TP-Link X20 Mesh - poor throughput

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GeoffisPure

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#284607 4-May-2021 09:49

Appreciate any advice - I'm not a network expert by any means.

We purchased the X20 3-pack. We have a gigabit fibre connection and ISP supplied modem. The first X20 is connected to the modem with ethernet. The other 2 X20s connected automatically wirelessly during setup.

Consider 3 rooms in a straight line. The ONT, modem and main X20 in the left room, a wireless X20 in the centre room and another wireless X20 in the right room.

We are finding that a person in the right (far) room will get faster internet speeds if they turn off the X20 in that room, and simply connect to the X20 in the middle room. Is this to be expected? Basically if we stand right next to each X20, we are getting 500Mbps in the left room, 200Mbps in the middle room and 100Mbps in the right room. It sounds like it's defeating the purpose of having multiple mesh points as we'd probably get the same throughput if the 2nd and 3rd X20s weren't even turned on?

nztim

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TEAMnetwork

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#2701597 4-May-2021 11:07

Welcome to the world of wireless repeating,

I hate mesh devices for this very reason, Access points should be wired and centrally managed

Any views expressed on these forums are my own and don't necessarily reflect those of my employer.

tripper1000

1609 posts

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#2701645 4-May-2021 12:56

I'm not familiar this this product line, but with generic single band repeaters you 1/2 the bandwidth every time you go through a repeater. This roughly correlates to the numbers you report. Others may be able to advise if there are configuration tweaks possible for your repeaters.

Repeaters are a compromise & won't match a properly set up network as NZTIM describes.

Edit: They're good for filling black spots (aka wall to wall coverage), but they're not necessarily going to improve speed (aside from the obvious giving coverage where there was none). I suspect the speed and latency improvements advertised in the marketing blurb will be conditional on having wired Ethernet back-haul.

sbiddle

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#2701742 4-May-2021 15:15

Welcome to the word of wireless mesh networks.

In all seriousness there is a reason I would never ever recommend a wireless mesh solution for to deliver a high performance solution. Mesh networks may be convenient, but they certainly won't deliver the speed or performance that cabled AP's do.

wratterus

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#2701794 4-May-2021 16:39

As the others have said, it sounds like they are working about exactly as they should be.

noroad

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#2701804 4-May-2021 16:55

wratterus:

As the others have said, it sounds like they are working about exactly as they should be.

Yep, if you want full wireless speed of each unit you need to ethernet connect the mesh units to to the gateway unit to avoid the re-transmission tax. unless you get very expensive units with multiple radios this is how it works.

nztim

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#2701898 4-May-2021 19:00

Also never expect 1gbps over wireless to a single device

In near perfect conditions, Late model HP Laptop with 3x3 MIMO, Brand New Aruba AP-535 Access Points gave IPERF test results of 790mbps

2x Late model HP Laptop with 3x3 MIMO simultaneously got 500mpbs IPERF to each

Any views expressed on these forums are my own and don't necessarily reflect those of my employer.

raytaylor

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#2703601 8-May-2021 07:14

Store-and-forward repeating or "mesh" means that half the airtime is dedicated to relaying the packet upstream, while the other half of the airtime is dedicated to communicating with the end user device. If there are multiple hops upstream then you end up with only 25% of the speed after two hops.

This means having a lower but more direct signal can be faster than a good signal with repeating.

The solution is usually powerline wifi extenders or hard wired access points as others have said.

Ray Taylor

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