Wifi Router chatter

[Cosmacelf]

That wifi best practices and unifi details are great. Thanks for that.

Wups, I just reread it, and should update that last bullet point. Ubiquiti, now, finally, has rock solid Fast Roaming support, and it works well. So do enable it. It allows me to be on a WiFi Calling voice call (or Skype or FaceTime, etc) and walk around the house with the cellphone seamlessly hopping from AP to AP. Just don’t run between APs

 

[Kodemonkey]

Moderator note: This post plus the 14 following replies were moved from a thread in the Tesla Energy section about Powerwall TEG network connectivity.

I just wanted to get from the experts here what the options on. I am amazed by coming to sites like these I can end up knowing more
than my installers know. It will be a lot of work to hard wire, but, want to do it right.

Thanks for the inputs. As an engineer, I always ask the 7 why's on anything.

Another option would be a MIMO device. I have a mesh network with 3 google wifi pucks (1st gen). I have 39 devices on it and 2kids doing zoom calls everyday for about 6 hours and my wife teaching via Zoom, with me also at home but remoting into computers. It all works well, but the wifi was interfering with my bluetooth headset so I plugged in one of these:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B01H74VKZU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It works so well that I may get a few more so the mesh network isn't using part of its bandwidth talking to the 2 far mesh routers. My performance is about a factor of 5 faster and so far it has been completely stable (6 months so far).

 

[getakey]

Another option would be a MIMO device. I have a mesh network with 3 google wifi pucks (1st gen). I have 39 devices on it and 2kids doing zoom calls everyday for about 6 hours and my wife teaching via Zoom, with me also at home but remoting into computers. It all works well, but the wifi was interfering with my bluetooth headset so I plugged in one of these:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B01H74VKZU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It works so well that I may get a few more so the mesh network isn't using part of its bandwidth talking to the 2 far mesh routers. My performance is about a factor of 5 faster and so far it has been completely stable (6 months so far).

I have mesh as well with ~40 devices. Very happy with speed (download at the cable modem is ~500 Mbps).
When you say 5 times faster, do you mean 5 times faster than your wifi?

 

[Kodemonkey]

I have mesh as well with ~40 devices. Very happy with speed (download at the cable modem is ~500 Mbps).
When you say 5 times faster, do you mean 5 times faster than your wifi?

Yes. Even though I have AC1200, my upload speed was 10Mbps, and my download in the 20Mbps range when everyone was doing zoom calls at the same time. Now I am getting my full 20Mbps upload and 80-100 Mbps down. I have 2 HD Nest cameras also streaming all the time. The Mesh handles it and I have zero complaints from the family about bandwidth. I just know the Gen1 Google wifi doesn't have a third radio for backhauling the data between the nodes. So there is a lot of overhead on the regular channels. Having them all plugged into the powerline MIMO devices would probably speed things up. My speed at the router is 450Mbps down and 20Mbps up, and the mesh tests it every day and it is spot on.

 

[Kodemonkey]

Yes. Even though I have AC1200, my upload speed was 10Mbps, and my download in the 20Mbps range when everyone was doing zoom calls at the same time. Now I am getting my full 20Mbps upload and 80-100 Mbps down. I have 2 HD Nest cameras also streaming all the time. The Mesh handles it and I have zero complaints from the family about bandwidth. I just know the Gen1 Google wifi doesn't have a third radio for backhauling the data between the nodes. So there is a lot of overhead on the regular channels. Having them all plugged into the powerline MIMO devices would probably speed things up. My speed at the router is 450Mbps down and 20Mbps up, and the mesh tests it every day and it is spot on.

My wife's computer (closest to the main mesh router) gets the full 450Mbps. My son basically built her a gaming computer because the school-supplied laptop she has is junk and everything was locked down. She's super happy now that she doesn't have to wait for her keystrokes to appear a second after she typed (the laptop wants to be on the school network and was constantly looking for something).

 

[getakey]

My wife's computer (closest to the main mesh router) gets the full 450Mbps. My son basically built her a gaming computer because the school-supplied laptop she has is junk and everything was locked down. She's super happy now that she doesn't have to wait for her keystrokes to appear a second after she typed (the laptop wants to be on the school network and was constantly looking for something).

Thats cool. Good job for son and nice present for Mom

I just checked and speed at my modem is 598.7 down and 18.7 up. Forgot they upgraded the down speed several months ago
down speed at computer connected to wifi is 230 down and 17.6 up

 

[gpez]

Another option would be a MIMO device. I have a mesh network with 3 google wifi pucks (1st gen). I have 39 devices on it and 2kids doing zoom calls everyday for about 6 hours and my wife teaching via Zoom, with me also at home but remoting into computers. It all works well, but the wifi was interfering with my bluetooth headset so I plugged in one of these:

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B01H74VKZU/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It works so well that I may get a few more so the mesh network isn't using part of its bandwidth talking to the 2 far mesh routers. My performance is about a factor of 5 faster and so far it has been completely stable (6 months so far).

Are those power line adapters frequency sensitive? Curious if they degrade/drop when the Powerwall is supplying power and has increased the microgrid frequency.

 

[jjrandorin]

Another option would be a MIMO device. I have a mesh network with 3 google wifi pucks (1st gen). I have 39 devices on it .

I have mesh as well with ~40 devices.

I knew there was a reason I feel such an affinity for people in this section of TMC. I have like 52 devices on my home network, and my IT co workers (all gadget geeks) were giving me grief about it, because (for example) my new fridge has wifi. Its fairly useless, but it IS connected (lmao).

They all had <20 devices and were like "what are you doing there, at home???"

Its just my wife and I here, and I dont even have alexa or anything like it, I just have TVs, game systems, receivers, cameras, laptops, ipads, nvidia shields, etc etc. Seeing you guys have similar number of devices makes me feel even more at home

 

[h2ofun]

Thats cool. Good job for son and nice present for Mom

I just checked and speed at my modem is 598.7 down and 18.7 up. Forgot they upgraded the down speed several months ago
down speed at computer connected to wifi is 230 down and 17.6 up

So, if you were to start over, what is the best wifi setup to get for the house? My stuff just does not work worth beans

 

[getakey]

Are those power line adapters frequency sensitive? Curious if they degrade/drop when the Powerwall is supplying power and has increased the microgrid frequency.

Another question. I remember puting one of these in my last house without Mesh because one of my TVs was out of range of the wifi. However, I recall having to put some sort of filter on the cable line to prevent network going back outside of the house.
Is this still required?

 

[getakey]

So, if you were to start over, what is the best wifi setup to get for the house? My stuff just does not work worth beans

My mesh is Linksys, but a couple years old. Haven't kept up to date with the latest, but usually good info through reviews of the products at Best Buy or Amazon. Or find reviews in CNET

 

[jjrandorin]

So, if you were to start over, what is the best wifi setup to get for the house? My stuff just does not work worth beans

You might like the home networking reviews at the following site:

Dong Knows Tech

He covers all sorts of mesh networking / home networking, and does speed tests etc. Take a look there.

 

[Kodemonkey]

Are those power line adapters frequency sensitive? Curious if they degrade/drop when the Powerwall is supplying power and has increased the microgrid frequency.

the HD-PLC technology should not be affected, but I have no idea if the device will not like higher micro grid frequency. I’ll let you know when I get mine installed. But if the power is out, the mid spans from fiber/cable providers are probably going to drop as well. It’s not like the days of POTS where they have a room full of batteries at the Central Office. That’s why I still have a landline plug in phone. Even though I don’t have a landline, I can still dial 911. Today in southern CA I have received PSPS (planned safety power shutoff) from Edison AND ATT cellular.

 

[Kodemonkey]

You might like the home networking reviews at the following site:

Dong Knows Tech

He covers all sorts of mesh networking / home networking, and does speed tests etc. Take a look there.

I will check that out. Always like review sites. I’ve sold at least 5 google mesh systems after people saw mine and how easy it was to use. And the thing just works. So far the radios have held up well. We hammer on wifi so much that even the expensive routers radios would die in 2-3 years. This is random, but I had a Netgear Nighthawk tri band I put in at work. The damn thing had a leaky firewall - within a day after I fired it up several of our VOIP phones started ringing uncontrollably. Someone was trying to takeover our phones. I had to do a port forward for that inbound port to an up address that belonged to a unassigned IP and it stopped immediately. I ended up replacing it with a google wifi. Which sucked because the Netgear had a VPN feature I was going to use.

There are other mesh networks that may be better - at the time I bought it though it was a CNET editors choice. I’m sure that has changed.

 

[wjgjr]

Another question. I remember puting one of these in my last house without Mesh because one of my TVs was out of range of the wifi. However, I recall having to put some sort of filter on the cable line to prevent network going back outside of the house.
Is this still required?

Were you running a MoCA (using coax for networking) network? Those require a PoE filter, depending on the provider and how they bring the network to your home. With FiOS (which does not require a PoE filter,) due to equipment we aready had, we use MoCA as the backbone for wireless (and for some extra ports as needed) - a verizon router (configured just to act as a switch + wireless) and two "network extenders" actually works really well for us. But we also have cat-6 running from our primary router (which is located in our utility room, within 10 feet of the TEG) to important rooms in the house.

 

[getakey]

Were you running a MoCA (using coax for networking) network? Those require a PoE filter, depending on the provider and how they bring the network to your home. With FiOS (which does not require a PoE filter,) due to equipment we aready had, we use MoCA as the backbone for wireless (and for some extra ports as needed) - a verizon router (configured just to act as a switch + wireless) and two "network extenders" actually works really well for us. But we also have cat-6 running from our primary router (which is located in our utility room, within 10 feet of the TEG) to important rooms in the house.

It might have been MoCA now that I think about it which would make more sense. Was in my last house

 

[bmah]

But if the power is out, the mid spans from fiber/cable providers are probably going to drop as well. It’s not like the days of POTS where they have a room full of batteries at the Central Office. That’s why I still have a landline plug in phone. Even though I don’t have a landline, I can still dial 911. Today in southern CA I have received PSPS (planned safety power shutoff) from Edison AND ATT cellular.

In NorCal, Comcast goes down a few hours into PSPS events for this reason.

At least in our area, AT&T fiber to the home service uses GPON (Gigabyte Passive Optical Network) technology, which doesn't require any repeaters or amplifiers between the ONT and the...central office? head end? Anyway, the end result is that because Powerwalls kept my home network gear powered-up, "the Internet stayed up" at my house during three multi-day PSPS events over the past 15 months. Turned me into a big fan of GPON.

Bruce.

 

[Kodemonkey]

In NorCal, Comcast goes down a few hours into PSPS events for this reason.

At least in our area, AT&T fiber to the home service uses GPON (Gigabyte Passive Optical Network) technology, which doesn't require any repeaters or amplifiers between the ONT and the...central office? head end? Anyway, the end result is that because Powerwalls kept my home network gear powered-up, "the Internet stayed up" at my house during three multi-day PSPS events over the past 15 months. Turned me into a big fan of GPON.

Bruce.

We don't have that particular service in my area but I had 3 neighbors that went with the ATT Fiber and they all eventually went back to Spectrum. They said it was slow and the TV service was complete garbage. It all depends on the area. I know they have GPON in LA, but we are north of the city and our last mile is a different product.

Have no idea what the telecom terminology is anymore. I used to run an ISP with 56K modems and T1 lines (our MCI internet cost for 1.544Mbit was $3000 a month). We used to call them NAPs. Then AOL built a POP in our area and I had to sell off. Still kept the ISDN customers though. I was the only one in the area with those - I even had out of area people using it paying intra-lata fees! Remember when it used to cost more to call to the next city than it was to call across the country? I don't miss those days...

 

[Kodemonkey]

In NorCal, Comcast goes down a few hours into PSPS events for this reason.

At least in our area, AT&T fiber to the home service uses GPON (Gigabyte Passive Optical Network) technology, which doesn't require any repeaters or amplifiers between the ONT and the...central office? head end? Anyway, the end result is that because Powerwalls kept my home network gear powered-up, "the Internet stayed up" at my house during three multi-day PSPS events over the past 15 months. Turned me into a big fan of GPON.

Bruce.

Well, I just received this tweet from Spectrum - so that pretty much answers the question about my internet going down if there is a power outage.

 

[el-guapin]

Netgear R7800 running OpenWRT!