Mesh without the religion

Mesh had a brilliant decade of marketing: a house as a cloud, satellites as a personality, a phone app with a heatmap. Some houses needed it. Many bought it because the hub was in a cupboard and nobody would run a cable. The religion says more nodes. The physics says a cable to fewer, better radios. You can still buy mesh. Buy it after the WAN test, after one cable attempt, and without a vow.

After the WAN test

Ethernet at the hub is the ceiling. If that is 40 on a 500, you have a line or port problem. Mesh will decorate it.

If that is 470 and the back bedroom is 8, you have a radio problem. Continue.

Backhaul is the product

A mesh node that talks to another node through a stone wall is two radios doing a job a £12 cable would do better. Use ethernet backhaul where you can. Powerline if you must. Wireless backhaul last.

The pack-of-three on a shelf is hoping you will not find the cable.

Enough

One extra AP in the far place humans sit is often enough. A node on every landing is how you invent interference.

If you still have a dead bathroom, maybe you can live without Zoom in the bathroom. That is also a network design.

A satellite is not a personality. It is a radio that still wants a backhaul.

Mesh can be the right ugly system for a hard house. It is the wrong religion for a cupboard you refuse to cable. Start with the cable.