@9ux 

 

Have you bought Deco already? If not yet, I can have conversation with you to find better options from TP-Link Deco for your environment. For example, BE85 is quite expensive model which will shine in place with large empty spaces and no walls, which is opposite to what you have. 

 

Please let me know the following:

 

1. What is the speed of your Internet link, the one ISP provides you with?

 

2. You home LAN, is it gigabit (switches, etc.) or faster?

 

3. Do you by any chance have coaxial cable (TV  cable) going from one side of the house to the other side of the house? If yes, we can use that.

 

 

Hi  @Alexandre. 

 

Thanks for the suggestion. I bought 1 BE85 for now to test against my Asus AiMesh setup (7x). Considering switching to deco mesh. Typical rooms are about 4-5 meters. One hall is 10m.

 

1. 2 Gbps

2. The ethernet cables support 10Gb. Couple of lines run at 10Gb already some node unit only support 2.5G. TL-SX105.

3. Yes we do. Actually coaxial ports are in most rooms. Do TP-Link have coaxial backhaul products?

  @9ux 

 

If you have coaxial cables, you can bring Ethernet to every room where that cable terminates. Then, you can connect "standard" Deco units to the Ethernet and they will run on Ethernet backhaul.

TP-Link does not have coaxial backhaul products, but you don't need them: you will create a universal solution that can be used with TP-Link Deco and any other WiFi mesh brand which supports Ethernet backhaul and with standard Ethernet wired clients such as desktop, SmartTV, NAS, wired network printer.

 

This solution is superior to powerline link. If you ask me to, I can write longer post explaining why powerlines are inferior solution, but short summary from tests done at my house: I am getting stable gigabit speeds over coax cables, with powerline my top speed was about 100Mbps and unreliable.

 

Ethernet over coaxial cable provided by MoCA adapters. Here is conceptual idea, and under this picture I'll discuss it a bit more:

 

 

 

1. Depending on speeds you want, you have two options to consider:

1.a. MoCA 2.0 adapters with gigabit Ethernet port. I have those, they do deliver gigabit speeds.

1.b. MoCA 2.5 adapters with 2.5 gigabit Ethernet port. If you decided to go with MoCA 2.5, make sure adapter has 2.5 gigabit port - some come with 1 gigabit Ethernet port, make sure you buy the right one.

 

2. MoCA adapter must support Deco Ethernet backhaul, not every brand does. I have ScreenBeam adapters, they are compatible. ScreenBeam is rebranded Actiontec, I suggest you limit your choice by these two brands.

 

 

Before you go full scale deployment, I recommend the following two tests. You will need pair of Deco units and pair of MoCA adapters for it:

 

1. Bring all gear to same room, connect both adapters with short coaxial cable. See they established link. Connect Main Deco to one of adapters and Satellite Deco to second adapter. If Satellite Deco reports Ethernet backhaul, they are compatible.

 

2. Check each coaxial cable at your house, starting with longest. Same as first test, but with cables going over the house. Start with longest cable. Then, test all other cables. If you get Ethernet link and Deco on Ethernet backhaul with them, now you can start full scale deployment by buying as many MoCA adapters as you need (up to 16 according to MoCA adapter specs page).

 

 

These adapters are not cheap, but think about this as a project to bring Ethernet over you house, Deco or no Deco. If you look at it that way, perhaps it would make sense to spend a bit on it.

 

----------------

 

If one Deco model can establish Ethernet backhaul through MoCA adapters, any Deco model should work with same MoCA adapters, too. If you can bring Ethernet to every room, it would make sense to go with less powerful Deco units placed to every room and using Ethernet backhaul.

 

If you would like to discuss options you may have with Deco models, and you may be able to save on them to compensate for the cost of MoCA adapters, you'll need to tell me the following:

 

1. Do you need WiFi speeds faster than gigabit for wireless clients? 

 

2. Do you expect that wireless clients connected to a single Deco unit could exceed gigabit speed combined?

 

3. Why have you decided on BE85? Any hardware/software features you need from it, or what other reason? It is WiFi7, why not less expensive WiFI6E or even WiFi6 Deco model?

Hi  @Alexandre. 

 

Thank you so much for the ideas.

Just to confirm. This is the coax port right?

 

 

 

1. Do you need WiFi speeds faster than gigabit for wireless clients? 

Some clients does, but also I have too many wifi clients especially 2.4G IoT devices (70-80).

 

2. Do you expect that wireless clients connected to a single Deco unit could exceed gigabit speed combined?

It's nice to have.

 

3. Why have you decided on BE85? Any hardware/software features you need from it, or what other reason? It is WiFi7, why not less expensive WiFI6E or even WiFi6 Deco model?

I want to try the unit that have all the features. Especially it have 10Gb ports. I need this speed for some of the rooms for software development, AI project, NAS.

 

Does mixing different deco models potentially limit some features that is present in the big unit like BE85?

 

  @9ux 

 

It is a bit hard to say from that picture if this is coaxial cable, because it is inside the panel. This is more traditional look:

 

 

Take off the panel if you can and take a look. 

 

Also, all these TV cables should congregate in one place, near the corner of the house, where you may see cable splitters like this:

 

 

 

In regard to Deco mesh, it makes sense to run it with hardware of the same series. TP-Link has WiFi6 X-series such as X50, WiFI6E series such as XE75 and WiFi7 series such as BE85. Usually bigger number in model name means more powerful device, for example X95 is top of the line WiFi6 model, X50 is mid-range by price/performance, while X10 is the most budget one.

 

It makes sense to use most powerful Deco model for Main Deco, so your BE85 should become Main Deco. Based on your requirements for home network, I would suggest going with MoCA 2.5 adapters having 2.5 gigabit Ethernet port. For Satellite Deco you can use less expensive BE63 or BE65 that has 2.5 gigabit Ethernet ports - perfect match for such MoCA adapter.

In Amazon in my region BE65 are currently half the price of BE85. They should make excellent Satellite Deco.

 

If TP-Link releases even more budget friendly models from BE-series, they could be named BE50, BE20, BE10 if TP-Link keeps following its naming convention. These could also be good addition for your Deco mesh, as long as they have 2.5 gigabit Ethernet ports. Obviously, BE10 should go to smallest room with least number of clients.

Hi  @Alexandre. 

 

Thanks for the details! I'll try the coaxial backhaul solution.