topic Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro in Broadband & Landline

Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

TraderTravel — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 17:01:18 GMT

First up I should state that I have reported the issue posted below to EE Customer Services, but I thought it worthwhile posting here in case others are searching.

I have a new service connected (1.6gbps service) with a Smart Hub Pro and multiple Smart Wifi Pros. I thankfully have an ethernet network plumbed in, so all the Smart Wifi Pros are connected via ethernet directly back into the Smart Hub Pro.

What I have noticed is that if you connect an Apple TV to the Smart Hub Pro via the second ethernet socket on the Smart Hub Pro, you will experience connectivity issues and speed issues (speeds drop down to 100-150mbps when measured using the SpeedTest app). Connectivity issues range from apple authentication issues to a few other odd gremlins. If I place a switch inbetween the Smart Hub Pro and the Apple TV, the speeds go back up to maximum (1gbps), and the connectivity issues disappear, so the software/firmware issue seems to be directly correlated to having the Apple TV directly connected to the Smart Wifi Pro using ethernet.

I have been able to replicate the issue with multiple Apple TVs and multiple Smart Hub Pros, so the issue definitely seems to be a software/firmware related issue - it is not a hardware issue. Plugging an Apple TV directly into the router (Smart Hub Pro) does not exhibit the issue, so it is only via the extenders.

Hopefully the issue will be fixed in a future update, although it does make me wonder whether any other devices experience issues when connected to the Smart Wifi Pro via the ethernet socket.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

norwoody — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 17:08:50 GMT

Just adding my 50p worth. I recently got a new M4 Mac Mini and I'm noticing the same issues. When it is wired to one of the Smart Wifi Pros (the extenders) I get ridiculously low speeds (20mbps down / 60 up), whilst I get ~400mbps down ~100 up connecting over wifi. I've swapped ethernet cables plenty of times too.

I'm on the standard 900 down / 100 up package. I'd also noticed the EE TV mini box was cutting out a fair bit in my second bedroom but putting 2 & 2 together it's likely down to the same issue (it's hardwired to an extender as a workaround to other issues with not behaving correctly over wifi)

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

TraderTravel — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 17:40:55 GMT

Agree 100% with you. I've also swapped cables and checked ports and I am able to reproduce the issue. Definitely not surprised your Mac is affected if Apple TV has similar issues.

Interestingly I am using my Mac Laptop with a 2.5gbps dongle and I have no issues at all, but that is obviously not using the built in ethernet adapters and instead is using a USB connected ethernet chipset (Realtek based).

There is another thread here with slightly different issues which I suspect might also be related:

Smart Wifi pro wired backhaul issues - The EE Community

Regardless, I would definitely get in touch with customer service so that these bugs can get squashed. I'm very certain a firmware update can resolve this.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

norwoody — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 17:58:53 GMT

Thanks, off the back of what you said I just tried with two spare dongles I had lying around (10/100/1000) one from Anker and another from uni and the anker one seems to behave normally from both ports of the hub.

After checking, it looks like the Anker dongle has a ASIX chipset, while apple uses Broadcom and my other dongle uses Realtek. Strangely only the ASIX seems to be working reliably.

I'll get in touch with customer services, thanks. I have seen posts elsewhere that suggest there are newer versions of the firmware available than what I'm running, but unfortunately updates are entirely under EE's control.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

TraderTravel — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 18:40:30 GMT

Be aware it is not just a speed issue. I think there are general issues with packets as I was experiencing a lot of login issues for Apple services, so this is not just a matter of not getting the speed you are paying for.

Curious to see if you are seeing this on the Mac as well, although I suspect a Mac application might be a little more tolerant of connectivity glitches compared to an Apple TV.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 19:03:17 GMT

@TraderTravel You seem to have conflicting information posted or just not explained well!

You wrote one statement ""What I have noticed is that if you connect an Apple TV to the Smart Hub Pro via the second ethernet socket on the Smart Hub Pro, you will experience connectivity issues and speed issues (speeds drop down to 100-150mbps when measured using the SpeedTest app). Connectivity issues range from apple authentication issues to a few other odd gremlins. ""

Then followed up with "" Plugging an Apple TV directly into the router (Smart Hub Pro) does not exhibit the issue, so it is only via the extenders.""

Think you are meaning what?

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

TraderTravel — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 20:07:42 GMT

The issue is only with the extenders (Smart WiFi Pro). Apologies for the mix up. EE’s naming in hardly friendly.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

norwoody — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 20:34:30 GMT

Yep,

I had a strange problem after transferring data from my old macbook to the mac mini the other day where logging into my apple account gave an "unknown error". I spent a while googling it and randomly unplugged ethernet only for the apple account login issues to go away... So that does sound like something funky going on with packets.

Networking has never been my forte at the best of times, but these Smart Wifi Pro extenders don't lend themselves to much investigation.

Update:

Now it seems like it's happening even while on wifi. I'll try restarting all of the extenders and the hub to see if that makes a difference.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 12:22:46 GMT

@TraderTravel No problems, i got what you were trying to put across, easy is just not in the vocabulary but it does make you workout the brain!

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 12:27:30 GMT

@norwoody Would just try a disconnect with the wireless wi-fi connection on the device and straight back on again about 30 seconds later, if it does not work, would be looking at the wireless wi-fi signal strength to start with.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

norwoody — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 13:06:35 GMT

@JimM11 cheers for the tip. Actually not long after posting that I powered down the Smart Wifi Pro Extenders, rebooted the Smart Hub Pro (Router) and left the extenders off for about an hour or so. I then turned the extenders back on one by one and so far speeds seem to be in range with what I'm expected both wired and wireless.

I'm not sure what's going on but the ethernet issues with the mac mini and the slow wifi seems to have gone for now but it doesn't look like I've had a firmware update or anything and I've changed nothing else in my network.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 13:41:22 GMT

@norwoody The last Pro FW update was way back in Feb25 as far as user's had posted then was at that time, the details below just incase you need to compare, anything different may be newer, there are NO dates, i add that as ref when first seen Forum wise just so you know! All you can do is keep the eye on it and see how it all behaves!

FW: r2.64.7-R-1303938-PROD-1 and the gui is at App version 2.34.2. 07/02/2025

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

wenklaw — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 13:55:36 GMT

Yep I’m seeing issues with wired backhaul speeds degrading over 24 hours to around half what it should be, approx 400mbps.

And I’m also unable to connect to my openvpn host I have running on my NAS (on the same network) if the device trying to connect is connected to the EE WiFi pro. If the device is connected to the EE router it can connect to my OpenVPN host no problem. Now this isn’t particularly important BUT devices SHOULD be able to connect via the EE WiFi pro and always have been able to when I have used other MESH devices via a wired backhaul.

Something seriously wrong with the EE WiFi pro IMO

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

norwoody — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 15:32:16 GMT

@JimM11 wrote:
@norwoody The last Pro FW update was way back in Feb25 as far as user's had posted then was at that time, the details below just incase you need to compare, anything different may be newer, there are NO dates, i add that as ref when first seen Forum wise just so you know! All you can do is keep the eye on it and see how it all behaves!
FW: r2.64.7-R-1303938-PROD-1 and the gui is at App version 2.34.2. 07/02/2025

@JimM11 yeah I have the same versions on my Smart Hub too. Though I did see some mention of a new version that allowed for setting DNS servers as part of DHCP? Or maybe that was for a different EE router model, it’s difficult to keep up with the naming conventions.

@wenklaw interesting that you mention the degradation happens over 24 hours, I’ll check my network again later tonight to see if I notice the same.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 15:45:16 GMT

@norwoody EE Smarthub+ implemented now last release of there FW update, Pro in the future who knows! One follows other follows other but never together, lot's going on no doubt!

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

TraderTravel — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 16:00:35 GMT

I see the issues as soon as I connect an Apple device (natively) to the EE Wifi Pro (i.e. extender). Just to reiterate, Apple TV seems to drop from 1gbps down to 100-150mbps when connected via the extender. The extender itself is connected to the main Smart Hub Pro via ethernet backhaul. If I disconnected the extender and plug the Apple TV into the ethernet which connects to the Smart Hub Pro, I get the full 1gbps again.

I've been able to duplicate this behaviour on two different Apple TVs, and on two different Smart Wifi Pros (extenders).

Personally I don't like running Apple TV on anything but ethernet, as a TV never moves and it always likes to hog bandwidth. If you have multiple people watching TV in different rooms, directing that traffic down ethernet makes sense.

My key issue is not the just the drop in speed, but more importantly the fact it does appear to be dropping packets as I get authentication issues etc. Considering all the traffic is staying on the wire, this should not be happening.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

XRaySpeX — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 16:02:15 GMT

@norwoody wrote:
Though I did see some mention of a new version that allowed for setting DNS servers as part of DHCP? Or maybe that was for a different EE router model, it’s difficult to keep up with the naming conventions.

That's for the the Smart Hub Plus now @ f/ware level r3.8.11-R-1414606-PROD-83002 , not the SH Pro.

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Wed, 06 Aug 2025 18:40:51 GMT

@TraderTravel Do you have a spare or old 1Gb/s switch lying around that you could try in between the Apple TV and the Spare nic port on the Extender where you currently have the Apple TV currently connected!

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

TraderTravel — Mon, 11 Aug 2025 09:59:43 GMT

As you will see above @JimM11 , clearly I do, as I am able to test the difference in speed between an Apple TV directly connected to the Smart Wifi Pro (extender) via ethernet, and that of a device connected via a Switch. I don't however believe I should have to use an additional switch just to get the thing to work. 🙂

Re: Apple TV connectivity issues with Smart Wifi Pro

JimM11 — Mon, 11 Aug 2025 11:06:10 GMT

@TraderTravel The should or should not you are correct, best look to your own gear then and not rely on EE equipment!