Mesh setup advice

[srtboy28]

I recently purchased 6 eero pros off ebay. I wanted to get some feedback from the community here on what I should do to create a mesh network within my home. I am currently using 6 asus routers to get wireless thoughout the house. Here is a diagram of my current setup. This diagram doesnt have all the devices listed but shows most of the configuration. This setup has two AC3100 as access points and four AC66/AC68 in wireless bridge mode. I was looking at eero and thought I could replace all 6 asus routers with these eero pro gen2's. After some discussion with eero support most are advising against this. The main issue here is that when my spouse walks upstairs or downstairs her Iphone doesn't change ssid's within our network. I was thinking that creating a mesh network with one ssid would be better. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

This network has 55 devices connected in total. 15 wired 40 wireless.

 

[thiggins]

It would be helpful to know what eero support's objection is. But I'd guess it's that there would be waay too many APs in use.

Assuming that eero pros will bridge to the Ethernet port as long as they see that is is not connected to the internet, the problem is mesh nodes will still act as APs. Routers set to bridge mode to not act act APs.

Too many APs in too small an area will have way too much signal overlap and devices won't be able to roam properly.

Having a single SSID doesn't make devices roam more easily. It also has the downside of not being able to manually select a specific band or AP for connection.

Devices determine when to roam and where to connect. Apple devices traditionally have been known to be very "sticky", i.e. they don't roam easily. But newer iPhones on the latest iOS implement 11k, v and sometimes r, which can help with roaming, if APs/routers also support it.

Deployment Reference for iPhone and iPad

This content has moved.

support.apple.com

Wi-Fi roaming support in Apple devices

Supported Apple devices and Cisco networks recognize each other, allowing the devices and network to use the latest Wi-Fi technologies to optimize the experience.

support.apple.com

But you still must not have a lot of overlap between APs / mesh nodes. You might try reducing 2.4 GHz transmit power in the router and AP.

 

[srtboy28]

It would be helpful to know what eero support's objection is. But I'd guess it's that there would be waay too many APs in use.

Assuming that eero pros will bridge to the Ethernet port as long as they see that is is not connected to the internet, the problem is mesh nodes will still act as APs. Routers set to bridge mode to not act act APs.

Too many APs in too small an area will have way too much signal overlap and devices won't be able to roam properly.

Having a single SSID doesn't make devices roam more easily. It also has the downside of not being able to manually select a specific band or AP for connection.

Devices determine when to roam and where to connect. Apple devices traditionally have been known to be very "sticky", i.e. they don't roam easily. But newer iPhones on the latest iOS implement 11k, v and sometimes r, which can help with roaming, if APs/routers also support it.

Deployment Reference for iPhone and iPad

This content has moved.

support.apple.com

Wi-Fi roaming support in Apple devices

Supported Apple devices and Cisco networks recognize each other, allowing the devices and network to use the latest Wi-Fi technologies to optimize the experience.

support.apple.com

But you still must not have a lot of overlap between APs / mesh nodes. You might try reducing 2.4 GHz transmit power in the router and AP.

All my devices have low ping and high throughput. The only issue is when roaming with mobile devices. I am thinking I will just return the eero pros and stick with what I have. One suggestion from the subreddit was to install AX cards and get rid of the asus routers. I thought for some reason having the routers in bridge mode would cause some issues. I haven't been able to run a successful mesh system. I tried merlin firmware 384 with mesh 1.0 and nothing seemed to connect on the second node. I also have all my routers on firmware 380.69_2 since anything higher seems to cause drops with my smart switches and just random drops within the network.

Also eero support basically said that for my home size of 3500sqft anything more than 3 or 4 nodes would cause issues. They dont recommend using 6 nodes. I had planned on wire backhauling three and then using 3 for the desktops upstairs.

 

[Tucu]

Why do you use different SSIDs on each AC3100? If you want devices to roam the AP should share the SSID.

In my house I have 3 APs (one on each floor); I split the network into 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz SSIDs. Laptops and smartphones use the 5Ghz band. Roaming usually works quite well. The floors of the house are made of concrete, brick and tiles so the signal drops a lot as we move between floors. This is also aided by using low power on the 5Ghz band; 2 APs are on 200mW and one is on 100mW.

 

[srtboy28]

Why do you use different SSIDs on each AC3100? If you want devices to roam the AP should share the SSID.

In my house I have 3 APs (one on each floor); I split the network into 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz SSIDs. Laptops and smartphones use the 5Ghz band. Roaming usually works quite well. The floors of the house are made of concrete, brick and tiles so the signal drops a lot as we move between floors. This is also aided by using low power on the 5Ghz band; 2 APs are on 200mW and one is on 100

I just assumed that each access point should have a different ssid. I currently have 2.4ghz and 5ghz split. If I name each access points ssid the same would that cause any issues?

 

[degrub]

IF you want client devices to"roam", then the SSIDs need to have the same name. If you want to manually select the SSID to associate with as you move around, name them different. If you want to restrict certain devices to one band or the other, name those two bands differently, but keep all of the different APs 2.4 GHZ SSID's the same name and the APs 5 GHz their own name but common across the APs.

 

[Tucu]

I just assumed that each access point should have a different ssid. I currently have 2.4ghz and 5ghz split. If I name each access points ssid the same would that cause any issues?

It should not cause any issues and it should help with roaming. Keep the band split but use one SSID per band. Use the same credentials on each router. Best if you use different 80Mhz channels for each of them. At home I use 36-48, 52-64 and 100-112 (the last two are DFS but they work in my setup).
In the US channels 36-48 and 149-161 are not DFS channels so they are the most commonly used.

 

[srtboy28]

Thanks for the help. I should have asked for help a long time ago. I will sync ssids and place them on different channels as suggested.

 

[thiggins]

IF you want client devices to"roam", then the SSIDs need to have the same name.

As long as a device has been authenticated on each SSID, it should be able to roam. Same SSID is not necessary.

 

[Tucu]

As long as a device has been authenticated on each SSID, it should be able to roam. Same SSID is not necessary.

I could be misremembering, but isn't 802.11r's mobility domain bound to one ESSID? So fast transition can only happen within one SSID?

 

[thiggins]

I could be misremembering, but isn't 802.11r's mobility domain bound to one ESSID? So fast transition can only happen within one SSID?

I'll take your word for it. But 11r support is not common in consumer Wi-Fi. And most users aren't concerned about sub 100ms roam times.