PlayStation Portal - Wi-Fi Issues

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Hi all,

I have an issue with my PlayStation portal and using it around my house.

I received it yesterday and have been naturally testing it in different rooms etc. it basically streams games from my ps5 to allow me to play anywhere in my home (so it should anyway).

Here is my issue - It works superbly in my office where my router etc are. Once I go to another room like my lounge or bedroom I start to lose picture quality and games stutter making it pointless to try and play in there.

I have Fibre 500 so to me this is unacceptable. I should be able to stream some games.

I am thinking my smart hub 2 is just not giving me the coverage I need throughout my home. I have even tested my internet speed from my bedroom over Wi-Fi and I am only getting 10-20mb!

Would a better quality router help solve this? Can anyone recommend me a good quality router? I have fibre going straight to my property as I have a new build house.
 
This is a pretty common complaint with the device. It needs a very strong wifi connection.

You'll need to get wifi range range extenders if you plan to use the device without issue everywhere.

The portal does have an option in the settings menu that let's you lower the image quality, this lowers the required signal throughput and may fix the issue without having to extend your wifi range, though it will degrade the image quality
 
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I don’t want to have to downgrade image quality. I’d rather try and sort my signal out and use it as intended.

Would a better more powerful router not be an option? I hear the BT discs that extend coverage have issues with connectivity etc.
 
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Most form of range extenders are garbage, how old is the hub 2? BT might have a newer one which could help but wireless devices all transmit the same and are bound by the law and physics.

If you want high soeed everywhere then look you not a dedicated access point and mount it centrally upstairs hardwired.
 
Most form of range extenders are garbage, how old is the hub 2? BT might have a newer one which could help but wireless devices all transmit the same and are bound by the law and physics.

If you want high soeed everywhere then look you not a dedicated access point and mount it centrally upstairs hardwired.

The hub isn’t too old. Maybe 3 years.

Once I leave my office and walk across the hallway the Wi-Fi signal drops to 1/2 bars and then that’s when I start seeing poorer performance so I feel like if I had a strong signal throughout my home I could play it where I want to…

So range extenders are useless?

What is the point of 300 quid routers if they don’t give off a stronger or more even coverage?
 
What is the point of 300 quid routers if they don’t give off a stronger or more even coverage?
It's a marketing gimmick. Look at Sky and BT Wi-Fi guarantee and the throughput they actually guarantee.

Wi-Fi will penetrate one wall at home, after that you are going to have much lower bandwidth, as you're experiencing.

Most wireless mesh systems use half the bandwidth for the backhaul. Some systems offer wired backhaul, or they have a dedicated wireless backhaul. But nothing will beat a proper hardwired system.
 
My upstairs is a dead zone to wifi, I tired a few things like extenders etc but didnt want spend a fortune I now use a couple of 1gb TP-Link powerline adaptors from my main router downstairs in my house to connect directly to a another router TP-Link router upstairs and I actually get a faster wifi connection upstairs doing this than downstairs. Total setup was about £100 I think.

Often I get 350 -400mb which is much more than I need.

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Have you actually tried using your phone to see what speed/signal(bars aren't always too helpful since they arent always standardised so an app which tells you might be better) you're getting in those rooms. If you're only going out to the corridor, or the next room you are definitely going to see a drop in speed just due to the nature of WiFi, but it shouldn't be enough to fully degrade the Playstation Portal. Like the bandwidth requirement for Geforce Now Ultimate is under 100Mbps, so the Portal shouldn't have a requirement higher than that considering the screensize and you should be able to get 100Mbps in a room over or on the corridor. You'll probably see some packet loss due to the distance, but that should only be occasional small degradation or stutter not total drops of quality.

I don't have the Portal myself since I have a Steam Deck and a controller that attaches to my phone to do largely similar things, but I can't say I've had such a bad experience on those devices only that far from the router, and that was back when I was using Sky's really meh old router (only WiFi 5). Which makes me think it's partially a Playstation Portal issue. I have seen other people say that the Playstation Portal stutters/degrades easier than streaming the same content in the same location/same wifi on other devices. Not that it helps you that its a Playstation Portal issue, if it is you're either waiting for an update if it can be fixed via software, or as everyone else has said, wire up some access points elsewhere.

Powerline might be a good solution but it's truly not guaranteed. You've said your house is newly built, which is a good start as it means at least the wiring is new, but the other thing that can affect speeds is the powerline adapters being on the same circuit. As soon as they have to cross circuits then you start to lose performance. I think either way you'll probably not get the full amount of your connection to them but it should still be enough for a Playstation Portal. To use them you connect one powerline adapter via ethernet to your router (ie your BT hub) and any other adapters into the rooms where you want the wifi extending (or next to a device like a desktop which you want hardlined into the ethernet port in it).

If powerline doesn't work, then you'd have to either look into MoCA if you have coax wired into rooms (I'd say if you have a new build this is probably unlikely since that kind of cabling is going out of fashion but I figure I'd mention it anyway) or getting ethernet cables wired. As others have mentioned you can use wireless backhauls if you buy a mesh set up, but you're looking at quite a big investment, and realistically you're still going to see a bit of a drop in speed just because obastacles are going to degrade a wifi signal eitherway. The only upside might be that the newer expensive ones can use 6Ghz for the backhaul and that might be a bit less congested than 2.4ghz/5ghz(ie less prone to interference so might keep bandwidth a bit better).
 
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Do you have a link to these TP power line adaptors? How do they work exactly? Do they replace my BT Hub or connect to it?

They use the internal electrical cabling in your house as a wired network. I just plugged one into the wall socket next to my router and plugged a network cable into it and another adaptor into a wall socket in my bedroom and connected the router to it.
The powerline adaptors needed zero config and just worked, the only config I had to do was on the TP-Link router itself but your should be able to use any modern router to do it.

I'd recommend getting passthrough style adaptors so you dont lose the socket. The adaptors I use are TP-Link TL-PA7017P.
 
Powerlines are very hit and miss, it depends on the house electrics, you may end up with terrible performance. They should be used temporarily or when no other option exits IMO.
 
For the PS Portal specifically, since you're streaming on the same home network, your internet connection won't matter. What will matter more is the 5GHz WiFi coverage, which you'll need to improve.

Don't bother with powerlines, depending on the electrical wiring of your home they can end up with even slower speeds compared to WiFi. Local game streaming requires both low latency and high bandwidth.

Ideally for the best results you want to run an ethernet cable to the WiFi weak/dead zone then add an access point to it. If running a cable is not an option, mesh kits with dedicated backhaul can also work well.
 
Speaking of 5Ghz. Something you could try before you buy anything is separating your WiFi out into 2.4ghz and 5ghz SSIDs if you haven't already. Usually by default routers are set to share the same SSID for easy connection, but I've personally found some devices like to prioritise 2.4Ghz when it really shouldn't. Separating them out means you can force it to use 5Ghz. I've never been with BT so not really sure what their router config is like, most routers call sharing the same SSID "Smart Connect" so that's what you'd want to disable. Sky's router on the other hand spelt it out quite literally "Syncronise 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz settings".
 
Thanks for the info. Running a cable through isn’t really an option so I think I may go with a mesh kit and see.

Would it be worth getting a couple of these BT discs and seeing if that helps? They just add the cost onto my monthly payment..
 
Thanks for the info. Running a cable through isn’t really an option so I think I may go with a mesh kit and see.

Would it be worth getting a couple of these BT discs and seeing if that helps? They just add the cost onto my monthly payment..
Depends which discs you get? I think I remember reading only the more expensive WiFi 6 discs having dedicated backhaul but I could be wrong. Even then, it'll lock you into BT with their hub, so if you ever want to change ISPs in the future you'll need to replace that too.
 
For the PS Portal specifically, since you're streaming on the same home network, your internet connection won't matter. What will matter more is the 5GHz WiFi coverage, which you'll need to improve.

Don't bother with powerlines, depending on the electrical wiring of your home they can end up with even slower speeds compared to WiFi. Local game streaming requires both low latency and high bandwidth.

Ideally for the best results you want to run an ethernet cable to the WiFi weak/dead zone then add an access point to it. If running a cable is not an option, mesh kits with dedicated backhaul can also work well.

I use the Deco X50 mesh kit for my home.
The house is two stories across 200sqm and despite having an expensive router there were parts where wifi was under 10MB/s.

I made that mistake originally of thinking a better router would fix the problem but it did not. The thing is there are laws all around the world that limit how powerful a wireless signal can be and because of that it doesn't matter if you have the best router or not you'll never be able to get good speeds everywhere with a single router.

Then I ended up buying the X50, they were super easy to setup and within 5 minutes it was done and now get fast wifi everywhere, even in the yard outside, the signal only drops out when I'm about 10 meters away from the house
 
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buy either some access points or mesh. My experiance with asus is unless they are on cable backup it needs rebooting sometimes
 
Ok. I think I am going the Mesh route... There are so many....

All I want is to be able to use my portal in the lounge and bedroom upstairs (which barely gets wifi at the minute).

I dont really want to spend more than £200. Does anyone have any recommendations as well as the Deco X50? Do I really need a system with a dedicated backhaul just to use my portal?
 
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