একটি pfsense রাউটার দিয়ে আমার বিটি SmartHub প্রতিস্থাপন করার পর, আমি ভাল হিসাবে ঘর ওয়াইফাই আপগ্রেড করতে খুঁজছি করে থাকেন. যখন বেতার সবে একটি বাস্তবতা ছিল এমন বেশিরভাগ ডিভাইসে ওয়্যার্ড হয় সবচেয়ে কক্ষ সংযোগ আমি বছর আগে আমার পিতামাতার জন্য লাগানো ওয়্যার্ড আছে. তবে ফোনের, ট্যাবলেট, e‑readers, এবং ল্যাপটপের সত্যিই বেতার সঙ্গে সেরা কাজ করে (অথবা শুধুমাত্র কিছু ক্ষেত্রে বেতার সঙ্গে), and to work well need a wireless system that enables mobility.
Our house is old and fairly large — no single wireless point has ever provided reliable coverage, so I previously had 2 netgear EX6150 access points to ensure full coverage. আমিও ছিল 1 PC linked via powerline adaptors which I have been very unimpressed with. I had looked at wireless mesh networks and reviews a few times but felt (এবং এখনও মনে) that £100-£200 per access point is daylight robbery. There are plenty of basic devices out there for £50 or less than have all the hardware required, so I decided to investigate if these cheap devices could be turned into a mesh network
I should be clear about the difference between a mesh network and a collection of access points, as many other articles are not clear on this point. The key difference with a mesh network is that the access points communicate with each other and then tell client devices which access point to communicate with. With a set of normal access points a client device will stay connected as long as it can and will only switch to a new access point if it loses connection to the original. This means you can have a very low speed signal from a distance access point depite being near to a much stronger signal from a different access point. To put it simply — if you want to be able to roam and always get the best possible connection you need a mesh network.
To turn a cheap device into a mesh-compatible device just means the software on it needs to be able to communicate with the other access points and then issue advice to clients about the best access point to use. Of course no-one if giving away free software upgrades to old or cheap devices — instead they’d rather you junk the old hardware and splash out on new. Fortunately there are several open source replacements available, OpenWRT, সদস্যদের, ডিডি-WRT, এবং টমেটো যা অনেক পুরাতন রাউটার এবং এক্সেস পয়েন্ট সম্মুখের চমকিত করা যেতে পারে.
Unfortunately for me, none of the open source builds appeared to be compatible with either my BT SmartHub (V6) or the Netgear EX6150 access points, probably because they’re ইউকে শুধুমাত্র ডিভাইসের. I considered buying 2 অথবা 3 cheap routers to flash and had a look around for sales on any routers with wireless-ac support. The only models under £50 were TP-Link devices which were also not listed as supported by any of the open source builds.
I had resolved to wait for devices to come down in price but then spotted that the BT Whole Home WiFi system was on offer with 2 ডিস্ক শুধুমাত্র £ 100. After a little research I ascertained that all devices featured a wired ethernet port, that the system supports wired ethernet “backhaul” and that 2 sets would work together as a single big set. আমি আদেশ করেছিলাম 2 খেলনা, তাই শুধুমাত্র £ 200 জন্য আমি পেয়েছিলাম 4 এক্সেস পয়েন্ট.
Initial impressions (শুধুমাত্র এক সপ্তাহ পর) are very positive. Setting up the system was straight-forward — connect each device in turn via a wired connection so that it can receive the settings for the system across the wired network, তারপর এটি unplug, locate it where you need (within range of another access point) এবং আপনি চলে যান. I connected all of my devices to wired connections and left them there. I now get multi-hundred megabit wireless connections in every room in the house, and when moving between rooms handover works fantastically and seamlessly. For the price I’m very impressed with the system so far.
“Hi James I realise it has been a long while, but I just checked this on windows 11 (build 23H2)…”