[SOLVED] Mesh or router for apartment

[Deer87]

Hi people,
My old d-link 150n is beginning to give up on me, so I'm shopping for a replacement.
First a sales rep told me that I need to switch to Mesh as it was the future. Then I asked a friend who works in IT (software, not hardware) and he was dead against it, although he tends to have strong opinions.

I looked a bit around and my gut-feeling is aimed at a Tp-link archer c7, as it appears to be a good allround router.

I live in a two-bedroom-apartment, but might move to a house within a few years. Internet-speed is 75 Mbit PS/ 75 Mbit PS.
And currently my desktop is cabled, and we have a smart-TV, two smartphones and an iPad connected to the wifi.
My oldest kid is two so I'm leaving them out of the equation for now.

What should I choose, mesh or router, and is the 7c a reasonable choice?
Thanks in advance

 

[richiestang_78]

Mesh networks are the future for large scale wifi as they solve alot of problems with accesspoints/extenders. But if you are going to be in apartment for a few more years, save your money and just get a normal router until the price of mesh network equipment comes down.

 

[gmagdna]

That router is a good budget choice that'll work great for the apt, or a house assuming you aren't Jed Clampett moving into a multi-thousand sq ft mansion. The C7 will effectively cover ~2,300sq ft (theoretica). In the house if you find dead spots due to materials, number of walls, whatever...you can get an extender. Plus in a couple of years when the child is an avid online gamer tossing back Red Bulls chatting with his Kindergarten homies until 3am, you'll still be able to surf the internet looking up "how did I get here?" on all the self help sites while you binge listen to Netflix in the background.

 

[Deer87]

Thanks both of you for the input. It sounds like it's a good choice then, and as Richie put it the tech gets cheaper in the next couple of years.
It solved my issue so thanks a ton

 

[bill001g]

Your friend was correct, I am more likely than him to recommend you never use mesh.

Mesh is mostly marketing trying to sell slightly better repeater software. It still has the major issue that it must receive a good signal from the main router and still be close enough to resend it. It does not fix the largest issue that every radio hop you pass increases you change for interference and adds delay at each hop. Many times the repeaters themselves actually cause interference with each other especially if you have more than 1. Some of the technology still send the same signal back to the main router in the same radio band that stomps on any new signal being sent like first generation repeaters.

The only way the so called "mesh" works well is if you connect them via ethernet cable. This is a massive deception since using remote devices as "AP" has been done since the beginning of wifi in corporate installs.

Also don't believe their stupid stuff about seamless roaming. The end client not the network actually controls where it connects. They might try to force the client to do what they want but it is far from seamless. Normally the user of the device knows best and can just stop and start the wifi client and get the same results.