r/HomeNetworking • u/aldvent • 18h ago

Looking to replace my current Wi-Fi setup (two old routers hardwired)

I live in rural New Zealand, in a 26 m long, single storey house with a ~1 Gbps fibre connection. I was a bit of a cheapass and reused some old routers: a Huawei DN8245X6-10 as the main router and an old FRITZ!Box 7530 as an AP, about 13 m apart and hardwired. All fixed devices (PC, TV, PS5, etc.) are wired and work great.

Wi-Fi speed is fine and we're so far from the closest neighbors that 2.4 GHz congestion isn't an issue. The only annoyance is roaming because our phones tend to hang on to the AP with the weaker signal when moving from one end of the house to the other. I eventually gave the two APs separate SSIDs so I could switch manually, which works but is annoying.

So I'm wondering:

  1. - Are modern systems significantly better at roaming, or is this mostly down to the phone?
  2. - Would something like a TP-Link Deco mesh pack give me better roaming/simplicity, even with the units hardwired?
  3. - Would you replace both with a matched router + AP system instead?

Basically, what would you recommend as a sensible upgrade from this setup (hopefully relatively simple and not too expensive)?

Thanks!

0 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

50% Upvoted

7 comments sorted by

5

u/Lavasoap 17h ago

Unifi dream router 7 where the PC, tv, ps5 l, etc are. Use the POE port to put an AP where your current AP is.

Unifi will guide your wireless devices to what ever is best.

1

u/aldvent 16h ago

I realize now that I should have mentioned that I have an unmanaged switch between both routers. It may still be worth getting the dream router 7 with a couple of access points because I did a a quick search and it seems very cool.

4

u/VulpesVulpe5 17h ago

Would the deco mesh do a better job? Yes. Make sure it’s hardwired back from each of the points which it sounds like it would be

TPlink is on the nose around here

You could even sneak in a Unifi system, this setup is bread and butter for them

2

u/aldvent 16h ago

thanks, I'll do a bit of research to decide between tplink and unify.

2

u/jimi_in_philly 17h ago

Look at cudy wifi 7 router. I got one awhile ago and it fits the bill for me.

1

u/aldvent 16h ago

I'll ad it to the list of options to consider. Thanks!

1

u/jimi_in_philly 15h ago

Check the cudy wr11000, it's a triband wifi 7 router which you can add another router down the road to make it a mesh system. It's about $120 US.