eero - eero Pro 6E

I’m so you think the eero 6e pro is a good choice? I have a few matter smart plugs and the new Apple TV that has thread and three HomePods and three minis, and two thread smart Schlage locks.

I went with the eero 6e pro. So far so good. Set up Was incredibly easy. But having a small issue setting up a couple smart devices. I got everything set up fairly simply. But I’m having trouble getting a smart plug with matter from Kasa hooked up to my HomeKit app as well as my Samsung sound bar. I’m figuring out I believe it has something to do with the smart plug and soundbar are on one band while my phone might be on the 6ghz band. Most of this stuff is over my head and I’m learning a lot as I go. I was wondering if you’ve come across something similar with your eero? I don’t know how to make so my phone can be on the same band as the devices. The smart plug and soundbar work fine in their native apps. And actually worked fine in Homekit with my old router. So it has to be something about the triband that my new eero network offers. Any of this make sense to you?

I had a single original Google WiFi puck in a 2 bedroom apartment and loved it. When I bought a house in 2020 i upgraded to the Nest WiFi, basically what you have in the screenshot there. I was able to use my Google WiFi puck as a mesh AP and I had 3 pucks in the whole house. I did NOT use wired backhaul setup as it was not feasible and the throughput was absolutely awful. For context, I have gigabit from my ISP. With Nest WiFi I’d hardly ever get more than 100mbps on a single device regardless of how close I was to the puck. I replaced the whole system with a single Eero 6E and made no changes to my ISP/modem etc and now get 800mbps downloads on a 5ghz or 6ghz device with no loss of coverage in my home. In conclusion, switch to Eero or anything but Google. Google gave up on this product.

Eero 6e with 3 nodes.

I went from 3x 6e pro to 2x 7 pro. The new setup is substantially better and I’m getting nearly hardwired speeds (I have 1gb down 40mb up) upstairs with my gateway downstairs and using wireless backhaul. Just my 2c.

I went with the Eero 6E. 3 units cover my whole house and yard without issue (2700 ft2). I've got probably 50 smart home connections all running without issue. I did add one 2.4 ghz network extender to reach an outdoor generator that I was having issues with but probably didn't even need to do that (we later found out there was a faulty wifi module in the generator that was causing it to drop). To swap over my network I just ripped out the XE75 setup and set up the Eero with the exact same SSID name. Boom - every single thing in my house was up and running and I didn't have to reposition anything. It probably took me 10 minutes. I've been super happy with the switch. I'm not doing any crazy high performance network stuff, but I'm usually streaming 2 or 3 4K devices, running the whole Sonos system across the house, and working or gaming on 2 or 3 computers simultaneously with zero issues. Prior to my XE75 I had a Netgear Orbi setup (the original) and had more problems with that than I do with the Eero ... but nothing was as bad as the XE75. And the nice thing was I was unload the XE75 for 70% of what I paid via Facebook Marketplace.

If wired ethernet is a requirement, you will need a node with a port. The 6E would be a good one.

You may purchase a single 6E and deploy it has a node.

That’s the beauty of Eero. You may mix and match any of their devices together. In your case, I would purchase two of these. One has your base, the second as your node. https://a.co/d/iZrE64V

Hmmm, there maybe something in the way blocking your signal like a hot water heater. Anyways… I like the Eero’s. The larger models come with meshed nodes that have ethernet ports to wire into your office devices. They also use a concept called “out of band” backhaul. Meaning, node-to-node traffic doesn’t share the same frequencies as your normal LAN traffic. Look for this in any mashed network solution you deploy. And ultimately, Eero is easier to setup and maintain. Set and forget. If you want to play with and tweak your WiFi settings, look at a UniFi solution.

Good point on direct line-of-sight. I think I realise that the hallway is the key here since there is unobstructed view from every room in the apartment to an imagined line running through the hallway. So I could move the router to the hallway just on the other side of the wall from where it is now (perhaps drilling a hole to run wires). Then additional APs could be placed on the same line running through the hallway, so they would all be in good range of each other. I am thinking that I could start with just two APs in the hallway like that - and then could add another two on the small diagonal walls at both extremes if two aren't enough. How does that sound? Am leaning towards a pair of Eero 6e as I don't need wifi 7, and can find them for fairly cheap. As they would be placed in the hallway, they also have to be fairly discreet. If I go with UniFi I imagine the best solution would be a router in the location shown above and then two APs in the hallway - one wired and one wireless. But that would be a bigger and more expensive setup.

I'm happy with my 6e's and not seeing a compelling upgrade unless I splurge for the 7 max's

For your use case and skill level I’d go with eero. Replace existing router with eero.  Something like the Eero Pro 6e. Plug second eero into the line you ran for your pc, plug PC into spare port on eero. Now you have seamless WiFi on both floors. YMMV. Placement might not be perfect but you can fiddle with it.

Eero can do a decent job if you are absolutely against wiring in access points. Just temper your expectations. The access points that are furthest away from the gateway will have slower speeds than the access points that are closer to the gateway. Your house’s type of construction will also play role in performance.

My 6E three pack was why I got the PoE gateway… so I could get 2.5 to each node.