I can see ASUS ZenWiFi XT8 AX6600 Tri-Band Mesh Wi-Fi 6 System - White (Set of 2) for about £200 which seems good really. Should I be looking at those instead?
@@Didyouseeitreally nice upgrade... thought I'm biased as I have them too. 😆 I got them a year or so ago. I have one at the bottom of the house and one at the top. I still have the AX86U too, which is in my garage.
Hi Kevin, I've only just seen this video, prompted by the fact I will get a 900 full fibre installed next week (FTH only just available here now). As I have a steel walled workshop at the top of our rear garden I have been using a Zyxel Multi X AC3000 Try-Band Mesh system attached to an EE Hub to get a wifi signal inside the workshop. Would you have any idea if this will still work when I plug it into the BT Smart Hub next Friday?
Hi Kevin, Thank You for a very interesting video and I love Your passion for the Asus AiMesh routers. However I am a bit unclear of the compability. I, like You, have a Huawei wifi router supplied by my ISP Vodafone, Yours from BT. But I can not let the two routers coexist because of ip adress allocation problems? Did You scrap Your BT router or did You let it coexist as a access point? But the AiMesh router have to be the main router connected straight after the fiber modem? Right? What is compatible with the AiMesh?
Hi Per. Glad you liked the video. I scrapped the BT router altogether as it was slow and didn't let you customise anything. It wasn't worth setting up as an access point as the range and speeds are poor. I have my fiber modem connecting directly to my router (albeit, via my network using cat 5E ethernet). Two routers can be used together as routers. This situation is called Double NAT and it's not something I am looking to use. There's a good article about it at dongknows.com/double-nat-vs-single-nat/ 👍 Kevin
Hi Kevin, thank you for the informative video! I currently have an RT AX-55 (situated in living room) and I’ve been exploring the option of using ZenWifi as nodes to expand my network to reach spotty areas like my bedroom. Is there any reason why you’d pick the mini XD4 over the AC1500? In terms of specs, I’m not too sure which better supports the bandwidth/most compatible with my RT AX-55, what do you reckon?
I opted for the XD4 as there are three units in the pack. I also like how small and inconspicuous they are haha I'd say they're better than the AC1500 though as AC is WiFi 5 and these are AX, which are WiFi 6. I'm using then just to extend the network around the house. They've worked well. Have you found a few black spots in your network?
FTTP almost available (probably via Sky) in our area so considering these exact devices to go with it. How have you found it? (no follow up video yet?!). Are you using wireless backhaul throughout and what's the performance at distance (upstairs / through walls) like?
Apologies. It was something I always planned to get round to, but other things got in the way. I've found this setup to be fantastic. I use wireless backhaul on one of the nodes and the speeds are solid. I've not had any complaints wired or wireless.
Hi Kevin I noticed you had the BT box. How did you get round the VDSL issue (FTTC). I want this exact setup but with having FTTC and needing Sky MER I am at a loss how to get round this. Could you help me out? Thank you
I am thinking of replacing my ISP router and old/awful BT Wholehome mesh with ASUS RT-AX82U and 3x xd4 ax1800. The more I read the more I'm put off - Reddit comments about wireless backhaul on dual band etc & not using the AX82U's radios at all...like wtf really. I suspect this will work fine for my needs of streaming in the house and garage without dead spots. Stop me if I'm wrong please!
Hi Dan. I should be able to point you in the right direction👍 One thing to note is that one size does not fit all. By that I mean, there is no perfect setup as it largely depends on your needs, your budget, whether your house is wired, the size of your house etc. First off, anything you buy is going to be better than what BT give you. BT, and most ISPs, offer terrible routers at ridiculous prices. Before we talk about budget and which routers to consider, can you tell me whether your house is wired with ethernet ports? You should ideally only buy dual band routers if you have ethernet ports throughout your house (like I do). If not, you should consider Tri band models. Thanks. Kevin
Thanks Kevin. So dual band is pointless without ethernet connection? I don't have the house wired fully. I have 1 ethernet from the router to a switch in the lounge to supply my pc, ps5 etc. The storage attached to my pc has my movie library on it that I watch around the house and would like it to work in the garage den at some point in the future. I ordered 3x XD4' from Amazon for £135 and am watching a few of the AX82U's on Ebay atm aiming to spend only £100ish. Should I pull out of this plan and cancel my order? I don't really want to be spending twice this amount so will accept imperfections but not a total mess. I have FTTP 900m connection
Dual band wouldn't be pointless, but speeds would be affected. Dual band means you have the 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz bands. The 2.4Ghz band delivers slower speeds, but it can travel a further distance and is better at penetrating through walls etc. This band is commonly used by smart lights, security cams etc. The 5Ghz band had higher bandwidth and higher speeds. That's the main band you'll use when connecting to your network. So if you have two access points. For example, the first one is your main router downstairs and the second is upstairs. The only way for them to talk to each other is to use either the 2.4Ghz band or 5Ghz band. The 5Ghz band is typically used as it has higher bandwidth and speeds. So if your router boasts a speed of 2,400Mbps, your max speed drops to 1,200Mbps. As the other half is reserved for communicating with the other access point. Tri band is better as a third channel can be used as the dedicated backhaul. So a Tri band router will either have 2.4Ghz, 5-1Ghz and 5-2Ghz bands (i.e. a second 5Ghz band) or it will have 2.4Ghz, 5Ghz and 6Ghz bands. The 5Ghz or 6Ghz band can be reserved as a dedicated backhaul. Think of it this way....that extra channel is doing the work a long ethernet cable would do instead.
Also, bear in mind that more access points can be worse, not better. As the access points range cross over too much. If I was in your position, I would buy a half decent Tri band router first and then review things. You may find that one router is sufficient. This also allows you to walk around, test the strength in different areas of the house.
@@KevinMuldoon Thanks for the advice. I was pleased to find the used pair of XT8 AX6600 for only £200 on eBay so am going with that instead. I'll give some feedback once I have them.
Hey, can you use features, which are only in main router? I mean, if your phone or desktop is connected to main router, can you use its features, which are not in xd4s?
It depends on the feature, but most features are available through the whole network with the other routers acting as nodes. Obviously, if a node doesn't have technical support for something, it won't be supported. For example, if the main router is WiFi 6E and the nodes are WiFi 6, the nodes will only support WiFi 6.
I believe the main router can still offer 6E if the nodes are only 6. All of my routers are WiFi 6 so it's not something I've checked myself. This is a good article on the subject you might find useful dongknows.com/best-aimesh-routers-and-combos/ 👍
Hi Kevin, I just bought RT-AX82U and Zenwifi Mini XD4. Can you give me some advice ? In my opinion, I will use RT-AX82U as Main Router About setup AIMesh network, may i connect 82U with core pack by ethernet and two packs left with wireless or these two packs must connected with the core pack and not related with the Main Router ? I still confuse about this
Hi Thanh. With the XD4, I was able to connect the main node and one of the other nodes with no problems. For some bizarre reason, the third node took many attempts to stay connected. What I did with all of them was connect them via ethernet. Then once they're set up, you can use them wirelessly if you want. I have one in my garage working wirelessly and it works great. I believe you can use any of them wired or wireless.
@@KevinMuldoon Hi Kevin , I have some more questions. - When you setup XD4, the main node you connect to the WAN slot and the others two to the LAN slot . The Cables connect from slot LAN 1 2 3 of the main router, am I right ? - In the AIMesh network, the others two notes connected to the network though the main note or they connected direct to the main router. Hope you can reply for me. Thank you very much
I connected the wan slot on the main node to my AX86U (The LAN port would work too). You can connect the XD4 to any LAN port on your main router. For the other nodes, I used their LAN port to connect to the main router.
I haven't experienced any issues so far. It's been solid and speeds are better than previously. Have you encountered this yourself? If so, which model did you have problems with?
@@KevinMuldoon I run a ax88u if been having some wan stability issues for a while now, and sometimes it just crashes and thinks it can only run 100 mbps until i restart it.
That's interesting as I had initially ordered that to complement the 86U, bit I cancelled the order and got the XD4 instead as it gave me three access points instead of one. Are you using the latest official firmware or are you using Merlin or something? Definitely not an issue with your ISP?
@@KevinMuldoon using latest but if used merlin before to just to figure out if QoS planner worked there some issues with it if you set to calculate bandwidth automatically in both.
I noticed that certain settings really hit speed. For example, AI Protection reduces speed greatly. There were a few other settings I disabled as they cut speeds so much. If you can't fix it via the admin area, perhaps you need to go back one or two versions of the firmware.
![OneMesh vs. AiMesh [Whole-home WiFi systems]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/HpL7MyXrhIc/mqdefault.jpg)
![OneMesh vs. AiMesh [Whole-home WiFi systems]](/img/tr.png)
Sweet! Keep us updated!
Asus XD4N 3 pack are awesome highly recommended still going strong after 2 years.
Good to hear. I would like last mine and upgraded to a set of ET12s alongside my AX86U.
I can see ASUS ZenWiFi XT8 AX6600 Tri-Band Mesh Wi-Fi 6 System - White (Set of 2) for about £200 which seems good really. Should I be looking at those instead?
@@danreilly2225 I haven't used them myself but I know they got decent reviews when they were initially released.
@danreilly2225 I just upgraded to the asus ET12 pro twin pack so good have isp Toob 1gb up and down. Always over 700mb on wifi.
@@Didyouseeitreally nice upgrade... thought I'm biased as I have them too. 😆
I got them a year or so ago. I have one at the bottom of the house and one at the top. I still have the AX86U too, which is in my garage.
This is exactly what I was looking for
Glad you found it useful 👍
Hi Kevin, I've only just seen this video, prompted by the fact I will get a 900 full fibre installed next week (FTH only just available here now). As I have a steel walled workshop at the top of our rear garden I have been using a Zyxel Multi X AC3000 Try-Band Mesh system attached to an EE Hub to get a wifi signal inside the workshop. Would you have any idea if this will still work when I plug it into the BT Smart Hub next Friday?
Hi Kevin, Thank You for a very interesting video and I love Your passion for the Asus AiMesh routers. However I am a bit unclear of the compability. I, like You, have a Huawei wifi router supplied by my ISP Vodafone, Yours from BT. But I can not let the two routers coexist because of ip adress allocation problems? Did You scrap Your BT router or did You let it coexist as a access point? But the AiMesh router have to be the main router connected straight after the fiber modem? Right? What is compatible with the AiMesh?
Hi Per.
Glad you liked the video.
I scrapped the BT router altogether as it was slow and didn't let you customise anything. It wasn't worth setting up as an access point as the range and speeds are poor.
I have my fiber modem connecting directly to my router (albeit, via my network using cat 5E ethernet).
Two routers can be used together as routers. This situation is called Double NAT and it's not something I am looking to use. There's a good article about it at dongknows.com/double-nat-vs-single-nat/
👍
Kevin
Hi Kevin, thank you for the informative video!
I currently have an RT AX-55 (situated in living room) and I’ve been exploring the option of using ZenWifi as nodes to expand my network to reach spotty areas like my bedroom. Is there any reason why you’d pick the mini XD4 over the AC1500? In terms of specs, I’m not too sure which better supports the bandwidth/most compatible with my RT AX-55, what do you reckon?
I opted for the XD4 as there are three units in the pack. I also like how small and inconspicuous they are haha
I'd say they're better than the AC1500 though as AC is WiFi 5 and these are AX, which are WiFi 6.
I'm using then just to extend the network around the house. They've worked well.
Have you found a few black spots in your network?
FTTP almost available (probably via Sky) in our area so considering these exact devices to go with it. How have you found it? (no follow up video yet?!). Are you using wireless backhaul throughout and what's the performance at distance (upstairs / through walls) like?
Apologies. It was something I always planned to get round to, but other things got in the way.
I've found this setup to be fantastic. I use wireless backhaul on one of the nodes and the speeds are solid. I've not had any complaints wired or wireless.
@@KevinMuldoon thanks mate, very helpful!
Hi Kevin
I noticed you had the BT box. How did you get round the VDSL issue (FTTC). I want this exact setup but with having FTTC and needing Sky MER I am at a loss how to get round this. Could you help me out? Thank you
I'm not sure if Sky works differently. With BT fibre, you just need to connect the fibre line to your router and you're good to go.
I am thinking of replacing my ISP router and old/awful BT Wholehome mesh with ASUS RT-AX82U and 3x xd4 ax1800. The more I read the more I'm put off - Reddit comments about wireless backhaul on dual band etc & not using the AX82U's radios at all...like wtf really. I suspect this will work fine for my needs of streaming in the house and garage without dead spots. Stop me if I'm wrong please!
Hi Dan.
I should be able to point you in the right direction👍
One thing to note is that one size does not fit all. By that I mean, there is no perfect setup as it largely depends on your needs, your budget, whether your house is wired, the size of your house etc.
First off, anything you buy is going to be better than what BT give you. BT, and most ISPs, offer terrible routers at ridiculous prices.
Before we talk about budget and which routers to consider, can you tell me whether your house is wired with ethernet ports?
You should ideally only buy dual band routers if you have ethernet ports throughout your house (like I do). If not, you should consider Tri band models.
Thanks.
Kevin
Thanks Kevin. So dual band is pointless without ethernet connection? I don't have the house wired fully. I have 1 ethernet from the router to a switch in the lounge to supply my pc, ps5 etc. The storage attached to my pc has my movie library on it that I watch around the house and would like it to work in the garage den at some point in the future. I ordered 3x XD4' from Amazon for £135 and am watching a few of the AX82U's on Ebay atm aiming to spend only £100ish. Should I pull out of this plan and cancel my order? I don't really want to be spending twice this amount so will accept imperfections but not a total mess. I have FTTP 900m connection
Dual band wouldn't be pointless, but speeds would be affected.
Dual band means you have the 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz bands.
The 2.4Ghz band delivers slower speeds, but it can travel a further distance and is better at penetrating through walls etc. This band is commonly used by smart lights, security cams etc.
The 5Ghz band had higher bandwidth and higher speeds. That's the main band you'll use when connecting to your network.
So if you have two access points. For example, the first one is your main router downstairs and the second is upstairs. The only way for them to talk to each other is to use either the 2.4Ghz band or 5Ghz band. The 5Ghz band is typically used as it has higher bandwidth and speeds.
So if your router boasts a speed of 2,400Mbps, your max speed drops to 1,200Mbps. As the other half is reserved for communicating with the other access point.
Tri band is better as a third channel can be used as the dedicated backhaul. So a Tri band router will either have 2.4Ghz, 5-1Ghz and 5-2Ghz bands (i.e. a second 5Ghz band) or it will have 2.4Ghz, 5Ghz and 6Ghz bands. The 5Ghz or 6Ghz band can be reserved as a dedicated backhaul.
Think of it this way....that extra channel is doing the work a long ethernet cable would do instead.
Also, bear in mind that more access points can be worse, not better. As the access points range cross over too much.
If I was in your position, I would buy a half decent Tri band router first and then review things. You may find that one router is sufficient.
This also allows you to walk around, test the strength in different areas of the house.
@@KevinMuldoon Thanks for the advice. I was pleased to find the used pair of XT8 AX6600 for only £200 on eBay so am going with that instead. I'll give some feedback once I have them.
Hey, can you use features, which are only in main router? I mean, if your phone or desktop is connected to main router, can you use its features, which are not in xd4s?
It depends on the feature, but most features are available through the whole network with the other routers acting as nodes. Obviously, if a node doesn't have technical support for something, it won't be supported. For example, if the main router is WiFi 6E and the nodes are WiFi 6, the nodes will only support WiFi 6.
@@KevinMuldoon thank you. So if you are next to the wifi6e main router, you will be using wifi 6e, not wifi6 like in case of nodes?
I believe the main router can still offer 6E if the nodes are only 6.
All of my routers are WiFi 6 so it's not something I've checked myself.
This is a good article on the subject you might find useful dongknows.com/best-aimesh-routers-and-combos/ 👍
would love to see some more videos on these Kev
Thanks Ed. I'll try and do a follow up at one point 👍
Hi Kevin, I just bought RT-AX82U and Zenwifi Mini XD4. Can you give me some advice ?
In my opinion, I will use RT-AX82U as Main Router
About setup AIMesh network, may i connect 82U with core pack by ethernet and two packs left with wireless or these two packs must connected with the core pack and not related with the Main Router ? I still confuse about this
Hi Thanh.
With the XD4, I was able to connect the main node and one of the other nodes with no problems. For some bizarre reason, the third node took many attempts to stay connected.
What I did with all of them was connect them via ethernet. Then once they're set up, you can use them wirelessly if you want. I have one in my garage working wirelessly and it works great.
I believe you can use any of them wired or wireless.
@@KevinMuldoon Hi Kevin , I have some more questions.
- When you setup XD4, the main node you connect to the WAN slot and the others two to the LAN slot . The Cables connect from slot LAN 1 2 3 of the main router, am I right ?
- In the AIMesh network, the others two notes connected to the network though the main note or they connected direct to the main router.
Hope you can reply for me. Thank you very much
I connected the wan slot on the main node to my AX86U (The LAN port would work too). You can connect the XD4 to any LAN port on your main router.
For the other nodes, I used their LAN port to connect to the main router.
@@KevinMuldoon Thank you very much
You're welcome.
does aimesh allow for wired connections?
Yeah you can hook up connections to Asus routers via ethernet. The number of Ethernet ports does vary from router to router.
Be ready for some wan stability issues eventually if unlucky.
I haven't experienced any issues so far. It's been solid and speeds are better than previously. Have you encountered this yourself?
If so, which model did you have problems with?
@@KevinMuldoon I run a ax88u if been having some wan stability issues for a while now, and sometimes it just crashes and thinks it can only run 100 mbps until i restart it.
That's interesting as I had initially ordered that to complement the 86U, bit I cancelled the order and got the XD4 instead as it gave me three access points instead of one.
Are you using the latest official firmware or are you using Merlin or something?
Definitely not an issue with your ISP?
@@KevinMuldoon using latest but if used merlin before to just to figure out if QoS planner worked there some issues with it if you set to calculate bandwidth automatically in both.
I noticed that certain settings really hit speed. For example, AI Protection reduces speed greatly. There were a few other settings I disabled as they cut speeds so much.
If you can't fix it via the admin area, perhaps you need to go back one or two versions of the firmware.