One of our customers called us out to his home because he had difficulty with Wi-Fi signal weakness in different parts of their house.
When MacMedics arrived, the customer’s Internet was very spotty, and two different networks were present. An older Apple base station created one of the networks, while a Comcast router created another. Neither network was stable or connecting reliably. We spoke to Comcast support, and the problem was traced to a faulty connection to the house.
During the conversation with Xfinity, it was discovered that the customer was on an older internet plan that only provided 300 Mbps data speed. The customer service representative offered a new plan for slightly less money and provided 900 Mbps. A service person would come out the next day to fix the network connection issue and “upgrade” the speed.
When we returned the following day, internet service was much faster, but still did not cover the entire area of the home.
We recommended a Mesh network system. Mesh networks enable multiple routers to work in unison to deliver fast, super-stable WiFi. Unlike a typical home network built around a centralized hub, a mesh network consists of various routers communicating with each other. This creates a strong signal at each base station rather than trying to boost a weak signal with an extender.
MacMedics provided an eero 6 Pro (3-unit set) for a home that will cover approximately 5000 square feet via a mesh network.
MacMedics installed the gateway eero in the room with an Internet connection and the other two modules on the main floor towards opposite ends of the house to create a triangular pattern. We turned off the second network from the Apple Time Capsule base station. That device is now just providing wireless backups over the new network. When we completed the network installation and configuration, we transferred the network control to the customer’s account. We can continue to monitor the network remotely as well.
This improved Wi-Fi coverage throughout the house significantly. With faster Internet speeds coupled with the enhanced eero coverage, our customer is now getting almost gigabit speeds on all devices throughout the home. He can manage his network through the eero app on his iPhone.
There is an eero setup for any size home or office and budget. Ask MacMedics how we can end your Wi-Fi frustrations and keep your data flowing FAST!
Update 5-5-2022
Another customer contacted MacMedics after seeing our first post about mesh networking with eero because they were also experiencing dropouts and poor performance during video conference calls. This customer is currently working from home and teaching classes online and relies heavily on their WIFI network for Zoom. Their internet provider checked their Internet speeds remotely but could not determine that there was a problem with speed.
MacMedics installed the eero 6+ 3 pack as the NEW WiFi network on three different floors to increase wireless coverage and stabilize and improve the speed throughout the house.
To combat the most famous issue in video calls: stuttering and dropouts, the eero mesh system offer a feature called “Smart Queue Management.” You can turn on “Optimize for Conferencing and Gaming” in the settings. This will prioritize video calls over other data on the network when it recognizes that you are using this type of bandwidth. We also plugged the customer’s laptop into an Ethernet port on one of the eero remote units to help make the primary user of the network speed even more consistent.
The customer’s speed went from an average of 45 Mbps on the old system to 140 Mbps after the new eero system was installed. This increase, combined with the optimized conferencing settings, solved the WiFi networking and speed issues. We checked back with our customer a week later, after they hosted several video calls, and confirmed that everything was running great.
