Whole Home Mesh WiFi

If you are tired of dealing with poor wireless coverage in your home, you might want to consider a professionally installed Whole Home or Mesh WiFi system.

What Is Whole Home WiFi?

Whole-Home WiFi is a collection of wireless access points that are either wired or wirelessly connected to each other to provide full wireless signal coverage in your home. If this sounds complicated, don’t worry, it’s not.

First, keep in mind that Mesh WiFi is just a different type of Whole Home WiFi. Traditional Whole Home WiFi networks generally use a wired network cable to connect the wireless access points to a hub, or router. Mesh WiFi uses access points that connect to each other wirelessly, while at least one of the mesh access points connects back to the router with a cable. (Side note – an access point is just a device that creates a wireless signal, very similar to a WiFi-Router combo, just without the router component).

What Type of WiFi Setup Should I Choose?

Mesh WiFi Setup

Maryland Home Tech Consulting can install both types of WiFi networks, but there are benefits to choosing one type over the other. Mesh WiFi is the simplest to install in your home since it does not require extensive network wiring. You’ll only need one access point to have a wired connection, so it can be placed near the router and connected with a network cable. The remaining access points will connect wirelessly to that first wired one, and/or other wireless units. The downside to this type of WiFi setup is that the signal speed can degrade, the further you are from the base station. If you are at one end of your home, and you are connecting through more than one mesh access point, you may not get the full speed that you would when near the base station. However, quality mesh wifi hardware can reduce this type of signal degradation with advanced antennas and frequency controls and most customers will see mesh wifi speeds near 80% or greater. (Traditional plug-in type wifi extenders often reduce speeds down to 40% or lower!)

Wired WiFi Setup

On the other hand, a wired Whole Home WiFi setup allows each access point to be connected directly to the router over ethernet cabling. This provides the best performance since the access points are not “piggybacking” off of each other. With a wired system, you get full WiFi speeds at each access point. Maryland Home Tech Consulting can install these systems if you have existing ethernet wiring in your home, or if you plan to have an electrician install ethernet cabling.

One last benefit of choosing a wired setup, is that wired access points that we install are PoE (power over ethernet) capable. This means they can be powered with just the single network cable needed to connect to the router, through a power injector, or small PoE switch. Mesh WiFi units, on the other hand, will still need a power cable of some type and are generally placed near an outlet to provide power.

Maryland Home Tech Consulting can do most WiFi system installs and configurations in one day, so you can get up and running with less headache and work. Request an estimate today!