Hi, I am in the UK and have a 100mb FTTP with a company called Gigaclear. They provide a Genexis HRG1000 as a NTE/CPE.

I have a lot of smart home devices in my home including my heating system, Amazon Echos, WiFi and Zigbee smart switches and CCTV cameras. I also have 3 x TP-Link EAP245, an EAP225 and an external EAP225 providing my WiFi Mesh network which works great and is rock solid. Most important items like EAP's, my server and the CCTV cameras all have fixed IP addresses which are reserved in the DHCP scope. The router functionality is very basic but does what I need in my home.

However over the last year or so the LAN DHCP server has become very flaky. The problem arises when we get a power outage even for a short period (which we seem to get a lot)!  On restoration of power the router can take 30mins to an hour before all devices receive an IP address from the DHCP server. Sometimes I have to use a laptop with a fixed IP to access the router and "Save" the DHCP scope. This appears to kick the router into assigning IP addresses.

I have complained to my ISP and asked for a replacement Genexis HRG1000 but they say they don't have any stock as they no longer supply them. Their answer is to put the NTE into bridge mode and use a Linksys Velop Mesh WIFI/router which they will send me. I have said no to this for two reasons:-

1) I have a working and stable mesh WiFi with my EAP devices and don't want to introduce another make

2) To have a second router behind the NTE means yet another device which is always on and consuming power.

The ISP are instant this is the only solution or they will charge me for an engineer visit and the cost of a replacement NTE/CPE made by DKT Comega.

I have therefor decided to look for alternative routers and came across the ER7212PC which is a router, POE Hub and an OMADA controller all in one. By relocating the position of the router I could replace a 5 port POE switch for my EAP's, a 4 port Gigabit hub and have a hardware Omada controller so would replace two existing powered devices with one making a power saving.

My questions are:-

1) If I purchase a ER7212PC can I set this up behind the existing router in order to configure it before the ISP put my existing NTE into bridge mode? I appreciate it will be double NAT but its only until I can set up static IP's DHCP scope on the lan etc.

2) Do I have to use a VLan for my existing wired LAN or is this the only way to configure the wired network

3) I believe the first start up configuration wizard sets up the Omada controller first. There is an option to import a configuration from another controller. I am using V3,2,7 Omada software on a windows 10 PC. Am I able to export the configuration from this software and import into the ER7212PC?

4) are there any good tutorials for setting this router up in a small office environment which is the closet usage scenario to my home environment

I appreciate this router is possibly overkill for my needs but it ticks lots of boxes. Any advice would be gratefully received