Firstly, apologies for the length of this post.

 

I've had a pair of M4 Decos for 6 months, using them in AP mode connected to my BT Smart Hub, with Wi-Fi turned off on the hub. They've been working fine, one in the living room at the back of our 3 storey townhouse, with the other in my office, one floor up at the front of the house. The BT hub also had my Hue Bridge and alarm hub connected via Ethernet.

 

We've just had fibre installed, and the ONT is in the hall. This has meant moving the main node from the living room to the hall, where I only have two available sockets and room for just the ONT and one M4, now running in router mode.

 

I moved the satellite from my first floor office at the front of the house, to a full height built in cupboard on the landing where I keep my printer and other items. I then connected the Hue Bridge and alarm hub to it.

 

Knowing that the new locations would have an impact on range into our garden (where we've a Google Nest Mini in our garden room and a Tapo smart plug controlling some lights), I picked up what I thought was a bargain twin pack of an E4R and E4S on Amazon for £36. That they were designated Router and Satellite on opening surprised me, as my M4 twin pack aren't separated into router and satellite.

 

The E4s were Ver:3.0, (2-pack)(EU).

 

All were running latest firmware.

 

Almost immediately, the problems began. The app would report that some of the nodes were offline, and our several Amazon Echo devices kept dropping off the network.

 

This was happening fairly consistently.

Having removed the E4 pair from my network, the M4 setup is functioning well, after a fashion. Frustratingly, some devices still try and connect to the more distant node, but I realised that after removing the E4 pair, the app offered greater functionality - namely, the ability to set a connection preference. I've now set a specific target node for each of my Amazon Echos.

 

I've returned the E4 twin pack.

 

Unfortunately, now that I'm back to two nodes, I've had to move the first floor node back to the living room to get coverage in the garden (either the Deco range is poor, or the wireless radios in the Nest Mini and Tapo smart plug are poor).

 

This means that the top floor is now struggling, specifically the Roku connected to my TV.

 

So, after all that, a couple of questions.

 

1. Anyone else experienced similar problems with E4s?

 

2. How best to improve the coverage to the top floor?

 

I've considered replacing the 2x M4s with a three pack of S7s, but understand that the current S7 firmware doesn't allow connection preferences.

 

I've also considered something like an RE330 on the middle floor just to serve the upstairs Roku. I'm aware that it's an extender, and won't be part of the mesh, but that works, as I can give it its own SSID, just for the TV.

 

Or should I just buy one or two more M4s?

 

I'd welcome the Community's input.

 

Many thanks,

 

S.