Linksys Velop vs Netgear Orbi (etc): Mesh in Europe

After years of frustration in a difficult house with Apple Airport Extremes, I’m finally going to go over to mesh.

I have lots of thick walls and floors, and while I have four hardwired LAN points, I also need a wireless bridge to the kitchen.

I’m looking at the Linksys Velop, available easily in Europe and not expensive. I’ve seen also Netgear Orbi, although I’m not sure that’s a true mesh. I prefer the Velop from what I’ve read.

Can anyone offer a comparison between these? In particular do they require a subscription like Eero does? If so I’d be chary of diving in. (Eero is out because of that, and availability; and Google is out because of security concerns.)

I moved from 1 Extreme and 2 Express to 3 Velops. It was not a seemless transition but a better one if you are willing to move nodes and try different setups. It did allow me to put a couple Roon wireless endpoints where I needed them. Ropieee’s with PI 3’s wireless. It does not play well with some older b/g wireless devices. In particular Global Cache IR transmitters. I needed to keep one of the Expresses to bridge a sepate network so they could connect. I also needed to break out the 2.4 and 5 ghz networks as some devices may need to connect to only one or the other. The good thing is the software is pretty easy to navigate. BTW - if things seem to be slowing or disconnecting - run the channel finder. If Apple were going to remain in the router market I may stayed with them but I needed to make the change.

I was also already thinking about switching to a mesh network. As my current router is the Synology RT1900ac, I am waiting for their mesh router (and reviews about it) which was announced a few days ago (mr2200ac). I really like their administration interface. It is the same they use for their diskstations. Easy to configure with the option to install additional services.

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I’ve had a 3 box Orbi system for 18 months. It’s great when it works, but Netgear force untested firmware releases at regular intervals that cause everything from minor annoyances to complete system failure. Check out the Orbi boards on the Netgear community forum, their customer care is monumentally bad.

I am currently using a 3 Velop system in bridge mode with my RT-2600ac router (long story but I’ve been trying to have a single, seamless Wi-Fi network for a long time) - pretty much has been set and forget, Roon can stream to every output on my Macs and additionally streams to the AirPort Extremes. I use the Synology interface to manage the router and the Linksys app (very occasionally) only if I need to run the channel finder. IMO you don’t need a new router. EDIT - Velop does require a Linksys account for setup and management. There is a way to access the interface directly but I’m not sure if you can bypass the account requirement that way.

I was not aware Synology would release a mesh network. If I would I would have perhaps waited instead of buying a netgear orbi. By the way the orbi is replacing Apple extreme at home and i would say that I’m very happy with. Much more better speed than with the Apple…installation in bridge and not so easy as I though everything could be done through the iOS app. Login into the orbi through the ip address is much more easy. As usual in bridge mode with netgear not easy to identify the devices connected.
As you mentioned, interface of the Synology is a real deal breaker vs netgear.
Let’s see

You might also check out the Amplifi system from Ubiquiti: https://www.amplifi.com They are well known for delivering very good network coverage and speeds. I use their Unifi system that gives an user more options but is mostly used wired. The Amplifi system is practically the same tech in a more user-friendly package.

Thanks for the information. I think it is possible to use the router in bridge mode (router being managed by another box) but is it possible to extend the WiFi network not with the mesh point but with other router in order to be able to use the Ethernet ports : in a nutshell making a mesh with routers and not with mesh points ?
Best regards

I actually don’t know if you can use the router as a mesh point. You can better ask this at the people from Amplifi to be certain.

My experience with Velop was not positive. I had pretty much used all Linksys network products in the past including several wireless routers and network switches. After a month and numerous reconfigurations, I returned my 3 pack Velop mesh system to Best Buy. I had nodes on three levels of a somewhat large 5200 square foot house. For no apparent reason the satellite nodes would lose contact with the network and require a reboot. Also, my wireless devices would not stay linked to the closest, most logical node and would randomly connect to a more distant one with less than acceptable performance. Maybe I just had a bad batch of Velop routers. I ended up going with a 3 eero mesh network system (3 separate eeros, not a 1 eero and 2 beacon system). This has worked very well for me. Nonetheless, of course I always try to configure a wired ethernet connection to all of my networked media devices whenever possible.