@Carl LoL are you serious? Is this some kind of passive-aggressive respond to attck the customer? I'm also experiencing high ping spikes on my M9 WiFi, and based on this thread, there's no fix for the issue. Fortunately I'm still within my return period.

@LWZ 

haha it's fine. I realized quickly that he was of no real help, just had me running around doing tests for god knows why. I replaced the unit and had the same issue. Swapped it with a Netgear Nighthawk from Costco (for that return policy!) and have had zero problems since. I'm wondering if the M9 is just not designed to work with only 1 unit as I had it. Maybe it can't handle the load? 

@Ashhong 

I wish my devices were in return window as the problem is still occurring even with mesh off. Not as much as with mesh on but still happening. 

3 devices and no fix. 

@Ashhong Thanks for your reply! I have the 3-pack, so each node has <10 connections and it doesn't help either. I belive it's a design issue and they won't fix it (they don't even understand the difference between spike and average and how it affects gaming). Which Nighthawk did you get? Is it one router or a mesh? Can you share your ping results?

@ausinuk Yes I tried turning mesh off for my computer and it didn't help either. I still have the ping spike.

@LWZ 

No, it was at all.  Testing needs to be completed before an RMA is issues, that's just the way it is.  We can't replace a product just because a consumer believes it to be defective.  As is it a majority of products that are replaced are found to be in complete working order.  Also if you look at our warranty policy.  https://www.tp-link.com/us/support/replacement-warranty/ you will see that we can only replace a product determined to be a manufacture defect.  We can only do that if troubleshooting is completed and that was the point of my questions and requests.  We need to run test and collect information to determine 1. what the cause of the issue is and 2.  If there is something out of the ordinary have the information needed so that engineering can properly review. The user I was engaging with did not reply, until your message so further troubleshooting was not possible with.  

Also, we do understand the difference between spikes and average however if average pings are low, such as below 100Mbps then the impact on gaming is minimal.  Also, you have to consider the overall usage and load on the network as a whole during the time the packets spike.  Another thing is that all networks are different.  If you can provide more insight into your particular network, we would be happy to review and assist in troubleshooting the concern 

@Carl 

I appreciate your help and do understand that there is a process to an RMA. The reason why I stopped replying was because it was clear to me after trying multiple Deco units that it was not a defect, but rather an issue with the product overall. I should not have better performance from a 6 year old bargain router collecting dust in my closet. I didn't see a reason to continue using it as I could still return it. 
 

also, you are extremely mistaken by assuming random high ping spikes do not affect online gaming. It is not acceptable in any way. I cannot imagine any gamer being ok with the ping spikes I was going through. It completely ruins any competitive match. 

@Carl sorry to be pedantic but we have been talking about network ping response times. The key here is time. So when we see a spike the ping result is not mbs but rather time as in ms. 

What we have experienced is network spikes in that the normal ping response, in my case 10ms jumps to over 1000ms and I can see this consistently if I turn back on mesh. 

I have a 100mpbs broadband which is never saturated. So bandwidth or network utilisation is not the problem. It is the deco devices. Even when I was doing the tests reportly early the ping was from a static computer, ie gaming pc that does not move anywhere, to the deco device it talks to. I also pinged the other 2 deco devices that I have with same spike result. You could count the ping replies and guarantee every 10 pings resulted in enormous packet speed change to over 1000ms. 

Although turning mesh off removes the consistent 10 pack consistently the apikes still happen. Only randomly now. I have another wifi router which categorically does not have this problem. 

@Ashhong 

Oh no worries at all. I kind of realized why you stopped responding, especially after your message to the other user.  I was trying to highlight why I was going about the process the way I was.  And I do understand how high pings do affect the quality of gaming.  Due to network issues with my ISP for instance I can't connect to any game servers on COD under 54ms and forget about hosting a party.  With me this is becuase my ISP shared bandwidth usage and wiring that needs to be updated, but my pings are averaging well above an average ping as a result.  When you have your average below 100 Mbps espcially on a test say where you send 500 packets your spikes are minimal and you may see a hicup for a second or two but the affect on the overall game experiance is minimal.  That was the point I was trying to make.     

@ausinuk 

That was actually a typo.  A result of typing Mbps way too much.  Yes I meant "ms" not Mbps. I'd love to collect more information for you.  So I can then send it up to our engieering team with as much details so they don't try to send it back asking for more infromation.  What I need is the following.

• What hardware version do you have?
• What firmware version are you running?
• What app version are you running?
• Beside turning off Mesh Technology what other features if any have you modified?
• Have you tried to swap locations of the nodes, and or which is the base node?
• When you run your pings is it Wirelessly or wired?  What node are you connected to?
• With the pings are you loading the packets?  If so how large?
• Have you done a trace route?