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Invest more $ in Eero or go a different route?

Hi All,

So i'm in a bit of a situation where i'm really trying to decide whether to further invest in Eero or try something different. Sorry for the lengthy post.

Hoping for some good input from some of you that have experienced a similar situation.

Basically i have a two-pack of the 1st gen Eero's that for the last almost 3 years have served me pretty well and been pretty rock solid.  Love that part and the overall design.

I've been on the fence about Eero Plus and would happily pay for it for the additional family protection especially content filtering with 3 kids, however, the lack of true whitelist/blacklist has held me from subscribing.  Also i use LastPass and not sure if i want to change-- but that's a separate thing.

 

So last year we bought a new house and moved.  It's an older home with two stories and a full basement.  Main Eero gateway is on the main floor and the 2nd moved upstairs.  I get fairly good coverage of the basement with my 1st floor Eero and overall not bad.  However,  i have a breezeway and garage that i really start to lose signal and my back porch is basically not covered at all.

I will mention that it's an older home and has some pretty thick plaster walls that has some type of metal mesh in the concrete board with plaster over that.  Definitely a lot more dense that sheetrock.

So recently i bumped my Charter Spectrum ISP speeds from 200mb to 400mb and then that's where I started to pay attention to some things.

I've had a few issues previously like occassionaly webpages would just stop loading for a bit and i'd have to disconnect/reconnect to the Eero wifi network even though it didn't show any problems.  Also devices don't seem to be routed to the 5Ghz side as quickly or as often as they should.  On my new Galaxy Note 9 phone many times it will stay on the 2.4Ghz and thus speeds really suffer.  If i simply turn off wifi and toggle back on it will switch to 5Ghz immediately-- but it's a hastle. :(

Now lately since i've been paying attention i've noticed really poor speeds.  Sitting less then 10 feet from the main gateway i'll get usually in the 350mb download speeds and sometimes the full 400mb, but upstairs i can't get over about 120mb to 150mb and that's only when on the 5Ghz side.  If my device stays on the 2.4ghz then it's usually about 50mb or less.

5 replies

    • labragg1
    • 5 yrs ago
    • Reported - view

    For giggles i recently picked up an Orbi two piece system that consists of an RBR50 and RBS50 satellite.  I put them in the exact same spots as the Eero.  

    WOW-- i've never seen speeds like this.  I'm average close to 450mb on my main floor and 400mb upstairs where the 2nd satellite is-- i've never seen even close to these speeds upstairs.  Also i'm getting 350mb to 400 in my basement.  My breezeway, garage, and back portch which had amost zero coverage before now have coverage and speeds close to 80mb--which is plenty sufficient for those edge areas.  

    Yeah-- I know-- Orbi has a bad track record of unstable firmware, etc-- but i was just wanting to have a comparison to see what was possible. I plan on returning it at some point-- but i'll have to admin that with the latest firmware it's been rock solid the last week and i have to admit the speeds are incredible.

     

    So now i'm not sure if i should invest more money in trying to add a couple Eero 2nd gen units and then move my 1st gen units into other areas-- or just go a different route altogether.  I've heard of some heat issues and failures with the 2nd gen Eero's but not sure?

    My concern overall is speeds and performance since it's looking like Charter and other ISP's will be pushing higher speeds in my area over the next year or so.  If i invest more money i want to be sure i've got a system that can handle some higher speeds without me having to rip it out again.  

    This stuff is just too expensive to upgrade every year or two.  

    Any feedback would be very helpful!! Thanks!

    • Chi7
    • 5 yrs ago
    • Reported - view

    Hi.   I’m a fairly new eero user, 2nd gen.   Had it for a few months now NS I’ve tried mot of the readily available, popular mesh networks, including AmpliFi HD, velop and orbi.   For me, orbi had raw power but was terribly unreliable and inconsistent.    The velop performance was pretty on par with Eero, the deal breaker for me was Eeros app and customer service.   AmpliFi HD, is only dual band like the 1st gen Eero, but their range was incredible and always reliable.   So to balance it all out, I chose the Eero.   Tri-bnd, great customer service and minimal WiFi issues.    I have no heat issues and actually got one of the routers refurbished from amazon, thanks to one of the users here.   

    • labragg1
    • 5 yrs ago
    • Reported - view

    Chi7 -- thanks for the comments.  I don't plan on keeping the Orbi as i know they have reliability issues-- just trying to decide if investing more money in the 2nd Gen Eero's is worth it at this point.  I'd be looking at $350 for two new 2nd gen's unless i find a good refurb deal.  I'm just curious if the 2nd gen's can handle more throughput if i continue to up my ISP speeds.  

    Is anyone out there using the 2nd Gen Eero's with any ISP's about 400 or 500mb ?

      • Chi7
      • 5 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      labragg1  just keep in mind, the third band is what gives you that extra speed and range as it frees up the other two bands, something the 1st gen lacks.   So whatever you choose, sounds like your home can benefit from a tri-band router.  

      • Steve1963
      • 5 yrs ago
      • Reported - view

      labragg1 Refurb 2nd Gen tri-band eeros are still for sale on Amazon, currently for about $115.  I bought a couple as backups for my system and they look brand new - can't even tell they're refurbs.

      I have 1 Gb/s service and my (second generation) eeros are now all hardwired.

      Keep in mind, NO wireless system is going to magically defy physics and penetrate difficult barriers.  You are right that Orbi provides raw power, but that's mainly due to the dedicated backhaul band.  I had Orbi too, and it was horrible for me from a stability standpoint.  Tried Zyxel Multy X also (same specs as Orbi, with dedicated backhaul also) and it was not much better.  Multy X did show the backhaul connection speed in the app and it was usually in the low to mid 400's, even though it claimed a 1733 Mb/s backhaul connection.

      There's also Gryphon in the stable of mesh systems with with dedicated backhaul, but I haven't tried that one.  I did read it was made by the same manufacturer as Multy X and Luma.  To be fair, though, most of these main-tier systems, including Eero, Velop, Orbi, Gryphon, Multy X, TP-link Deco M9, Google Wifi, etc. all use the same IPQ4019 CPU/chipset, the same 512 MB RAM, the same 4GB flash memory, and have varying if not similar antenna arrays - the difference is in the firmware/software.

       I get 420-440 Mb/s almost everywhere in my house with my three eero pro system, but I don't have plaster walls or walls with chickenwire in them.  When I had my eeros wirelessly meshed, I was getting 200-300 Mb/s at the satellites depending on where they were.

      I will say I tested a couple powerful Linksys routers (EA9300, EA8300) and could not get over 400-450 wireless speeds from them, even with a Gigabit connection.  I think a realistic wireless speed cap for most people in most conditions is usually going to be 500 Gb/s or less.  I am talking internet speeds and not necessarily raw data transfer.  The EA9300 is an AC4000 tri-band router and I was not able to extract better wireless performance from it than I was from a wired eero.

      Nokia has a new mesh system out there, but specs on it are pretty vague.  The Deco M9 also has solid specs and has had good reviews, is tri-band, and backhaul (like eero, I believe) is shared across bands.  I haven't found anything compelling enough or proven to be better or more reliable/stable than eero.

Content aside

  • 5 yrs agoLast active
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