Sky Pod speed

[reelspike]

Hi,

So we moved to Sky Max this week with a pod.  Previously we had the older Sky broadband hub with the broadband boost box. 

Whilst the WiFi in our house is now mega fast with the new Sky max hub (like 700mb/s), the boosted coverage speed isn't great at all via the Pod.

We have an office and home cinema in the garage (separate building in the garden) and the older Sky broadband booster box was able to comfortably deliver 100mb/s to

it. But now with the Sky pods, it's only getting 25mb/s. I even, sometimes, drop out of WiFi and my phone drops back to 3G/4G in the garden!

What gives?

Reading online it says to play around with location. I've move it several places, and I can see that my laptop and home cinema box connects to the Pod but only gets 25 mb/s wherever I go.  This is far slower than what we had a week ago with the old kit - and even slower than what we had with BT copper broadband!

Does anyone have any tips or help on this? Because I'm tempted to ask Sky to return us back to the previous setup - or can the Sky broadband booster be used with the Sky Max hub?

[JimM1]

@reelspike would certainly try pairing the old SE210 booster to the sky max hub!

[reelspike]

Hi, thanks for the reply. I've just reconnected it but it actually dropped down to 5 mb/s when outside. Eeek!!  

on the Sky app it says that the SE210 booster was connected to the pod. So I turned the pod off but then all I got was no WiFi in the garage and garden. 

hmm. 

[JimM1]

@reelspike As a final part then hopefully you still have the old SR203 hub, would reconnect that and pair the SE210 to it and see if you get back to what was the original.

The SR213 will be better speed wise when local and close by it as it's a wi-fi 6 device, As you said that you got i think 700Mb/s wireless to it, then as a wifi 5 on the SR203 would be at best around the 600Mb/s, you can get the test figures pre and post when you measure from the same point. SE210 can look good give you all 3 lights paired ok but will NOT pass data, had it when i tried pairing it to an EE Smarthub+ Router. Bit off faffing about but better to get it worked out now before you have to send gear back to sky!

Have never used the Sky Max or the Pods, so have NO experience off how good/bad or indifferent they are. 

[JimM1]

@reelspike As a side note, when you went to Sky Max did you also go Fibre connected at the same point in time, if so did the Hub change position by much distance wise etc from previous to new, i only allow the hub to throw the  Wi-Fi signal out about 40' max then you start to get serious speed drop, boosting signal get's you back but when you boost with sky it's an automatic 50% reduction due to the operation, so if 600 at the hub, around the 300 at the booster.

If your position off the hub has changed to further away, would speed test both devices at there positions and note them for the SR203 and booster to the SR213 and pod!

Wi-Fi analyzer on your mobile is going to help you big time, netspot for android is free to use, works good, if you are a fruit flavoured user then not so many only one i know off is wi-fi analyzer from matt hafner, i use his program on windows, but i do use the paid version as need to see all the detail all off the time, restricts the free version! 

[Chrisee]

@reelspike & @JimM1 zccording to Sky the SE210 is not compatable with the new hub and pod combination. The new hub/pod combo is a triband system and uses a closed 5GHz band  for the backhaul traffic while the older hub/booster used the main dualband 2.4GHz/5GHz signal.  Given the reduced range of the 5GHz signal I am not too surprised that you are getting lower speeds externally assuming your property has external brick walls especially as the pods plug into wall outlets so cannot be positioned in a.window like the older boisters. 

The external building is always going to be a challenge to network if you only use wifi from the main property iideally you would run an ethernet feed from the hub to the garage and have a local WiFi access point out there. Alternatively assuming the power for the garage comes from the main consumer unit a powerline networking kit could be a simple solution but assume you will only get 25% of the rated through put. You can buy these systems with built-in wifi access points but for home cinema use I would strongly recommend installing an ethernet switch in the garage and feeding your kit from that.

[JimM1]

@Chrisee Morning chrisee, did not know the SR213 was tri-band as always mentioned as a dual band, take it you may have seen the hidden 5Ghz backhaul if you have ever looked!

[JimM1]

@reelspike Just a couple attached pictures to show you the Netspot display for the signal strength indication, if there is a hidden band it will find it and mark with the word hidden next to it! 5G-2 is my Wireless backhaul AI Mesh speed. So nothing direct connected to it! Tp-Links are powerline!

closer deviceslittle further away.

[Chrisee]

@JimM1 the SR213 switches to triband mode when connecting to a matched pod you can see the signal on a WiFi Analyzer app. The system is an adaptation of Comcasts Xfinity routers which use technlology from Plume (the pods are very similar) which was developed for US homes which are primarily timber framed but it performs less well in UK properties which have masonary walls. 

In broad terms the white hub is incompatable with earlier Sky boosters as it does nor support the Sky Q mesh networking system. Like any third party router it can be used to connect a main Sky Q box but that only uses the 2.4GHz signal from the hub to conect. Any Q minis or old boosters have to be networked from the main box and connect to a closed Sky SSID shich only uses the 5GHz band. The wifi hotspots spots on the Q boxes cannot be used to connect third party devices.Therefore its a common issue with customers with Sky Q boxes switching to the max hub that wifi coverage is reduced. 

[JimM1]

@reelspike Just 2 further to show how bad it gets so quickly, outside back door tripple glazed just hanging in there and no more, and about 20' line off sight to the Router, double brick and tripple glazed window, not a hope in a million years.

It's a no way 20' direct line of sight.Just about but not very much.

[JimM1]

@Chrisee Thanks, got it now!

[JimM1]

@reelspike Have blanked out all the mac addresses for the devices but left the Sky ID's so hopefully they get through and approved to display for you!

[reelspike]

Hi everyone - wow, thanks for all the replies - lots for me to take on board!

I've ordered a set of powerline adapters, to see how they work.  They've arrived tonight so will try them after I get back from work.  Hopefully that setup will work - and probably be more robust as I'll plug in the Apple TV and computer to it via the ethernet connection on the adapter.

If that doesn't work, then I might just switch back to the old hub and booster setup (as that did work) and tell Sky to revert me back!

I've also downloaded a Wifi analyser (I have an iPhone) so will be interesting to see what this churns out.

Thanks everyone 🙂

[JimM1]

@reelspike About if you need anything.! Good luck with the powerline, Checked my garage is about 60' away from the 2nd router, but do powerline to the garage for the wi-fi treadmill and out about gardening wife is the user for that, not a speedy fast device, but it does what she needs for the Music and you tube videos on her mobile, powerline is connected to the primary router top off stairwell so does go a fair distance!👍

[Chrisee]

@reelspike ios devices do not allow real wifi analyser apps to work as Apple do not allow third party apps access to the w ifi hardware. However Apple's own Airport Utility is the closesr match. To get this to work enable WiFi scanning in the app's settings and when opening the app click on WiFi scanning and then start.it will generate a list of WiFi networks within range in decreasing strength with channel and current signal strength.

The various apps in the app store listed as Analnysers are just networking untilities without a scanner as such. Despite using ipads for work tasks Sky's broadband engineers carry an Android phone to run scans!