Third party router or mesh with sky fibre

[marc-knuckle]

right got it up and running so thats good.

however.

before swapping i used my phone, google pixel 7 pro, to test the signal strength using an appt, in various locations. downstairs, in the conservatory, laundry room after conservatory and upstairs. i had the sky router, a mini upstairs acting like a mesh and an extender from sky in the conserv. i had found that the laundry room even though only 5-6 meters away from that extender didnt get signal maybe due to it not working well or the one wall (even though the doorway was always open and almost in direct line of site). 

with the new router i get WORSE signal in almost all areas apart from it does hold on to the signal in the laundry room whereas sky didnt but everywhere sky gave a better strength.

i have turned of guest network that i had set up in case that affected it. not much else i know to do to improve it as even things like location is the same as before where it comes into the house so thats the same.

is there anything else i can do? at the minute i am wondering why i spent nearly £300 for worse coverage.

[jamesn123]

@marc-knuckle 

Which router did you end up buying?

Have you ensured its running on a different WiFi channel to any of your Sky gear?

Is the router in an open space?

[marc-knuckle]

Hi mate i went with asus rt-ax86u pro

I'd turned off the sky WiFi already, checked the other day in the engineers menu.

I've checked the channel numbers with an app to avoid neighbours as best i could. 

Not used 160mhz with the 5g. 

Checked in the Professional menu that both are using the full TX power which they are.

Thing is, even with these it's about the same as the old, basic sky router that was apparently low quality yet this relatively expensive router I'm having to do all this to match the sky one.

I've also moved it to a more centralised location, higher up on the bookcase as opposed to behind the tv but this is now only MATCHING the sky one when it was behind the tv.

I feel I'm missing something.

[jamesn123]

@marc-knuckle 

What about smart connect? Disable that if it is enabled and see what the coverage is like then for the two different bands.

[marc-knuckle]

Yeah got that disabled already as i always like having the choice of what to connect to and also some devices had issues when i left that on the Virgin router i used to have before sky.

[Rimz1]

Just wanted to see where you are upto with this, as I've been reading along this post today since I'm in a similar situation with the poor coverage around my house. 

Did you get it to work? What do you recommend that someone in a similar situation should do?

Thanks.

[marc-knuckle]

Well my son's laptop connects more solidly now but that's only because i raised it by putting it on the shelf to just under the ceiling, about 7 foot up from the floor and directly under where he sits in his room. So that's about 1.5m away and through the ceiling and wood flooring only so it's expect that.

I still think it's poor considering this is meant to be a powerful router yet struggles to out compete sky's basic router that people always say are trash compared to third party routers.

Goes to show that a lot of people's knee jerk reaction to these questions 'get a third party router' should be taken with a pinch of salt.

[Chrisee]

@marc-knuckle & @Rimz1 all Wifi units are affected by the laws of physics and all units have strictly regulated transmission power. Positioning is very important as having any wifi device out in the open and reasonably high helps a lot as signal strength is compromised by furniture and people and blocked by radiators. The amount of the signal that can pass through walls idepends on the density of the wall and the frequency of the signal so the 2.4GHz band signals  go further than the 5Ghz band. 

Each home is different and whatever manufacturers claim the speeds you get will depend on the charecteristics of your own home. Wifi speeds and regularity are affected by the level of dlectromagnetic interference which can come from neighbour's networks and from your own electrical gear. 

Modern whole home wifi solutions use multiband communication which can help overcome some of these issues. They best ones trade outright speed for stability which is as important for applications like watching video or playing games. Loads of choices around at varying price points. Connecting to Sky lines can be complicated but you can simply turn off the wifi on your Sky hub and replace it with a third party system running in Access Point mode.

[marc-knuckle]

Agreed, BUT, with the new router initially in the EXACT SAME place as the old sky router used to be, it was worse.

So even if i hadn't bought the new router, and simply moved the sky router to where this new one now is, would have likely seen an improvement but i was sold on the 'get a new third party router' suggestion that i had read numerous times both on this forum and the wider internet searches is done.

[JimM1]

@marc-knuckle 

Hi marc, it is good you replied, the new router's do have a slight improvement but they are not the

be-all / end-all and magically fix, I agree the SR203 is a good wireless router but has it's limit's....