Question Deco Mesh Networking questions

[FabioTTT]

Hello, I'm interested in setting up my home network with a mesh system. Mainly I'm looking at TP Link'sDeco X75 package.

I have two big questions which nobody seems to be able to answer for me. I've reached out to TP Link support and they have no answered me.

1. Is it not possible to use my preexisting router to do the routing and have all 3 deco satellites run as Access points running in mesh?

2. I know that one of the 3 deco satellites will have to be used as a main router (by my ISPs modem). My questions is the 2 remaining deco satellites extend off of one another in the same direction? To help visualize this, I'm asking if all satellites need to be in range of the primary deco that is acting as the router by my modem?

Some things to consider:

I live in an old house so i cannot route ethernet cable through the walls and running ethernet outside the walls is not an option for aesthetic reasons (i don't care but people i live with do).

I live in a country where walls are brick/concrete with rods in them so each of these satellites will cover a much smaller range. Hence the question if they can extend off of one another without having them all be in range of the main deco.

I'm currently using powerline adapters but its not as efficient and the quality degrades after 100 meters.

The product I'm considering is: https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-Deco-..._t2_B09XGKHSRB
My current router is: https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-Arche...00&sr=8-1&th=1

I'd appreciate any advice or suggestions. Thanks!

 

[bill001g]

Check if MoCA is a option, do you have coax cables in the remote rooms.

Powerline units might be as good as any mesh system when you have walls that block wifi. If you exceed 100 meters you live in a mansion. Powerline is much more stable than wifi but can be slower. It depends on your needs. Mostly high speed is used for downloads. Powerline units can get about 130mbps for many people which is more than enough for most things. When you consider 4k netflix users under 25mbps.

You can not use the devices as "access points". Not because of any limitations in the device but because you do not have ethernet cables. A access point is always connected via ethernet.

Everything else is some kind of wifi repeater. In most cases mesh systems will only function with other devices from the same manufacture. Many times even different mesh systems model from the same manufacture can be incompatible. Mesh is not part of any wifi standard so all the implementations are proprietary. They partially do this to force you to buy everything from the same company. Some wifi mesh systems are just renamed repeaters. Many of these use a function called WDS to solve some of the issues with repeater. Although WDS is not a official standard most device function together.

Many mesh systems only talk between the remote units and the main router. Some will go remote unit to remote unit.
Again all proprietary stuff so you need to read the documentation. Repeater/mesh systems already get a massive performance hit because of having 2 radio signals. If you are going to add a third radio hop it is going to compound the issue. Your powerline units might actually perform better that a three or more hop wifi mesh system.

I would avoid any mesh systems if you have any other option.

 

[FabioTTT]

Check if MoCA is a option, do you have coax cables in the remote rooms.

Powerline units might be as good as any mesh system when you have walls that block wifi. If you exceed 100 meters you live in a mansion. Powerline is much more stable than wifi but can be slower. It depends on your needs. Mostly high speed is used for downloads. Powerline units can get about 130mbps for many people which is more than enough for most things. When you consider 4k netflix users under 25mbps.

You can not use the devices as "access points". Not because of any limitations in the device but because you do not have ethernet cables. A access point is always connected via ethernet.

Everything else is some kind of wifi repeater. In most cases mesh systems will only function with other devices from the same manufacture. Many times even different mesh systems model from the same manufacture can be incompatible. Mesh is not part of any wifi standard so all the implementations are proprietary. They partially do this to force you to buy everything from the same company. Some wifi mesh systems are just renamed repeaters. Many of these use a function called WDS to solve some of the issues with repeater. Although WDS is not a official standard most device function together.

Many mesh systems only talk between the remote units and the main router. Some will go remote unit to remote unit.
Again all proprietary stuff so you need to read the documentation. Repeater/mesh systems already get a massive performance hit because of having 2 radio signals. If you are going to add a third radio hop it is going to compound the issue. Your powerline units might actually perform better that a three or more hop wifi mesh system.

I would avoid any mesh systems if you have any other option.

Thank you for your reply. I had purchased MoCA in the past and attempted to use it in my home but was surprised to find that the moca system requires an additional coax connection to be available on your router/modem which is something none of the routers I've owned have had. I also don't even know if MoCA can be used with my ISP. I live in Peru and my ISP is Movistar.

I'm also not even sure how I would use MoCA when ive just recently switched over to a fiber connection. I'm honestly not even sure if MoCA is supported here in Peru.

As far as powerline tech is concerned, its what I have been using but the wiring in this apartment building is very old and is not grounded so I can't take advantage of things like MIMO for the extra throughput. 100 meters does sound like a lot but the wiring is so old thats its possible that the wires/cables haven't been done optimally over the years. The other end of the house will only need a connection for streaming media (4k content at max). The problem is when my powerline satellites are on that end of the apartment (its a reasonably big apartment with 2 floors) I top out at about 20 megabits if I'm lucky which isn't adequate from streaming 4k.

 

[bill001g]

Moca does not require any direct connection to the router via coax. The moca unit does of course need to be attached to your router to get network but that is done via ethernet.

The basic way it works is router---ethernet---moca----coax---moca---end devices.

In the simplest installs the coax cable just runs between the 2 rooms and is not connected to anything else. What is confusing is moca has the ability to share the coax cable with internet and television signals. In these cases you would only have 1 coax wire in the room by the modem/router. You need a splitter to connect both the modem/router and the moca unit to the one cable. This is just a option for people that have internet on coax it is not required to run it this way.

 

[FabioTTT]

Moca does not require any direct connection to the router via coax. The moca unit does of course need to be attached to your router to get network but that is done via ethernet.

The basic way it works is router---ethernet---moca----coax---moca---end devices.

In the simplest installs the coax cable just runs between the 2 rooms and is not connected to anything else. What is confusing is moca has the ability to share the coax cable with internet and television signals. In these cases you would only have 1 coax wire in the room by the modem/router. You need a splitter to connect both the modem/router and the moca unit to the one cable. This is just a option for people that have internet on coax it is not required to run it this way.

Thank you so much for the response. I tried to setup a MoCA network in the past and it was unsuccesful. I now have a fiber connection instead of a coax connection. Setting up a MoCA network would still work right?

 

[bill001g]

As long as the coax wire is still in the walls you can use it. It doesn't matter how your internet comes into the house...technically you don't even need internet if you wanted to just use moca to run a LAN.

 

[Pistolpackin]

1. Is it not possible to use my preexisting router to do the routing and have all 3 deco satellites run as Access points running in mesh? >>> Correct, not possible. The Archer is not TP mesh compatible, as far as I can tell.
Something else to consider. The Archer is a dual band router. The Deco is technically a triband... but good luck getting 6e to work as wireless backhaul because 6e reach is 15 feet, maybe. And if your environment is brick etc, the Deco purchase will never be able to use 6e as wireless backhaul, so effectively you'll have another dual band router. The ideal routers currently, in my opinion, are the triband units with one 2.4 and two 5Ghz bands. 6e is incredibly fast and efficient, but reach is poor by design\power table.

2. I know that one of the 3 deco satellites will have to be used as a main router (by my ISPs modem). My questions is the 2 remaining deco satellites extend off of one another in the same direction? To help visualize this, I'm asking if all satellites need to be in range of the primary deco that is acting as the router by my modem?
>>> Yes, I believe you can wirelessly daisy chain the two child nodes off the one parent node. Child two does not need to be in range of Parent, but Child two does need to be in range of Child one. And Child one needs to be in range of Parent. Setup all nodes in the same room of modem. It may tell you they are too close during setup, disregard the message and continue with setup. After they are setup, unplug both child nodes. Then relocate the first child node where you want it. Remember, these child nodes are wireless clients too, so if they are too far away from each other, they too will have high RSSI problems, and not connect to their upstream node in the daisy chain. Once you place the first Child node, wait for it to completely boot up, then turn off wifi on your phone used to setup. Then, while your standing next to Child one, turn wifi back on to ensure you're connecting to Child one. Run a 3rd party speedtest Oookla whatever, and see if Child one is providing acceptable speeds. Keep in mind, url and app based speedtests measure speed behind your wifi client (your phone,) so if Child one is too far away from Parent, and your phone is connected to Child one, your connectivity may work, but you speed may be impacted big time, especially since the Deco 5Ghz band will be doing two duties; providing backhaul communication between the parent\child nodes, and providing bandwidth for other wireless clients in the house, so again simply because you're using a dual band router (Deco), this can impact wireless mesh performance, regardless of distance between the nodes. If you're satisfied with speedtest result on phone while connected to Child one, then relocate Child two to the desired location. Then rinse and repeat; wait for Child two to boot up completely, disable wifi on your phone and turn it back on (to ensure you're still not physically connected to Child one.) Then run speedtest again and monitor results. If any of the speedtests don't provide adequate speeds, move the nodes closer to their upstream node.

Also, once you setup the Deco as a wireless mesh network, you might be able to use one of the Powerline to connect one child node as a wired AP directly to the Parent, and mesh functionality will still exist. This might allow you to extend one of the Child nodes far from the Parent. But, it may be too far to communicate wirelessly with the other Child node, so 'mesh roaming' may not work at all.
I'm not recommending you do this with both child nodes because the Powerlines may step on each other and may break Mesh or child nodes connectivity entirely.

Some things to consider:

I live in an old house so i cannot route ethernet cable through the walls and running ethernet outside the walls is not an option for aesthetic reasons (i don't care but people i live with do).

I live in a country where walls are brick/concrete with rods in them so each of these satellites will cover a much smaller range. Hence the question if they can extend off of one another without having them all be in range of the main deco.

I'm currently using powerline adapters but its not as efficient and the quality degrades after 100 meters.
>>> Are you providing internet to the entire community? 300 feet? What's going on here?

 

[FabioTTT]

1. Is it not possible to use my preexisting router to do the routing and have all 3 deco satellites run as Access points running in mesh? >>> Correct, not possible. The Archer is not TP mesh compatible, as far as I can tell.
Something else to consider. The Archer is a dual band router. The Deco is technically a triband... but good luck getting 6e to work as wireless backhaul because 6e reach is 15 feet, maybe. And if your environment is brick etc, the Deco purchase will never be able to use 6e as wireless backhaul, so effectively you'll have another dual band router. The ideal routers currently, in my opinion, are the triband units with one 2.4 and two 5Ghz bands. 6e is incredibly fast and efficient, but reach is poor by design\power table.

2. I know that one of the 3 deco satellites will have to be used as a main router (by my ISPs modem). My questions is the 2 remaining deco satellites extend off of one another in the same direction? To help visualize this, I'm asking if all satellites need to be in range of the primary deco that is acting as the router by my modem?
>>> Yes, I believe you can wirelessly daisy chain the two child nodes off the one parent node. Child two does not need to be in range of Parent, but Child two does need to be in range of Child one. And Child one needs to be in range of Parent. Setup all nodes in the same room of modem. It may tell you they are too close during setup, disregard the message and continue with setup. After they are setup, unplug both child nodes. Then relocate the first child node where you want it. Remember, these child nodes are wireless clients too, so if they are too far away from each other, they too will have high RSSI problems, and not connect to their upstream node in the daisy chain. Once you place the first Child node, wait for it to completely boot up, then turn off wifi on your phone used to setup. Then, while your standing next to Child one, turn wifi back on to ensure you're connecting to Child one. Run a 3rd party speedtest Oookla whatever, and see if Child one is providing acceptable speeds. Keep in mind, url and app based speedtests measure speed behind your wifi client (your phone,) so if Child one is too far away from Parent, and your phone is connected to Child one, your connectivity may work, but you speed may be impacted big time, especially since the Deco 5Ghz band will be doing two duties; providing backhaul communication between the parent\child nodes, and providing bandwidth for other wireless clients in the house, so again simply because you're using a dual band router (Deco), this can impact wireless mesh performance, regardless of distance between the nodes. If you're satisfied with speedtest result on phone while connected to Child one, then relocate Child two to the desired location. Then rinse and repeat; wait for Child two to boot up completely, disable wifi on your phone and turn it back on (to ensure you're still not physically connected to Child one.) Then run speedtest again and monitor results. If any of the speedtests don't provide adequate speeds, move the nodes closer to their upstream node.

Also, once you setup the Deco as a wireless mesh network, you might be able to use one of the Powerline to connect one child node as a wired AP directly to the Parent, and mesh functionality will still exist. This might allow you to extend one of the Child nodes far from the Parent. But, it may be too far to communicate wirelessly with the other Child node, so 'mesh roaming' may not work at all.
I'm not recommending you do this with both child nodes because the Powerlines may step on each other and may break Mesh or child nodes connectivity entirely.

Some things to consider:

I live in an old house so i cannot route ethernet cable through the walls and running ethernet outside the walls is not an option for aesthetic reasons (i don't care but people i live with do).

I live in a country where walls are brick/concrete with rods in them so each of these satellites will cover a much smaller range. Hence the question if they can extend off of one another without having them all be in range of the main deco.

I'm currently using powerline adapters but its not as efficient and the quality degrades after 100 meters.
>>> Are you providing internet to the entire community? 300 feet? What's going on here?

Thank you for the informative reply. The whole 300 meter was something I most likely recalled incorrectly. The performance of the powerling adapters does degrade significantly after a room or two at least in my home which has extremely old/poor wiring. Thanks again!