Disclaimer, I used a pair of these for about 9 months after the OR contractor deigned to install our new fiber ONT at the far aside of the house, as far away from my home office / server room as possible
After griping about this on the phone someone suggested I try the Smart WiFi package which came with the then-new WiFi 7 router and mesh extenders. I went with the EE package because at the time the homeowners (who I live with due to care commitments) didn't want me drilling holes to run Cat6 out to my office. So my layout was thus:
- Router (Smart WiFi Pro)
- Smart WiFi pro paired to above #1 (Wireless)
- Smart WiFi pro paired to above #2
- TPlink gigabit switch connected to above #3
- Workstation / gaming machine connected to #4 - this is a device I remote connect to when in the house
- Work laptop connected to #4
- Proxmox server connected to #4
All in all, the speeds ranged anywhere from 100mbps - 500mbps on devices physically connected to #3 in the list. Connectivity was pretty OK, I could even sometimes remote connect to #5 from the house, but the wireless latency and reliability was utterly terrible and the devices would become randomly unpaired. Eventually I removed #4 from the equation by running a cable out from the room #3 was placed in (as it had an old vent) out to my office and connected it to the switch. That did improve the speeds, which went up to a good 900mbps when it was "working" but this didn't eliminate the latency or random pairing issues.
A few months ago, I got around the cable limitation by using existing holes (eg old coax hole) to run a connection out from the room the router was in, out to the room the mesh extender was in - therefore connecting each endpoint up to cat6, but then another problem emerged. While the link from the router (#1) to mesh (#2) was great (as in if you tested on it, easy 900mbps speeds, <1ms latency when ping testing to the router) if you tested downstream of the mesh extender (when it was hardwired ethernet connected to the router) the link speed tanked to about 300-600mbps instead of the full gigabit it should've been capable of.
To prove it wasn't the link, I introduced an unmanaged switch to that room, connected my office switch (#4) to one port and the mesh #2 to the other, and testing downstream the speeds went back to full gigabit speed. As such I am looking to detach myself from that ecosystem and look at other solutions.
In summary, the Smart WiFi Pro package does have some pros, but it has some major cons that IMO aren't worth the extra £8 a month it costs vs just buying and setting up your own kit:
- EE software (and especially the EE app!) is unreliable and cannot be relied on. If you want to manage these things, do it via the WebUI (eg https://192.168.1.254) for your router
- If you need to pair up the Smart WiFi extenders so they could run wirelessly, my recommendation is to physically cable them to the router (or the mesh unit you want to pair them to) then leave them on for about 10 mins, then disconnect and place where you need. Please note you will be having to re-do this step several times a month
- The Smart WiFi extenders regularly become unpaired (on a weekly-daily basis) when connected to each other Wirelessly
- It doesn't state this, but the Smart WiFi extenders CAN pair to each other rather than just straight to the router, but looking in the app / webUI implies its just paired to the router
- The worst offender imo, when connected via ethernet, the link speed degrades in half
Adding to this, all my other householders are disabled. As in, if something stopped working, I was the only person who could deal with it. Which defeats the point of why I wanted the system to begin with, as it was to extend connection / service reliability across the house.
