I’m clearly missing something obvious here. We have 1.5 gig fiber and a TP-Link Deco mesh setup. If I plug my laptop directly into the main Deco, I get around 900–950 Mbps, so the internet connection itself seems fine.
But over WiFi I’m usually getting somewhere around 80–120 Mbps.
And I don’t mean from the other side of the house. I can literally sit a couple feet from the main Deco, make sure the app says I’m connected to that unit, and still get roughly the same speed. House is around 2,700 sq ft with a lot of brick/concrete interior walls. Main Deco is downstairs and I’ve got three more nodes around the house. One upstairs node has Ethernet backhaul, the other two are wireless.
I know WiFi won’t match Ethernet exactly, but losing that much while sitting next to the main unit seems wrong. Explain it to me like I’m five. What should I actually be checking first?
First thing I’d check is the laptop, not the mesh.
What WiFi adapter does it have, and what band is it actually connected on? Being 2 feet from the Deco doesn’t automatically mean you’re on 5/6 GHz or using the fastest link the laptop supports. Mesh systems make a lot of those decisions for you, but the client still gets a vote.100 Mbps right beside the main node is suspicious enough that I’d rule that out before worrying about the concrete walls.
@MinimumNewspaper5 +1. And I’d verify the connection independently instead of only trusting what the Deco app says. I use NetSpot for this kind of troubleshooting. It’ll show you the BSSID you’re actually connected to, band, channel and signal level in real time. So if you’re sitting beside the main unit but the laptop is somehow hanging onto another node or sitting on 2.4 GHz, it’ll be pretty obvious. You can also see whether the surrounding channels are a complete mess, although I wouldn’t assume interference is the whole problem here if you’re only getting ~100 Mbps from a few feet away.
Four Decos in 2,700 sq ft may also be more mesh than you actually need. Especially with two wireless satellites.
This is where a quick survey is way better than guessing from the little WiFi bars. map the coverage.