I have a solidly built house. Signal strength is 100% in (upstairs) main bedroom 40% in another on the same floor. Downstairs 80% in the kitchen. My sim room is 45%, Lounge/TV room 20% and needs constant buffering and ground floor spare bedroom is 10% or less. Solid walls lots of copper pipes.
A mesh network will probably improve all of these areas…
Thoughts, experiences and recommendations please?
Some good info in here - Need Some Router Suggestions
I use a Google Wifi mesh and very happy with it. Not cheap though, and as per every Google product probably renamed/deprecated now. Our house is in Canada, so wood everywhere which makes it easy, so not sure about brick. For years I used Powerline Adapters (I keep thinking that’s the Disney Goofy Movie, the one with his kid but it’s not) as the electrical wiring is new, but never really were super happy with them.
I’ve had excellent results with Orbi (Netgear) mesh. The satellites can be connected either via wired or wireless. Even wireless, they are really fast. Mine are two years old, so not the latest gen, and get consistently ~ 500 Mbps measured between floors on the Wireless backbone. The new ones are faster. Very easy to deploy and manage. They also have a “hidden” interface for more advanced users.
I have the new eero 6 setup. Three identical units and it supports wifi 6. Right now, only my wife and my S21+ use it I think, most of our other devices predate it, but there will be more in the future.
I have a house split 75% down/25% up, but the internet was upstairs. The signal was fine there and in the front of the house below the upstairs, but as you moved towards the backyard it got weaker and weaker. The eero supports wired backhaul, so the 3rd router downstairs that’s close to the back of the house is connected via ethernet (the house came wired with it) to the 1st one upstairs. The 2nd downstairs router is close to the front and connects to either the 1st or 3rd router via wireless.
I now get several hundred Mbps over wifi all over the house, and even on the back patio. With my previous Amplifi HD setup I did not, it dropped to 20 Mbps in the back of the house and was pretty much nonexistent on the patio.
Unfortunately this eco-system doesn’t seem to be all that mature yet. There are devices that do certain things well but not everything.
The Netgear Orbi 850 series is super fast and all, but parental controls are non existent apparently. It’s also stupid expensive.
Meanwhile Google doesn’t do wifi 6 so not a future proof product. Also lower ranges, etc…
Asus has a good offering with their zenwifi xt8 but the parental controls and network protection are done via Trend Micro who are apparently collecting tons of data if you use their services (and like most companies probably even if you don’t).
I’m having a hard time choosing.
I will add the eero 6 has lots of those extras as well as part of a paid service, I think it’s called eero secure? I’m not using it so I can’t speak as to how well it works or not.
Ya it does. The Eero pro 6 would be what is be aiming for (I have gigabit internet) but reviews seem to show it doesn’t offer fantastic speed at range. Which defeats the purpose.
I don’t know what “range” might mean. I have 3 units covering my house’s 2 floors and it works everywhere indoors (5b/4bath) and on the patio. I’ve not really tried out in the yard or in front of the house, but of course there are a couple of things to consider.
Range is better at 2.4GHz than 5GHz, that’s just physics. So if you have a 2.4 device, or can force the device to use it, it’s better than 5. There is also interference that can be at play, depending on how noisy your environment is in those EM bands.
I never know with reviews that I’ve not read myself if they take these things into consideration or not.
Oh for sure. It’s definitely a case by case. No review can guarantee it’ll work in your setup. The reviews I read though showed significant slowdown on the other side of the room, is all.
For me the Wifi 6 would be a really nice feature to get, just because I can picture a wireless VR headset needing it (or rather benefiting from it). Other than that I am fortunate enough to be able to put in some wires (even just for backhaul on the Google Wifi things under and over the main floors). The current units are really expensive though.
Ya it’s nuts. I picked up the Orbi because you know Paulbeach syndrome. The speeds are pretty good. Same room I get 800+ down. I have gigabit internet.
Same floor pretty good. Right above or below pretty good. Middle of middle floor is like 200-500 down depending on location. Front yard I get 50 and back is like 150-200 I think.
I had to wire my wife’s work laptop into the satellite unit because it wouldn’t detect the network. 
I had the same issue with a couple of laptops.
There are generally 2 possible fixes. If the router has a “legacy” mode (which disables wifi 6 for 2.4GHz, leaving them to connect at 5GHz only), that can work.
Alternatively, you update the wifi drivers on the laptop and that can address it, especially if the current drivers are a few years old.
Ya. She can have work issue her a newer laptop 
she’s tied to the desk otherwise.