TP-LINK Deco M9 Mesh Wi-Fi System Review & Comments

Greg Hook

TP-Link's £280 Deco M9 mesh system aims to banish Wi-Fi blackspots forever with an impressive array of features including Tri-band, anti-virus and parental controls.
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Write your own review for TP-LINK Deco M9 Plus

joost80

I have personally had the Linksys Velop, Google WiFi and now the TP link deco M9 systems and only the M9 system worked as advertised, without hickups or performance troubles. I don't have a wired backhaul. With these systems it's very much a test it at home advise. The Orbi's work great for some, and bad for others. Same with Google WiFi. I could not get any speed with that system, while others praise it.

Eddy555

I've got a Velop with 2 nodes with a wired backhaul. Generally it's been pretty solid and the WiFi coverage is just about right for my setup.
I'm sure I looked at the TP-Link system, but can't remember why I dismissed it. I have other TP-Link gear (switches mainly) that are superb.

tman

I personally have a two node Google wifi mesh - and it's been singly one of the best investments I've made. Backhaul is over wifi, and performance and reliability of both units is excellent. No more wifi blackspots or ugly EoP wifi extenders. Mesh wifi is definitely the way forward.

bogart99

Have an Orbi RBK53 and no problems. Good wifi coverage across the whole house, 5 bed rambliung cottage, and seems rock solid, no reboots etc.

Pisto_Grih

I had a plan to order a mesh wi-fi system today and it was between this and Google Wifi - coincidentally saw this review and thought it was a sign so I've ordered a set . House is a brick walled victorian semi - and the router is at the front of the front room - so we've had to rely on powerline adaptors for any kind of coverage in the main family room at the back of the house. Given we have "up to 200Mbps" broadband (which we do get if wired direct) it's pretty galling to speedtest at 5 or 6Mbps at the far end of the house.

Ethernet is in walls, so that can be used for backhaul once terminated and tested, but for now will try it out WiFi only.

guest

Sorry but.

Why are proper wireless tools being used to measure the results?

Seems a little meaningless to review something without being able test correctly.

I can understand that you are reviewing based upon users not having the correct understanding or tools to measure and analyse there homes before deploying. But as a review I would want to see accurate measurements using the correct tools and methodology.

Without them your results and conclusions are meaningless.

Other reviews on this site use the correct tools to test. Seems a shame not to continue this in anything being reviewed.

Eddy555

What tools would you have used?
LANSpeedTest had always been pretty good when I used it, although I use iperf3 these days

Greg Hook

Yes, what tools would you suggest? Always happy to add additional testing regimes if they are free of course!

guest

Firstly.. Thank you for not jumping on me... I was trying to be constructive but its easy to piss everyone off

iPerf or other tools like it only test the raw speed for A to B which has its uses but in a wifi review, I would like to also see:

whats the RF in the environment.

What does the device (ideally more than one) see.

What does something like a Sidekick see when you do a survey. (Assuming your using something like Ekahau)

What is the antenna spread

What is your device reporting to connect at? is it a 3x3 or 2x2 how well did your device maintain this?

Whats the Antena db

How did you place the AP's to get the best coverage (height, distance from walls, ceilings, I want to know about reflections etc)

How many AP's do you actually need to give a primary and secondary signal at -65 (assuming this is your benchmark) compared with what the manufacture claim (you mentioned coverage - what does this mean in the real world. 2.4 at -75 is a really, really long distance.

Does the backhaul over wireless negatively affect the speed of a device? by how much compared to wire.

How many SSID's can be created and the negative effect of those. layer 2 isolation (does it work?) can you open it up? what control over layers do you have i.e. 2,3,7

Since this review is talking about mesh... I would like to see what is TP-Link using for handover r? some strange built in logic? how well does it work? how does it work? any controls / negative effects / tweaks to improve / dropped packets etc.

Can you change the minimum connection rates?

VLANs?

What were the channels used - because? - what options etc
what was the channel width used - because? - what options DFS etc

A comparative heat map is useful between different AP's in the same area.

iPerf from a location I can see on a map with more info from above has more use because I can use that data to guess how it would work in my house...

Saying speed from point 1 was x really does not mean much if the RF environment is rubbish, you have co-channel interference, the AP is doing something strange, your neighbor(s) decided to move there wifi/channels/width

You cannot compare wifi from different vendors that way.

sorry.

I have just been through reviewing wifi for my own home and it took serval AP's from different vendors and lots of time (and patience from the rest of the family) and lots of documentation to narrow the choice down to one...it was not the one I expected either.

Edit: And noticed your comment on Free .....

OK forget the above to some extent

Edit2: OK.. you can still do quite a lot of whats above. For free(ish) but it would be worth contacting Ekahau to see what they can do (7 day license for the review).. they also do a free ish trial which would give you an insight to much of the above   some of there free tools are very good, just limited.