mesh networking (Huawei AX AX3000)

Soogs

Soogs

Soogs

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Hi all
I'm not a big believer in wireless networks and stick with wired were possible.

I've been using powerline plugs to get everything possible plugged in but the units I have are old and are not getting the speeds (or possible stability) they need.

Just purchased 2 of these units as they work as a mesh and was wondering if they are likely to yield good results?

First unit will be the main AP that connects to my edgerouter and the second unit will replace the powerline used downstairs to feed the TV stand which has sky glass TV, android TV box, PS4, Xbox one s and a raspberry pi.

Should I just connect them all to WiFi or mesh the units and have them connect by switch to the mesh?

I know none of my devices have wifi6 but will the link over mesh be better than WiFi direct from the end devices?

As they're all connected to the TV only one is likely to be in use at a time.

Any thoughts?

Cheers in advance
 
Mesh the ax3 (I assume ax3000 is an ax3) nodes together and run the stuff downstairs of off the switch on the mesh node for best performance rather than wifi.
 
So it looks like you can't have these both set to AP mode in mesh. One of them has to be a router which really throws a spanner in the works as it now gives me different subnets which can't communicate with each other grrr
Looks like at least one of these are going back
 
Not a mode I have used so can't offer much help, can you not reserve a set of addresses on the same IP range and have the ax3 dole these out in its normal mode?

Or just use repeater mode with DHCP off?
 
Soogs said:
So it looks like you can't have these both set to AP mode in mesh. One of them has to be a router which really throws a spanner in the works as it now gives me different subnets which can't communicate with each other grrr
Looks like at least one of these are going back
Click to expand...

Given that the whole point of a router is to route traffic between different subnets, it doesn't seem like an insurmountable problem.
 
@WJA96 this router has the most basic setup I've seen for a long time. no static routes config either. also would have to set up DNS forwarders and MDNS stuff which I'm not sure how to do if I'm honest. (think this would be a lot easier if it had a CLI (and I knew what to do with it lol))

@sandys I set the first AX3 to AP mode and then connected the second one to the first as a WiFi repeater.
was the only way to make it work for the purpose I need it for.
unfortunately, the performance is all over the place.

Think I'm going to replace the old kit with a gigabit powerline kit and see if it has the desired effect.

TP link states the powerline plugs are linked between 225-280Mbps but the link light on my switch is showing it's connected at 100Mbps so maybe that's my bottleneck along with some interference
 
I previously used AV2000 powerline, can get the job done but nowhere near gigabit, a few hundred meg at best but as with wifi every house is different, tplinks tool would always suggest 1Gb plus, it was optimistic, whereas I can saturate a gigabit link over wifi with these AX3 devices.

They are a bit slow to switch networks starting up in 2.4Ghz and taking a good 5-10 minutes to bring up the 5Ghz.
 
I have 4 of these. One set up as main router (connected to my sky broadband hub), then 2 as wireless nodes in my house and one as a 'wired' AP via powerline to my external home office.

I had a decent amount of difficulty installing to start with, but I think I was trying to be too clever. I then factory reset everything and started from scratch, just following the really simple instructions on their website (once you have the primary set up, for wireless you just plug in next to the main, then press the HiLink button on main when it starts flashing, wait 30 seconds after both turn green then just put the node wherever you like (within distance). For wired you literally just plug it in, insert ethernet to the WAN and it works.

I can see all 4 via the Huawei AI Life app which is very nice, can see which devices are connected to which node which is handy.

Speeds are good, I have 38Mbps from the wall and I have minimum of 22Mbps in my oddly laid out old house with some very thick walls.

Stability has been a bit touch and go at times but I imagine that might be the same with any mesh network to start with, it's been flawless for the last week now (have had them about a month and a bit I think).

For the price I'm happy. Useful to have 3 LAN ports on each though lack of usb is a bit annoying. In terms of range for each one I don't think they are too marvellous, seems less range than my sky broadband hub, which itself doesn't have any of the 4 antenna. But for the spec in terms of bandwidth they are extremely well priced from what I can see.

Do try and experiment with orientation of the nodes though, I found that can make a 5-10% difference in speeds/signal.

I think I have double NAT going on, which may be the cause of some of my instability, but I am 1.5 months into an 18 month term with Sky and don't fancy forking out for a replacement to act as modem or deal with any of the other issues that might bring me, so I'm just going to see how I go from now.
 
Yes you would have double NAT with sky but it's no issue, I ran like that for ages and its impact was negligible, still had better latency than running in modem mode on VM. Don't worry about it, only adds an extra step for routing servers etc, never had any VPNs or gaming servers say no for me and when I was on Sky I used to have some of the lowest pings on the game servers regardless, not so with VM :( .

I have experience the odd issue where a node keeps dropping the wifi and going red after it has been switched off, seems like a node can go into a funny state on boot up that is not immediately obvious, so I need to reboot the node for it to sort it self out but once out of that node it is fine (in fact I just switch the teh channels that sorts it out, doing the 80/160 switch) I have six over 3 floors and a garage at the bottom of the garden.

The WAN port can be used as a 4th LAN port so long as nothing on the switch serves IPs.
 
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sandys said:
Yes you would have double NAT with sky but it's no issue, I ran like that for ages and its impact was negligible, still had better latency than running in modem mode on VM. Don't worry about it, only adds an extra step for routing servers etc, never had any VPNs or gaming servers say no for me and when I was on Sky I used to have some of the lowest pings on the game servers regardless, not so with VM :( .

I have experience the odd issue where a node keeps dropping the wifi and going red after it has been switched off, seems like a node can go into a funny state on boot up that is not immediately obvious, so I need to reboot the node for it to sort it self out but once out of that node it is fine (in fact I just switch the teh channels that sorts it out, doing the 80/160 switch) I have six over 3 floors and a garage at the bottom of the garden.

The WAN port can be used as a 4th LAN port so long as nothing on the switch serves IPs.
Click to expand...

That's some useful info, thanks.

If @Soogs doesn't mind we should turn this into a general discussion thread :)

@sandys did you go for the dual core or quad core models? I went for dual core as I didn't think I cared for the extra processing power, but when I bought a 4th I thought I may as well splash another tenner then use that one as the main router, in case it gave me any benefits.

Being as lazy as I am, I just set the quad core up as the last node I needed, do you think I'd see any tangible benefit to swapping it to my main? And do you know if the NFC feature for connecting a phone works on a node rather than primary?
 
Soogs said:
@WJA96 this router has the most basic setup I've seen for a long time. no static routes config either. also would have to set up DNS forwarders and MDNS stuff which I'm not sure how to do if I'm honest. (think this would be a lot easier if it had a CLI (and I knew what to do with it lol))
Click to expand...

Surely you’re making this more difficult than it needs to be. Turn off NAT on the EdgeRouter and pass traffic to the primary AX3 which will then pass traffic to the other AX3(s) meshed to it. Nothing more is required, surely?
 
dl8860 said:
did you go for the dual core or quad core models? I went for dual core as I didn't think I cared for the extra processing power, but when I bought a 4th I thought I may as well splash another tenner then use that one as the main router, in case it gave me any benefits.

Being as lazy as I am, I just set the quad core up as the last node I needed, do you think I'd see any tangible benefit to swapping it to my main? And do you know if the NFC feature for connecting a phone works on a node rather than primary?
Click to expand...

I went quad for no other reason than 4 is better than 2, it also had faster clocks and more RAM, with machines this is often better I have had no quantifiable performance metric for choosing one over another, no reviews covered it. :o :cry:

I would imagine it would make sense to be your main router.

Yes NFC function works on all, I switch it off.
 
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WJA96 said:
Surely you’re making this more difficult than it needs to be. Turn off NAT on the EdgeRouter and pass traffic to the primary AX3 which will then pass traffic to the other AX3(s) meshed to it. Nothing more is required, surely?
Click to expand...
yes I am lol
that said the AX3 doesn't have all the functions I need from a router. I have a few VLANs and a WAN failover setup on the ERX so I cant give those up.
I've set up both AX3's as APs. Got rid of the powerline plugs as they just arent cutting it anymore and looking at reviews even the more expensive units cant really do the job well.
I would love to rewire the place but I don't own it and don't want to spend that much on something I might only get a couple years out of (thinking of having kids soon and may need a bigger place)
I've run and dropped a cat6 cable from the office to the living room and then got the tv bench connected with a managed switch with the second AX3 running from there.
It's a bit overkill having the second AP but I mainly use it for load balancing the wifi as we have a lot of devices and don't want to risk unstable connections

@dl8860 go for it :)
 
How are other users getting on with these?

My 4 have been generally good with the exception of the furthest one from primary router, which would drop out every now and then, generally needing a factory reset and relinking with the main. Not a difficult process, but very annoying when it's the one used by the TV and thermostat!

New users connecting seems to be a point of fragility, as most issues happened when we had guests round. Definitely annoying and puzzling, as I thought WiFi 6 was supposed to be especially good at dealing with greater volume of users, and ofc it's quite embarrassing when watching a film with company and the internet craps out.

I've since linked that furthest one up to a homeplug adaptor, and huzzah it's stable as can be. I get 25Mbps (compared to 35Mbps wired from primary), which is basically the same as I was getting with purely wireless mesh, and so far (about a week) zero dropouts.

I also reset up the whole system so that the primary was a Quad core model (the other 3 are dual), not sure if that's helped.

But I'm now getting stable >20Mbps throughout my fairly sprawling and thick walled 4 bed house for total outlay of 130 quid. If it stays like this I'll be very happy.

Other downsides are a lack of usb port (meaning I need a plug for Tado heating ethernet bridge, no biggie) and the WAN port on one of them is a bit insecure, and the ethernet cable can slip out over time.
 
Still good for me, I have 5 in daily use and a 6th when I go down to the garage. The one on the third floor/attic only manages to mesh via 2.4Ghz but still good for ~90-100Mb despite Wifi meshing to ground floor node on 2.4G, I will drop a wire at some point down the outside wall, as mentioned earlier I have had the odd problematic one which after a boot which will repeatedly loose wifi connection, sounds like your are seeing the same but if I just change channel width from 80-160 or vice versa it sorts itself out and then I have zero problems. Other than that problem which I can test for after its booted as the fail is repeatable by playing something off of the streaming VM box for ~15mins or so its been up for months with ~50 or so clients no problem.

One or two devices need to go on the wifi6_wifi5 compatibility SSID mode as they are old and won't work well on wifi 6 with the rest on my stuff.

In fact as I was in the attic I thought I do a speedtest, not bad really seeing as it's going through 2 ax3 to get here, down stairs ones are wired though. Ping and jitter a bit worse but all vpn and voip stuff is fine. It's annoying as there's a router on second floor which is wired but it is on the other side of the exterior wall due to extension and wifi will not pass through it otherwise it'd probably manage 900mb+ in the attic as I used to when 1st and 2nd floor were wifi mesh connected.

Screenshot-20220105-180331-Speedtest.jpg
 
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Soogs said:
I've couldn't make the mesh work for me with the current setup I have so I've set the main one up in AP mode and then set the second unit to repeat of another wap i have lol
Click to expand...
I struggled a lot to start with getting the mesh going. I think I was trying to be to clever with settings, and got so annoyed that I just factory reset them all and followed the simplest instructions possible.

It worked straight away, even moreso when I redid it from scratch recently to have the quad core as main, it literally took minutes. So I'd encourage you to try again if you can bear to.
 
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