Wi-Fi System Roundup

[thiggins]

1. My understanding is that there system has one SSID and it determines which band a client will connect to (assuming the client is able to receive at both 2.4G and 5G). If the client supports 5G will the Orbi always connect it to 5G assuming that there is an adequate signal? What criteria does the Orbi used to determine which band it will connect the client to and are the criteria configurable?

My experience with Orbi as documented in the Roaming series is that Orbi will try to steer idle dual-band STAs to 5 GHz, as a general rule. It steers even if there is a strong 2.4 GHz connection. I haven't established what it uses for a 5 GHz RSSI threshold, but I'd assume it's in the 70-75 dBm range.

2. If I give the Orbi the same SSID and PW as the current 2.4G band on my router will all of my clients think that the Orbi is the same as my current Linksys router or will I have to re-enter the PW on all of my clients.

As long as the SSID and password are the same, your clients should connect. If they don't (and some STAs can be stubborn), just "forget" the old connection and re-connect to Orbi.

 

[JB20]

My experience with Orbi as documented in the Roaming series is that Orbi will try to steer idle dual-band STAs to 5 GHz, as a general rule. It steers even if there is a strong 2.4 GHz connection. I haven't established what it uses for a 5 GHz RSSI threshold, but I'd assume it's in the 70-75 dBm range.

As long as the SSID and password are the same, your clients should connect. If they don't (and some STAs can be stubborn), just "forget" the old connection and re-connect to Orbi.

Thank you once again for your insight and assistance

 

[speedlever]

Keep in mind that if you're blasting full power with multiple APs, your clients may have roaming issues since the signal strength may never drop low enough to cause the client to search for another, stronger AP. It can be a tricky balance and you may see differences between iOS and Android clients in that regard.

 

[bit curation]

We finally have our new Wi-Fi System test process up and running and ran the latest products from NETGEAR, TP-Link and eero through it.

Read on SmallNetBuilder

This is one of the best review found on the key differences among these mesh systems, the differences which are actually matter the most.

Would you consider to add Linksys Velop in the test? and what's the story about Nova, it has a huge upper side on the benchmark.