EE smarthub plus and TP deco Mesh

[Stamfordgarden]

Hi

I am new to EE broadband

I have a FTTP fibre 67 service with an EE smarthub plus and a landline service (home phone adapter) but my long thin house with thick interior walls suffers poor wifi coverage☹️  (and physically relocating the router is  a problem)

A friend has offered a TP deco X60 mesh router 3 pack (very good price 2nd hand) and wondered how I can use this to replace the smarthub3 but keep the digital landline whilst eliminating my coverage dead spots

Is this possible and has anyone else used a 3rd party mesh router and kept digital voice?

@XRaySpeX  (good answers and knowledge for other problems)

@Mustrum (good answers and knowledge for other problems)

[Stamfordgarden]

Sorry meant FTTC fibre 67

[Mustrum]

@Stamfordgarden  alas EE (and many other) Digital Voice needs the EE router to work.

In theory it should be possible to connect an ATA to any router, but EE(BT) have kept their settings hidden from the public to ensure their routers are used.

That said, you could connect the mesh up as an access point, or even a secondary router and run your network from your mesh system. Much will depend on what you are using it for and if your apps can cope with double NAT - an issue for gaming users I believe.

HTH.

[XRaySpeX]

For DV you must use the EE SH+ as 1st in line from the ONT. So you can't just replace it but could use the Mesh Router as a secondary router.

[Stamfordgarden]

Hi @XRaySpeX @Mustrum 

Thanks for the swift replies (sorry I think I confused a bit as I meant to put FTTC not FTTP so i dont have an ONT) but your replies are still valid I am sure

So if I understand you correctly my options are:

1) Turn off wifi on EE SH+ and use deco mesh as wifi access point or secondary router therefore  keeping my ATA and digital voice

2) Buy EE mesh components to bolt on to existing EE SH+ - I assume they sell these rather than just a coverage service??? giving me mesh and digital voice 

3) Use deco mesh 100% (no SH+) and also scrap the digital voice land line capability - gives me mesh but no voice

Is that a correct list?

[XRaySpeX]

Yes, those are your options.

[Mustrum]

@Stamfordgarden   It is close, but for option 3 it is unlikely your Mesh system includes a VDSL modem, so you would need one of those if you were to do away with the EE Router.

Option 2 ties you into EE even more but does include the extra features should you need them, that the EE site advertises.

HTH

[Stamfordgarden]

Hi @XRaySpeX @Mustrum 

Thanks again  - so if I do go for option 1

( Turn off wifi on EE SH+ and use deco mesh as wifi access point or secondary router therefore  keeping my ATA and digital voice)

Is this fairly straight forward to do or does it generally take some trial and error to get the right settings/config?

Apologies if that is a bit of a subjective/naïve question (probably depends on the mesh router)

Any major do's or dont's from your experience?

[Mustrum]

@Stamfordgarden   yes fairly straightforward, but without knowing which Mesh and what you want to connect to it then not sure what else to add at this stage.

I guess my first other question would be are you likley to get Full Fibre any time soon?

[Stamfordgarden]

Hi @Mustrum 

Its a Deco x60 mesh 3 pack from TP-link 

Unfortunately full fibre is not on the horizon for my village any time soon 😪

The steps I had assumed were turn off wifi on EE SH+ connect  x60 via cable, config SH as a master and X60 as slave (DHCP settings) and fingers crossed, then work out how to keep ATA working