Review on Ubiquiti AmpliFi Gamer’s Edition: Seamless Whole Home WiFi System with HD Router, 2 Mesh Points, Gigabit Ethernet, WAN Port, and Ethernet Cable – Replacing Router & WiFi Extenders by Christian Young

This is a good, simple solution with many useful features and benefits IF (and only if) your Internet connection is in the middle of your house. It's not actually a real grid, but more on that later. There's a lot to like about AmpliFi. As usual from Ubiquiti, the hardware looks very good. It has a small form factor and looks modern and even pretty when it comes to home electronics. The router has a small touchscreen that can cycle through different modes to show you useful information about your network and configuration, and the remote access points are lightweight and hold securely in place and won't get in the way, taking half of two a point of sale. wall plate. The built-in free VPN is easy to turn on when needed and can save you a few bucks a month if you currently pay for a VPN service. I really thought I would love this product. I've only had one problem with AmpliFi, but it's a big one. The description, and even the packaging, says that access points can work in a daisy chain when the router is at one end of the house, one access point is at the other end, and the other access point is somewhere in the middle. She. This is EXCELLENTLY true. The problem is you can't make them work that way. My cable comes into the house from one end and I need service to the other end so I set mine up that way hoping they would connect seamlessly. You are not. In most cases, the access point at the far end will try to connect to the router and not to another access point, even if the application managing the system says it's too far away and the signal is too weak. Sometimes it could be used in 2.4G mode but not in 5G mode, so I immediately had to limit a key function to make it usable. But even in 2.4G, in practice it would happen that if I walked from the side of the house with the router to my bedroom on the other side, my devices would switch to one of the access points as I got further and further away from it. routers. In a real mesh that would be fine, but one of two things could happen with AmpliFi: Sometimes when it's connected to a medium access point that has a good connection to the router but is far enough away from my device that my connection is not interrupted. or my device moves to the nearest access point and has a reliable connection, but the quality of service degrades because the access point is too far from the router. A few times after restarting the APs I finally managed to chain them but they don't stay that way and there is no option in the app to lock them in this configuration. I've researched the Ubiquiti forums and it turns out this question comes up a lot. Every time a user requests the ability to decide how to prioritize a connection, the company says its algorithms know better and that users should move the router to a location between access points. In my house, and probably many other houses, there is no other good way to move my router other than to hire an electrician or technician from a cable company to run cables through different walls. While I wanted to try it myself, I don't want to move my router to the kitchen or dining room, which are the only options in the middle of my house. I LOVE my access cable going into the living room next to the entertainment center and right above my media server and switch in the basement where I already have an ethernet cable in the walls. While I understand Ubiquiti's recommendation, it really isn't the best option for me. If AmpliFi can't be used reliably in the configuration I tried to use it in, maybe that configuration shouldn't be printed on the box, and maybe instead of calling it a Wi-Fi mesh, it should be called a router and two standalone devices will be sold . range extender. The advertised range of this product covers a much larger area than what I have at home and I bought it to have a reliable internet connection anywhere in my house but with my layout it didn't do what it promised Has. I bought this AmpliFi bundle and a Google Nest WiFi setup at the same time to see which best suited my needs. This isn't a Google Nest Wifi review, but by comparison, Google's setup with one router and three remote access points claims to cover less area than AmpliFi, but the advertised range is still greater than my home. , and in practice it provides a reliable connection to every device in every room and both terraces. With the well-designed mobile app, it's just as easy to set up, use, and manage. With Google Mesh, I lose Ubiquiti's free VPN and cute little touchscreen on my AmpliFi router, but I get three Google Assistant speakers, built-in access and monitoring controls for my kids' devices, and true mesh functionality without holes in the to drill walls and routed cables. to facilitate specific placement of components. I was more worried about the advent of AmpliFi, but I ended up bringing it back and leaving the solution to Google.