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Post by Ken on Apr 7, 2020 14:45:09 GMT -6
I have been noodling with this for awhile. I hate to replace infrastructure that is really essential but my Netgear Nighthawk 1900 started acting weird and it was getting a little old in terms of the compatibility (a/b/g/n, etc). After much snorting and pawing at the ground I picked up a three-beacon Eero Pro mesh system from Amazon. It was $499 which I consider steep. But I had $200 in reward money from my Capital One card so it was $300 instead. An app walks you through the setup and tells you if your placement of the beacons is good. From the app you can see who is on it and you can assign nicknames to the devices (Poptop's iPhone, Drez' Tilt Hydrometer, etc) and you can monitor all of that. The old router worked well. But we spend some time outside when it's warm and the coverage was a little dicey. In the past, I could barely stream music out there. After I installed this Eero system, I went out to the greenhouse and brought my tablet and streamed live TV out there. Impressive. So far, very happy with the coverage and speed. Cheers peeps.
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Post by jkor on Apr 9, 2020 11:54:46 GMT -6
I current have three wireless routers running, two in the house and one in the barn. Overall the coverage is really good. I had just one for a long time but I wanted coverage in the barn because I put a ad hoc home theater out there. I just daisy chained the routers and it works great. I can get wifi in the immediate vicinity of the barn, as well, which is nice. The far reaches of the backyard have no coverage but that's not a big deal. I had been looking into the mesh systems but the price seemed a little steep. I had got two newer TP Link routers on a clearance deal last year and i still had my old router, which wasn't terrible, so I didn't need to spend much to get it done, just a couple of long cat5e cables to daisy chain everything and I was good to go.
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Post by Ken on Apr 9, 2020 12:29:11 GMT -6
It's funny how much we rely on these things now. The other night there was a good storm that knocked out Comcast TV and web and also Dish TV and AT&T web at my neighbors house. Try isolating nicely with no web and no TV. The other part is that they keep coming up with new protocols and I assume each new one has its own set of goodies including the ability to switch from beacon to beacon seamlessly and I'm sure that speed, strength and distance are in there too. I think my old router was a "g" or "n" version. Now there is 802.11ac and 802.11ax. Yesterday I asked my wife and son how things were going with the new router. My wife was streaming Netflix to the greenhouse earlier in the week. But yesterday she said, "I've had some issues" and I asked WHAT and she said that some things seemed slow or were not working on her phone. My son glanced over at her phone and said, "Mom. Your wifi is turned off".
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Post by chils on Apr 9, 2020 13:00:32 GMT -6
Glad it worked out for you. Because of where I live our only options for internet are satellite or hotspot. I recently dumped my expensive(7 gigs/mth-$75) Verizon hotspot and bought a Sprint MiFi. Get 100 gigs of 4G a month for $65. I can pick it up even when out in my field 100yds away. I can finally watch videos!! Been great streaming on Amazon.
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Post by jayb151 on Apr 14, 2020 21:23:18 GMT -6
Man, I have one router on one side of the house, then I got an extender for the garage. Speeds in the garage aren't great, but are totally adequate for what I need. Plus the extender only cost me like $12.
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Post by Ken on Apr 14, 2020 22:07:13 GMT -6
Jayb... glad you made it over here, my friend. Cheers and welcome.
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Post by jayb151 on Apr 14, 2020 22:08:14 GMT -6
The one fault here, no Cheers emoji!
In any case, Cheers my brew brother.
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Post by Ken on Apr 14, 2020 22:09:25 GMT -6
The one fault here, no Cheers emoji! In any case, Cheers my brew brother. I know. I think our emojis are kind of lame. I may have to look into that.
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matt6150
Full Member
Patient Zero
Posts: 142
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Post by matt6150 on Apr 15, 2020 12:14:18 GMT -6
Ken, what's the difference with the systems that come with 3 eero pros vs 1 eero pro and 2 beacons? Is it just that you can't plug into the beacons? Also did you mount one outside at all?
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Post by Ken on Apr 15, 2020 12:59:10 GMT -6
Ken, what's the difference with the systems that come with 3 eero pros vs 1 eero pro and 2 beacons? Is it just that you can't plug into the beacons? Also did you mount one outside at all? Actually Matt, I think it's one and the same. All three of these Eero Pros look identical and have the same jacks on the back for hard-wiring with ethernet, etc. The instructions in the app ask you to grab one and use it as the one to connect to the modem. Then it walks you through placing the other two. Our house is a 2-story and about 3400 sqft and there is an office in the front and center of the first floor. That's where the one Eero is connected to the modem. The family room is back and left and the dining room is back and right. So the whole house (main floor, 2nd floor, basement) is covered well. The two beacons in the FR and DR also serve the backyard at this point. I mentioned that I went out to the greenhouse (probably 40-50' from the dining room beacon) and streamed live TV via wifi on a Fire tablet and it was smooth video... no pixels, buffering, etc. so I don't think I would have to add one outside. But if I needed to, I could take the dining room beacon and place it outside on a nice day (temporarily) and it would probably pick up either the main beacon or the family room beacon and that would cover the backyard even better. At this point it does not seem necessary because the greenhouse is about as far as we need wifi for.
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matt6150
Full Member
Patient Zero
Posts: 142
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Post by matt6150 on Apr 15, 2020 16:19:34 GMT -6
What I am seeing is the system you describe and then another with 1 eero pro and 2 beacons for $100 cheaper. If you go to the item you bought you can change it by selecting a different "size". I'm guessing the beacons just don't have Ethernet ports. I can't find any info on how far apart you can have each one.
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Post by Ken on Apr 15, 2020 16:34:46 GMT -6
I found this:
When I looked at the different systems I saw that all of the beacons seemed to have ports on the back. As I look at mine, they look the same: Power port, two ethernet ports. When I was looking, I was hoping that they would call one of them the "main router" and the others "beacons" because it would have made it more understandable. But these look the same. I'll just say this... if you have a decent-sized area to cover, you don't want to deal with dead spots, etc. and the price doesn't bother you, this system is the boss. I made it easier by using $200 in reward points. Believe me, I thought $499 was steep.
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matt6150
Full Member
Patient Zero
Posts: 142
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Post by matt6150 on Apr 15, 2020 17:43:04 GMT -6
I don't think you are following what I'm talking about. I understand the system you got but there is a different one that comes with beacons that is cheaper. From what I can tell the beacons have no Ethernet ports and just plug into the wall. They also don't provide as much coverage as the pro units. Thanks for the 50ft info. That puts me out of the range I was looking for.
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matt6150
Full Member
Patient Zero
Posts: 142
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Post by matt6150 on Apr 16, 2020 7:33:24 GMT -6
Ken, I didn't mean to come off as a dickhead but this is the system I was talking about. link
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Post by jkor on Apr 16, 2020 8:00:38 GMT -6
Man, I have one router on one side of the house, then I got an extender for the garage. Speeds in the garage aren't great, but are totally adequate for what I need. Plus the extender only cost me like $12. I've had mixed results (mostly poor) using extenders. I'm glad they work for you. I have some if you want them!
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