New Router suggestion?

If your house is wired. Use your Rogers modem as a router and get a proper access point for WiFi

TP-Link EAP245

https://www.amazon.ca/TP-Link-EAP245-Wi ... 07NMZR3F1/

How many users? how big of a house? What do you do with your internet (stream, work, play)?

bhrm wrote: ↑ How many users? how big of a house? What do you do with your internet (stream, work, play)?

Typically it is either Work OR (Stream + Play)
see a screenshot of the setup. Hoping replaced EA3500 will fix the dropping issue.

a3dview wrote: ↑ Typically it is either Work OR (Stream + Play)
see a screenshot of the setup. Hoping replaced EA3500 will fix the dropping issue.

Ooo great diagram!

Easy fix would just be buying mesh nodes like the Deco M4 2 or 3 pack, attach to ethernet backhaul and set them as AP, leaving your Cisco to keep routing OR buying the EAP suggested above since you have your home wired up.

a3dview wrote: ↑ My Cisco Linksys EA3500 keeps dropping. Planning to buy a new one. Any suggestions for good router pls?

Current setup is
Roger Modem >> EA3500 >> both Wifi + Cabled connections

In my opinion ... Huawei AX3 Pro Quad Core WiFi 6 ... I'm waiting on delivery (from Geekbuying.com) for a Third One (Black) ... to be paired and meshed with my two White ones purchased previously (AliExpress.com and Banggood.com).

This one will be placed on the main floor by the Laundry Room using the direct CAT6 connection that the Rogers Technician put in for the Smart Home Monitoring Netgear Router. My Chamberlain MyQ Module would then be plugged into the Router as would the Netgear (provided by Rogers).

At an average cost of $109.71 ... the Huawei WiFi AX3 Pro is the BEST BANG FOR THE BUCK!

This is my current setup (on Bell Fiber 1.5Gbps):

My Bell Hub 3000 (four ports) is in the basement below the front foyer of the house right beside the electrical panel.

The house was already pre-wired with CAT5e by the builder when it was built in 2006/7:
- two CAT5e to one bedroom at the front of the house - 1 connected to back of modem ... which is connected to a Huawei AX3 PRO WiFi 6 Router (for signal at the front of the house ... which can reach across the street to my neighbour's backyard)
- one CAT5e to the master bedroom
- one CAT5e to the family room at the back of the house - connected to back of modem ... which is connected to a Huawei AX3 PRO WiFi 6 Router (for signal at the back of the house ... which can reach 4 houses down in the neighbour's backyard when we are chillin' on his deck)
- one CAT5e to the garage
- one CAT5e to the master bathroom (why??? WTF????)

None to the third bedroom at the front of the house .... what????

I also added an 8-Port Gigabit switch beside the modem - connected to one of the four ports of the modem)

Rogers had put in a separate dedicated CAT6A for their Netgear router for Smart Home Monitoring (plugged into switch) that runs to the mainfloor laundry room where that router is placed.

I ran three separate CAT7 cables from the modem in the unfinished basement:
- one directly to the family room and threaded upstairs to a Gigabit switch behind the TV ... to feed the two unlocked android boxes + receiver + TV with direct ethernet connection
- two to different sections of the basement (future proofing for possible entertainment room with a second TV and possibly a more dedicated home office)

Everything and everywhere is covered ... would probably run another CAT cable under the baseboards into the bedroom that does not have an outlet ... but is that necessary? (unless ethernet is really needed)

I prefer all my stuff wired ... but because I am able to hide the cabling ... wiring is never an issue. (even my speaker cables for my 7.2 Home Theatre setup are all hidden)

The ONLY devices in our house that uses WiFi signal connection are:
- 2 Huawei cellphones
- 1 Acer tablet
- 1 Asus Laptop (personal)
- 1 Nest Thermostat
- 5 Nest Protects
- the Ring Doorbell 3 Plus
- the Blink Outdoor Camera+Module
- Echo Show 5
- Google Mini
- 1 WiFi camera inside my garage
- *** Gonna be adding a couple of Bestten WiFi Dimmer Switches soon as I will be having potlights installed on the mainfloor

Even my work laptop is connected via Ethernet to one of the Huawei routers ... no security issues/problems at all.

I'm still learning on the subject matter, just some experience to offer;

I have purchased quite a few routers over the years for friends, family, and myself, however I mainly run Asus routers, at this time. All router manufacturers have issues. I have a bricked Asus RT-AC86 at my feet right now. and one acting as an AP's on my network, also two RT-AC1900P routers in AP mode.

If you can't put the ISP provided router in bridge mode, setting up a mesh system can be a hassle. I've had lots of issues with mesh, besides the uncooperative ISP routers. Many dropped connections or weak connections, So, I set my main router, Asus GT-AC5300, up to fixed wi-fi channels, 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz, use the same SSID for both. Scan the neighbours wifi channels and find the least used channels, for example channel 1 or 9 may have less traffic congestion. Set all your Wi-Fi Access points to the same least busy channel (ie. 9) in the 2.4Ghz band and on (ie. 149) the 5Ghz band. I make the SSID the same, "MyPrivateNetwork" on all Access Points, (if you use capitals keep them the same), so your wireless devices will transfer to the next node easier and less incline to hang on to a weak signal.

Set some IP address room aside, outside the automatically assigned group. Most routers will automatically have DHCP enabled and assign IP addresses from a certain range for example, 192.168.1.1 to 254 in private networks. So reserve the area 192.168.1.1-30 for permanent network addresses, like your wifi access points IP addresses, network switches, NAS's, and other permanent network devices. Go in your router DHCP settings, Automatically assign 192.168.1.31/254 (or less, if you want room at the top). This will allow the router to give out addresses in that range for devices that log on, less frequently.

Secondly, bind the MAC addresses of devices that are always on your network to an IP address in the area outside the automatically assign groups. This will prevent devices from continually requesting the address from your DHCP server, kinda like a long car ride where someone keeps asking are we there yet? The network device will keep polling the DCHP server, can I use this IP? How about now? Can I use it? Yes, this is your IP quit asking.
And it will prevent other devices (such as iPads or tablets) from requesting the same IP when temporarily logging in. Less conflicting network traffic can mean less dropped connections.

I can still see some devices trying to connect on the same IP. I think it's the smarthome devices, google mini, amazon echo, nest protect, thermostat or .....

If you have frequent power outages, consider an Uninterruptible Power Supply on your ISP device and your main router, it may save you some headaches.

I'm hopeful my rambling can be understood and it's helpful to someone.

as a side note,
About 3 weeks ago, I started playing with a raspberryPi zero with PiHole for my DNS server. that's a whole other story.

Back a couple years, I received some help in this forum, on the thread below.
faster-home-network-2177967/#p29061272
I believe the most effective change was static ip's for the always on devices. I used the Shibby firmware, which was very effective while I had two ISP's connected. However Shibby quit working on his firmware and it was partly picked up by kille72
Dual ISP's also, messed with my online servers and kept getting me banned for different IP source login's.

a3dview wrote: ↑ Typically it is either Work OR (Stream + Play)
see a screenshot of the setup. Hoping replaced EA3500 will fix the dropping issue.

OT but in the basement you've got a switch running into a router, so you're running the router as an access point. Why not just replace the basement switch with the router, because it will have 4 ports on it already.

CameraBill wrote: ↑ OT but in the basement you've got a switch running into a router, so you're running the router as an access point. Why not just replace the basement switch with the router, because it will have 4 ports on it already.

probably because it can barely hit a wan to lan over 200mbps. Its not a do all kinda router an looks like it could easily be taxed.

https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireles ... l=&start=2

any NA brand with a dual a53 or better still a quadcore a53 soc or better is where I would start looking today. The consider separating wifi from routing.

lead wrote: ↑ probably because it can barely hit a wan to lan over 200mbps. Its not a do all kinda router an looks like it could easily be taxed.

https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireles ... l=&start=2

any NA brand with a dual a53 or better still a quadcore a53 soc or better is where I would start looking today. The consider separating wifi from routing.

No the main router is the EA3500. This is slower than the internet connection and should have been replaced when the internet connection was upgraded.

If that second access point is working fine well so be it, but consider that in normal networking access each device can use 100% of the bandwidth for short periods of time. I suspect that the basement access point is 2.4ghz only and so any thing connected to it is capped at 150Mbps which is half of the internet access speed.

I was using an asus AC68 that had a span of two years without a reboot. I moved up to a 1000Mbps connection and purchased an Asus AC86U based off of my reliability experience with Asus and other recommendations in this forum.

Thanks for all comments above.
Okay.... I replaced old router EA3500 with new ASUS RT-AX88U (from BestBuy) and seems all set now.
I also removed the 4 port switch as RT-AX88U has 8 ethernet ports and now fewer patches. The new router is definitely pricey but happy as took away many pains.

No connection drop (so far in last 24 hrs) and speed much better on all devices.
One of TV got full wireless (for IPTV) and no more freezes. I was using an ethernet cable for IPTV box for movies which was on floor.
YouTube 4K videos on three TVs in-home working on wifi same time with no issue.
Download/Upload speed become double (seems old EA3500 was restricting)
Ring door bell starts to work better due to wifi signal strength increase and immediate picture loading in live view.
DVR cams (8MP) loading quickly, simultaneously on all devices.

So far so good, even though I still have to fine-tune in new router configuration.