APs on the 1st and 3rd floor then. IMO UniFi makes some pretty good Access points for the prosumer market. Does you networking already have some PoE support or would you need injectors or a PoE switch aswell ?

About your current problem. Does your Fritz! repeater send out the exact same SSID as your main WIFI or is it a seperate network. Because if it is seperate, then unfortunately no device will automatically switch until the connection to the previous one is lost completely because to your device the other access point is a completely different network.

[Stahlmann]

10 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

The simplest good solution should be to just install 2 APs on the 1st and 3rd floor then. IMO UniFi makes some pretty good Access points for the prosumer market.

You mean these?

Ubiquiti UniFi AP AC Nanohd Wave2, PoE-Inj incl: Amazon.de: Computer & Zubehör

 

10 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

 

Does you networking already have some PoE support or would you need injectors or a PoE switch aswell ?

Currently there is no POE. I'd need an injector. The one i linked above includes one.

Network wiring basically doesn't exist in my house. There are no in-wall cables, just one cable (i did a reasonable job hiding it as good as possible) going from the router all the way up to the 3rd floor where i have a switch. All the walls are solid, no dry wall, so i don't really even have the option to install additional cables.

 

10 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

About your current problem. Does your Fritz! repeater send out the exact same SSID as your main WIFI or is it a seperate network. Because if it is seperate, then unfortunately no device will automatically switch until the connection to the previous one is lost completely because to your device the other access point is a completely different network.

They both share their SSID. I was hoping devices would automatically switch to the one with a better connection. But sadly they don't switch until they go completely out of range of the one that's currently connected.

[Dreckssackblase]

9 minutes ago, Stahlmann said:

You mean these?

Ubiquiti UniFi AP AC Nanohd Wave2, PoE-Inj incl: Amazon.de: Computer & Zubehör

Yeah basically these.

two of these AP AC Pros and that USG and you would be set. If you already have some kind of home server running and want to save some money, then there is also a free Network controller utility for Windows and Linux you can use. 

https://eu.store.ui.com/collections/unifi-network-wireless/products/unifi-ac-pro

We use these at work and were pretty happy them.

Edit.

With the Network Controller the USGs functionalities wouldn't be needed but the AP would still need PoE.

[Stahlmann]

1 minute ago, Dreckssackblase said:

Yeah basically these.

two of these AP AC Pros and that USG and you would be set. If you already have some kind of home server running and want to save some money, then there is also a free Network controller utility for Windows and Linux you can use. 

https://eu.store.ui.com/collections/unifi-network-wireless/products/unifi-ac-pro

We use these at work and were pretty happy them.

Edit.

With the Network Controller the USGs functionalities wouldn't be needed but the AP would still need PoE.

Isn't the router an AP by itself?

[Dreckssackblase]

18 minutes ago, Stahlmann said:

Isn't the router an AP by itself?

what router are you talking about ? yours at home already or the USG ? The USG has no wireless capabilities itself.

[Stahlmann]

9 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

what router are you talking about ? yours at home already or the USG ? The USG has no wireless capabilities itself.

I was talking about the USG.

 

Another question:

Would you say it's worth it to try only one of their long-range APs over 2 lite ones?

Do i even need the USG thing or could i just reuse my router?

[Dreckssackblase]

2 minutes ago, Stahlmann said:

Would you say it's worth it to try only one of their long-range APs over 2 lite ones?

Do i even need the USG thing?

from my experience the Pro variant already has a pretty good radius and you could technically change a switch in the firmware to tell the device is it in the US and not in the EU and send with more power. I simply don't know how much further the range in the long-range APs really is.

 

Technically you don't need the USG or the manager at all if you only have on AP as the settings can be configured via SSH. If you want remote monitoring and control oover your AP then a USG or the Network Controller Software is needed.

Only thing needed then would be a PoE capable switch or a PoE injector which might be in the packaging, as I have seen it both included and omitted.

 

if you are looking for alternative manufacturers aswell for that stuff so you can compare some stuff aswell then theres also Cisco and Netgear but I don't know what their software is like.

[Stahlmann]

24 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

if you are looking for alternative manufacturers aswell for that stuff so you can compare some stuff aswell then theres also Cisco and Netgear but I don't know what their software is like.

What about this solution? D-Link COVR-C1203 Mesh-Lösung AC1200 Dual Band Whole Home Wi-Fi System weiß: Amazon.de: Küche, Haushalt & Wohnen

 

It seems like these basically have one main AP and the others act as repeaters for each other, not needing ethernet other than the main one. Is this a load of BS or would you say it's worth a try to get more than 2 APs (max possible with ethernet bound APs)?

[Dreckssackblase]

6 minutes ago, Stahlmann said:

What about this solution? D-Link COVR-C1203 Mesh-Lösung AC1200 Dual Band Whole Home Wi-Fi System weiß: Amazon.de: Küche, Haushalt & Wohnen

 

It seems like these basically have one main AP and the others act as repeaters for each other, not needing ethernet other than the main one. Is this a load of BS or would you say it's worth a try to get more than 2 APs (max possible with ethernet bound APs)?

They look like a good consumer solution to me but I am not the biggest fan of Wi-Fi repeaters that have no Ethernet connection as the main AP will still be the bottleneck then and latency aswell as download speeds might suffer when the amount of network devices is high.

[Stahlmann]

2 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

They look like a good consumer solution to me but I am not the biggest fan of Wi-Fi repeaters that have no Ethernet connection as the main AP will still be the bottleneck then and latency aswell as download speeds might suffer when the amount of network devices is high.

Speed is not the No.1 priority in my case. The most important things are coverage and at least a somewhat consistent connection. Not like my current AP where i have full signal but sometimes 30 seconds or so without any data transfer. Most devices that use Wifi are phones and just 2 laptops (only browsing and light useage). Every device needing more bandwidth is connected via ethernet. (PCs, consoles, etc.)

 

I just don't get one thing about these solutions: If i have 3 (1 for every floor) does the one on the 3rd floor get it's signal from the main one on the 1st floor or does it receive the "repeated" signal from the one on the 2nd floor? I looked through the documentation and didn't find anything about this.

[Dreckssackblase]

I can't really find anything in the description either but from some of the reviews it sounds like they connect to the Main one.

[Stahlmann]

22 minutes ago, Dreckssackblase said:

I can't really find anything in the description either but from some of the reviews it sounds like they connect to the Main one.

Found an answer: The farthest one will use the APs in between as repeaters. But with each one added to the chain the bandwidth will cut in half. So it goes from (thoretically) gigabit - which is what my connection is capable of - to (theoretically) 500Mbps, which would still be plenty.

 

I think i'll give these a shot before going the more expensive route with Ubiquity gear. When i'm starting renovations a few years down the line i'll do a lot of rewiring either way, so then maybe i'll look into networking again, maybe i'll also consider adding a NAS then. Who knows...

 

Thank you for the help!

[Stahlmann]

@Dreckssackblase

 

Man you get what you pay for. The D-Link solution i mentioned arrived yesterday. The setup was a terrible experience. After trying to do it following the instructions failed multiple times i finally managed to get it up and running - only after i completely abandoned the instructions and tried it with just my very limited networking knowledge and logical thinking i guess. Still, 1 of the 2 additional APs fails to fetch the correct wifi password, so as soon as a device switches to that AP the device drops out of the network and it says "wrong password", even though it was connected before. So right now i'm just trying it out with the master AP and one of the two additional ones. It's perculiar, because yesterday after hours of trying to set it up when it finally worked all 3 APs were useable. Sometime during the night one just randomly "changed" the password on me...

 

I'm gonna try to get it to work a bit longer. If i can't manage today, i'm probably gonna settle for a solution using Ubiquity gear.

[Stahlmann]

So i got the D-Link Covr thing to work. I still don't know what i did exactly but after a few more hours of trial and error it's been working for a few days now.