Switches for QOS (beginner/ help!)

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Hi there

I'm hoping someone can give me some basic guidance with a home network query for a beginner!

What am I trying to achieve?
Prioritise bandwith on my Office PC, presumably using QOS. Primarily for gaming but also to video calls/ Zoom.

What does my network look like?
I have tried to sketch this as per the picture below:

1609781764238-png.29110



Fibre optic is not available in my area so I have a Vodafone Gigacube (Huawei Gigacube B528s-23a) providing 4g home broadband.

Option 1
It looks like I can put my router in "Bridge" mode meaning could I buy a third party router with QOS features and use that? As my Office PC is connected via Ethernet/ the switches I am not sure QOS on the router would work.

Option 2 (currently pursuing)
Swap the Attic switch for a Managed/ Smart switch with QOS. Tell it to prioritise the Office Switch.
Swap the Office Switch for a Managed/ Smart switch with QOS. Tell it to prioritise the Office PC.

Would that work? Presumably I don't need to swap the Lounge Switch or Cupboard Switch?

The reason the switches are daisy chained is because I can't run any more cables from the attic to the rooms and are reliance on the existing cabling.

I've purchased a couple of these but no idea yet how to set them up, assuming Option 2 is viable: ***competitor link removed***

Any guidance greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Tom
 
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If you're not running out of bandwidth on your LAN (very unlikely) then doing QoS on your switch is pointless. You need to do this on the gateway using something like pfSense, Untangle (not used it personally but there's people here who like it), etc.
 
Ok, so you're saying my internet is the bottleneck so no point trying to control at the switch level. I've probably misunderstood QoS in that case. I just want to avoid those moments when one device on the network takes all the bandwidth for even a few seconds causing issues on my PC.
 
When I first read this post I thought ‘rubbish’. There is no way you’ll be able to do QoS on a £20 switch. Bear in mind that switching is a L2 activity and QoS is L3 so it needs routing capability within the switch. Anyway I read the manual online and it appears the are (or at least some devices in the range are) L3 switches. Assuming that the £20 switches you’ve linked to really are L3 as the manual would seem to suggest then (from p63 of the manual) set the port on your switch that supplies your priority device and set it to Priority 4 (highest) through the switch’s web interface. The switch will then prioritise traffic away from other devices to your priority device.

I’m extremely sceptical though because the last L3 switch I bought was £600 for a 24 port unit but I’m always being shocked these days.
 
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Understood! Switches have just arrived so will give it a go shortly. Would you say it is just the office switch which I need to replace (given that one has the priority device on it?). No need to swap out the upstream attic switch? Sorry for stupid questions, learning a lot!
 
Prioritise everything that routes you to the machine you want top priority for, so prioritise the uplink to the office switch and the link from the office switch to the client you want prioritised. Let me be clear, I don’t think it will make much difference, but for £20 a switch why not try?
 
OK, all set up and prioritised but doesn't solve my issue unfortunately. Seems like I have "Bufferbloat". This article suggests using a router with SQM, rather than QoS: https://www.bufferbloat.net/projects/bloat/wiki/More_about_Bufferbloat/#why-does-sqm-work-so-well

How did you come to that conclusion?

Surely it's more likely to just be the 4G connection


Edit:
From personal experience with a poor connection, it can often be better to just rate limit what internet bandwidth individual devices can use, rather than trying to battle with QoS.

E.g on my ~24Mbps FTTC, I've set a global limit where any device can use no more than 5Mbps of downstream bandwidth, this allows 4 "main" devices to consume that consistently whilst still leaving some bandwidth available for any other odd devices that may need it.

(The downside is that no device can use any more than that, meaning that e.g. downloads are a lot slower, but there are ways around that)
 
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I get rubber banding in games (or say using my work's remote VDI) as soon as my wife starts streaming Netflix for example. If I kill it everything returns to normal. Same with things like my PC downloading an update: massive ping, rubber-banding, kill it and back to normal. So I'm fairly satisfied that 4G isn't the issue which very rarely drops out and seems stable. Testing for bufferbloat here http://www.dslreports.com/speedtest gives me an F grade and this is the same as before prioritising with the managed switches. At least it gives me something else to try!
 
I get rubber banding in games (or say using my work's remote VDI) as soon as my wife starts streaming Netflix for example. If I kill it everything returns to normal. Same with things like my PC downloading an update: massive ping, rubber-banding, kill it and back to normal. So I'm fairly satisfied that 4G isn't the issue which very rarely drops out and seems stable. Testing for bufferbloat here http://www.dslreports.com/speedtest gives me an F grade and this is the same as before prioritising with the managed switches. At least it gives me something else to try!

Rate limiting would solve that
 
Oh really? That would be great. Presumably that's a configuration at the router level and I'd need to find one that supports it?

I imagine there would be a way of doing on that Ubiquiti router you ordered, but someone with more knowledge would have to point you in the right direction.

On my Draytek router it's literally a page with a list that you can add individual IP addresses and specific bandwidth limits (as well as a global setting for any device not in the list).

In theory rate limiting should work as for example e.g. things like Netflix/Youtube will happily use all of your bandwidth for brief bursts to buffer - limiting your device viewing Netflix to say 8Mbps (good enough for 1080P), stops it bursting higher than that, and if need be it will temporarily adapt to a lower quality setting if it can't keep up for whatever reason.
 
Great, I'll do a bit of research. Thankfully my wife won't recognise the difference between 4K and 1080p!

If you've got enough bandwidth you shouldn't need to drop down to 1080P - Rate limit your netflix device to 25Mbps (4K Recommendation) and it can never use any more than that, which stops it from causing spikes of burst activity where it uses all of your connection for a few seconds and then idles.

https://help.netflix.com/en/node/306#:~:text=Watch Netflix in HD&text=Titles will play in HD,megabits per second or faster.
 
I'd probably just limit the bandwidth on the office switch port that connects to the lounge switch to start with, to about half my connection speed :) Then tweak from there.
If that doesn't work then something is probably snaffling data via the attic wifi, which would be the next thing I would throttle if it is.
The simpler you can make the solution, the easier it will be to make changes later.
 
Whilst limiting it on a Switch will work to some degree, it also has the added disadvantage that if you transfer any files between PCs then that will be slowed down as well.

A further option as well, would be to look at settings on your Wireless access points, on some routers/APs you also have the option to limit the wireless bandwidth
 
Thanks all. Turned off the wireless access point on the attic router itself leaving just the WAP on the cupboard switch. Limited egress bandwith on the office switch through to lounge of 10MbPs. My total bandwidth averages 25MbPs but can jump to 100Mbps at 3am. So it works. It feels like a blunt tool and not the most efficient management method, but it does work and that's a win for me! There is no local PC--PC sharing that is impacted at least.

Will still try and have a go with SQM tomorrow with the new router too.
 
I didn't read all the posts, so I am probably way off the mark here, but I am assuming that what you really want to do is prioritise traffic on the WAN not the LAN. In other words access to the Internet. Change your router for one that can prioritise individual machines on your network. I use an Asus router that can do just that. If your LAN is saturating then an individual line back to the router and then prioritise that. Saves a lot of mucking about.
 
I didn't read all the posts, so I am probably way off the mark here, but I am assuming that what you really want to do is prioritise traffic on the WAN not the LAN. In other words access to the Internet. Change your router for one that can prioritise individual machines on your network. I use an Asus router that can do just that. If your LAN is saturating then an individual line back to the router and then prioritise that. Saves a lot of mucking about.

You're bang on the money, and he was told that in the first reply I think, but he'd already bought the switches and he's already bought the EdgeRouter. So what can you do?
 
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