Wifi 6 Mesh Systems co-existing with Sky Q Mesh

[BlackCat]

Hi all, long time lurker, first time poster here 😀

The recent lockdowns have hilighted the strain my ER110 Sky Q Hub (SuperFast connection) gets under with pushing 30 smart devices connected and a couple of Sky Q minis streaming away while I try and chair Teams meetings - you get the idea!

I'm looking to future proof myself a bit and as we have a few WiFi 6 capable devices, I like the idea of a 3 unit Mesh system covering the high traffic areas of the house, possibly a tri-band system to really increase our WiFi capacity. I'm also looking to do some QoS to nurf the wife or kids hogging the 80down/20up connection we have.

So, it is looking like I'll need to replace the Sky Q Hub if I want to get the full-fat features of a Mesh router and I'm also keen to avoid a double-NAT. My current thoughts are to go for the TP-Link Archer VR2100 set to bridge/modem-only mode with a yet-to-be decided WiFi 6 Mesh router attached. I've looked at the Draytek Vigor 130 as the modem, but for what you get for your money I figured I'll go for the Archer then I have a half-decent modem/router as a backup.

A couple of things I'm looking for advice on please from people's experiences:

1) The Sky Q Minis - I'm looking to effectively separate the Sky Q TV Mesh from my own Mesh to keep the traffic apart and help with overall capacity. With the Main Sky Q 2TB box connected via ethernet to the Archer (or Mesh - would that be better?), I should just be able to reset to the network settings on the Minis to pickup the newly generated Sky SSID being broadcast by the main box? Anyone done similar and any pitfalls with interference I need to worry about - if my Mesh is a different channel from the Sky Q Mesh I should be ok, right?

2) Peoples general experiences with WiFi 6 Mesh systems in terms of their compatability with my proposed setup and experiences from configuring so they play nice with Sky. I appreciate there are a few posts on this, but with new devices coming to market and the variation in people's setups I thought I'd ask the question what people are running and how 🙂

[cookiemonsteruk]

@BlackCat 

What broadband package are you on superfast, ultrafast or essentials.  ?

An asus zenwifi xt8 is a router mesh that authenticates sky mer.  You would then need an adsl vdsl  modem such as draytek vigor 130 

[BlackCat]

It is "Superfast".

Are there any benefits of the Draytek Vigor 130 over the TP-Link Archer VR2100 that I am missing? They look to be a similar price point to each other at the moment and the Archer has the advantage of being a solid modem-router combo should I need a back-up if my proposed mesh fails for any reason.

In fact, I'm tempted to jump for the Archer now and evaluate its features and improved WiFi over what I have now before I decide if I really do need Mesh. If I'm still getting congestion, I just flip it into bridge mode and add a proper Mesh.

[cookiemonsteruk]

@BlackCat 

If tp link can be set to modem mode and bridged to a mesh so the mesh authenticates then the tp link would be fine .  

[BlackCat]

Have taken the plunge and ordered a TP-Link Archer VR2100 for delivery tomorrow as a starting point. I'll use this to replace the old Sky Hub and evaluate how this holds up with my network traffic and what sort of coverage I get around the house before I decide if I need a Mesh.

I am a little nervous about how this will play with my 2 Sky Minis. What is the general concensus on the best way to migrate these to the new router? - Give the new TP-Link router the same SSID and password as my current setup and hope the boxes don't notice so to speak?

[Chrisee]

@BlackCat the best answer to your first question about mesh systems to use with Sky's own Q mesh is don't! Mesh systems work by using multiple wifi signals so stopping 2 mesh networks in one area interfering one with the other is often impossible.

Every Q tv box or booster acts a mesh node and will broadcast both a 2.4GHz and 5GHz signal.  If you have a Sky hub, a main Q box and 2 Q minis then they will have effectively filled the 2.4GHz  band and will be covering ch36 to 52 in the 5GHz band. Therefore to use a third party mesh network it is advised to turn off all of the Sky wifi and hardcwire the Q boxes either to the router or to the mesh satellites.

When you do not have a Sky hub you connect the main Q box to the router's wifi (it will only use the 2.4GHz signal) the Q minis use the 5GHz wifi signal on the main Q box to connect - you use the wps buttons to connect. They cannot connect to the router's wifi directly. You lose the ability to connect to the Q box's hotspots but they are still there so can cause interference.. 

[BlackCat]

Many thanks for your reply @Chrisee 

Yeah, I'm a little nervous about interference from what I've been reading.

The TP-Link VR2100 arrived the other day and was no trouble to setup. We'll, the "Tether" app TP-Link encourage you to use allows you to select Sky(MER) as the ISP, but not to enter the all important credentials. Not owning a laptop with an RJ45 anymore, I needed to piggy-back my Raspberry Pi to complete the setup via the routers web interface.

Anyway, I'm in a much better position now with the Sky Q Mini Mesh effectively seperated from all other wifi traffic on my network. My Sky Q 2TB box is etherneted into the new router and I'm running all other wifi traffic to the router over as far apart from Ch36 as I can. Without my devices sharing the Sky Q Mesh, the Minis are now jitter-free so result there. Furthermore, I've been able to implement QoS on the main Sky box talking out so when the toddler goes on a downloading rampage he can't eat all the bandwidth.

Of course (and as exprected) my wifi range has taken a bit of a hit with the Sky Q Minis no longer acting as extenders. Still, I prefer this arrangement as heavy wifi traffic really messes with the TV quality on the Minis. Wanting this range back but being nervous of any adverse interference from a sophisticated Mesh as per my original plan, I've opted for the less sophisticated plug-in OneMesh of the TP-Link ecosystem. Other posters have reported these work well so they should arrive today and I'll have a play tonight to see what sort of results I can get.

[Chrisee]

@BlackCat glad you are making progress. 

If possible hard wire the Q mini boxes either back to your acces points and turn off the Sky wifi.completly if you do keep the Sky Wifi on you can set the boxes to use a more limted channel range in the 5GHz band the default is ch36 80MHz which will cause interference with ch36 to 52. However there is an option in the engineer's menu -enter settings,0,0,1, select on the Sky remote - to switch to a 40MHz bandwidth either starting at ch36 or ch44 i.e. using the lower or upper half of the channel numbers. This is useful if your access points have a limited 5GHz band channel range as many do. Changing the setting on one Sky box will cause the others to change to match.

[BlackCat]

Just reporting back in case anyone ever looks to do something similar and stumbles across this:

The TP-Link OneMesh is co-existing nicely with the Sky Q Mesh. So my setup now consists of a TP-Link Archer VR2100 (better WiFi coverage and more features than the stock Sky Q Hub) and 2x TP-Link RE300 Mesh Range Extenders. The 2x Sky Q mini boxes now effectively have their own exclusive Mesh with the Sky Q 2TB box to purely carry TV traffic around the home. Without my decides piggybacking the Sky Q Mesh and overloading the traffic when the Sky Q Minis were acting as range extenders causing the Minis to go on the blink, The TP-Link RE300s now carry the traffic (on a completely different channel to the Sky Q Mesh) back to the router when in the further reaches of the house.

With the ability to implement QoS on the Sky Q 2TB talking out to the Internet, I've taken control of how much bandwidth it can use at any one time too. So this in conjunction with separating the Sky Q Minis traffic from everything else, I've now got much more control over the traffic (internal and external) of Sky's hardware.

The cost of this was £145 all in, so while not as sophisticated as some of the WiFi 6 mesh systems I was looking at (which would have cost more than this plus a modem), The OneMesh all looks to be playing nicely with great coverage around the home. My slight regret was I didn't go for a WiFi 6 Mesh to sit on top of the Archer VR2100 switched to bridge mode afterall to really futureproof myself. I was just a little too cautious of the 2 competing mesh networks when perhaps I didn't need to be. Still, room for a future upgrade there as the 2x RE300s were only £25 each.

[Rob+AB]

Thanks for your help with this issue. I have 3 eero pro 6's that I am about to set up with a main sky Q box and another Sky Q mini box in the bedroom. I also have a sky WiFi extender. I  think I will need to disable the Sky WiFi in the sky router after I plug the eero into it as am in the uk and using IPoE.  But how do I get into the engineer settings on sky to change the channels that Sky Q uses? I'd like to keep Sky Q devices separate to my own devices (laptop etc) to remove interference. Can't see anything on sky tv remote settings. I can change Wi-Fi channel on the sky router but will this setting be retained when I turn the Wi-Fi off on the Sky router? Slightly confused! TIA!

[Rob+AB]

I should have said that I can't hardwire the main Sky Q box easily as in a separate room to the router so will need to use Wi-Fi. So essentially I need eero pro 6 Wi-Fi mesh running my personal and work network/devices and Sky Q multi room plus sky booster over the same Wi-Fi mesh network without interfering with my personal devices. Any advice gratefully received. TIA

[Chrisee]

@Rob+AB accessing the engineer's menu on Q boxes is done by navigating to settings and pressing 0,0,1 on the remote before select. You will see the setiings to disable the two wifi bands and a setting to vary the 5GHz band channel, the default setting of ch36 80MHz uses ch 36 to ch 52, the ch36 40MHz halves that range to ch36 to 44 and ch44 40MHz uses the other half from ch44 to 52.