Linksys Velop Mesh Home WiFi System, 6,000 Sq. ft Coverage, 60+ Devices, Speeds up to (AC2200) 2.2Gbps - WHW0303

The Linksys Velop Tri-band Mesh Network System, P/N AC6600, is a relatively uncomplicated system to set up IF you understand a little about or have previously set up basic home wi-fi networking. I don't know how easy it is for those who have no prior experience setting up a wi-fi. It may be as easy or it may not, depending on your technical acumen and how well you read up beforehand and prepare for the installation. I cannot comment since I've been fooling around with home wi-fi ever since it was mass-marketed in the late 1990s. The packaging is crisp and very well done. You open the Linksys box easily due to a magnetic flap (no tape or seals to cut), and you see three Velop wi-fi routers, and a quick install card on the left, under which are three power supplies, one for each router, and one ethernet cable for the "home" router. Note - any one of the three Velop routers can be chosen and installed as the "home" unit when you begin the installation. NOTE - BEFORE you begin the actual installation, get a notepad and pencil or whatever you want to use to take down some vital information. Turn each of the three Velop routers over and you will find five (5) unique numbers on labels on the bottom. The print (font) is microscopic so if your eyes aren't great, get a magnifying glass and be under a good bright desk lamp. I strongly suggest that at this time you choose which router is going in each of your three home locations. So for mine, I had "Office" (which is in my basement), "Living Room", and "2nd Floor". I stuck a temporary lable on the side of each router. Your names will probably be different. Leave 5 lines under each router designation on your notepad. Under each of your chosen router names, record the following numbers from its bottom labels: Name_____, Password_____, Recovery Key____, Serial No.______, and MAC (address)________. The Name and Password on the labels are from the factory and only temporary and will not be used once you have developed your unique router names (I used the room name), your wi-fi home network name and password during the installation of the first router. But the label names & passwords may be needed in the future so don't lose your notes. You will find the MAC address versus router name handy to know once your system is running so you can tell which router is which and what devices are connected to it. I had read in advance of how to transition from my existing Apple Time Capsule/Airport Wi-Fi network to the new Linksys network. My previous Wi-Fi using the Apple Time Capsule router included a separate Arris cable modem that I was using to connect to my Comcast broadband cable internet service. The modem was not changed for this new system, it works just fine. Just connect the modem ethernet output to the first Velop router (either one of the two bottom ethernet ports on the Velop). But if you're not familiar with your existing network, fear not! Just follow the installation app instructions that you will be using - see my next paragraph. - and you should do fine. Linksys requires you to install their Velop app on your smartphone in order to install the system. You DON'T use your pc. The app is available on Apple's App Store and I assume from elsewhere if you're not an Apple user as I am. The app is free and installs easily. Once it installs, start following it's step-by-step instructions. I found it handy to pre-read the instructions from the Linksys website (using my laptop browser) before downloading the smartphone app and beginning the actual installation. It's just a suggestion. Also, if you've turned off your old wi-fi router, using the smartphone app is handy because that can communicate with Linksys via your cellular connection until your first Velop router (and its wi-fi signal) is up and running. The app requires you to establish a username and password which becomes your Admin credentials for modifying or customizing the Linksys settings if you want to use features other than the standard default settings. I won't go into those details because it's well-covered in many websites online if you search on "how to setup Linksys velop mesh wi-fi system". So once I started the linksys app and connected the first Velop router to my modem, it took about 10-15 minutes for that to recognize the internet signal from my modem and indicate it was ready (a light on the top goes to purple when its ready to install, and when all is done it turns solid blue). I followed the sequential instructions on the smartphone app; at one point I had to register for the Linksys Cloud account (needed for some optional features) and you have to have a home network name (SSID) and a password ready to type in. PS - CREATE YOUR NEW NETWORK NAME (SSID) AND NEW NETWORK PASSWORD BEFORE YOU START** SO YOU DON'T GET CONFUSED DURING THE PROCEDURE - HAVE THEM WRITTEN DOWN IN FRONT OF YOU. **I used a free website called Random Strong Passwords to generate a very strong 16 character password for my network since i live in a neighborhood where houses are on 1/8 acre lots and relatively close to each other. Everyone sees everyone else's SSIDs (I can see about 8 other people's SSID's inside my house) so its best to name my wi-fi network using nothing that gives away that it's my network and a password that no one other than NSA with their supercomputer can crack. After the first router setup was complete, the next two were so easy it was ridiculous. I simply took the second Velop router to the first floor, plugged it, waited until the light on the top turned purple, then followed the prompts on the smartphone app to "Add another node". It went much faster and easier now that the network had been created by the first router. Just had to name it "Living Room". That was easy. The third Velop router went on the second floor, again, setup for the added router was fast. Named that one "2nd Floor". Easy peasy. Coming back down to the basement, I could see that my new Velop mesh network was up and running fine, and we have strong wi-fi (5/5 or 4/5) throughout our house. All that remained was to go around and re-program every device that connects to wi-fi with the new SSID and new password. Two smart TV's, one home stereo, a security camera, one smart thermostat, two Apple TV boxes, 3 laptops, 2 wi-fi printers, four iPads, and two more iPhones. After entering the 16 digit password so many times, I was grateful this only needs doing once or (hopefully) *very* seldom. Whew! Everything works! MUCH better signal & speed than before when I had only a single router. Today is 3 days after installation and the system has remained rock solid with no dropouts. I'm impressed.

Okay, so there are a mixed bag of reviews on the Linksys Velop. I was a pretty early adopter of the technology. My Apple Time Capsule (which was great in that it just plain worked and NEVER needed maintenance) had just died and I was hard pressed to find a solution that would replace it since Apple had long ago declared the death of the Time Capsule anyway. I had just moved into a larger house too, which meant whatever solution I chose had to have great wireless distance. I settled on the Linksys Velop Tri-Band and bought a three unit set. Setup was SO EASY. Then I hooked up all my wireless devices (I have a few...AKA 30+ devices). This is where the Linksys fails to impress. Speeds are average but far from great and when you have a lot of wireless devices attached, all hogging the 2.4 and 5 GHz wireless, things slow down or stop working altogether. I finally figured out that where I had my Linksys Velop devices (one in my office, one in the living room and one in the Master Bedroom) and they provided excellent wireless coverage, if too many wireless devices are attached, they slow to a crawl. I was rebooting the Linksys Velops constantly and it only temporarily fixed the problems. It was like all wireless routers I had used in the past (except for that Apple Time Capsule!). Then I wised up and purchased switches for each of my Linksys Velop. I know what many of you are probably thinking at this point. Wait a second...he bought a fancy wireless mesh solution and then added on wired switches?!?! Why yes...that is exactly what I did. The office has a larger switch attached since there are more devices in the office. And the living room and master bedroom have a smaller, 8 port switch, which only manages connectivity for my TV, Tivo and any miscellaneous devices. If you take some of the wireless load off your network (even if they are still running through the shared wireless band that the Linksys Velop uses to establish the wireless mesh) the Linksys Velop performs very well. It never needs a reboot anymore and much like my old Apple Time Capsule it just plain works. Maybe asking you to spend money on a fancy wireless mesh solution AND physical switches to offload some of your traffic is asking a lot, and you would be right...it is...but if you do, the Linksys Velop is a pretty decent solution to cover a lot of square footage. Love: Reliability, ease of setup and ZERO maintenance (other the occassional firmware upgrade) Don't Love: You can't attach a lot of high traffic wireless to the Velop without it locking up. Don't even THINK about wirelessly backing up a machine over a home network using the Linksys Velop (a feature that my Apple Time Capsule never even blinked at). If you're going to send a constant string of a large amount of data over the Linksys Velop, it will lock up.

This product is just really best Home WiFi mesh product. efficient, smart and reliable. Though before I was skeptical in buying them, as I saw some negative reviews, and the cost was considerably higher. however, I wanted to take chance to evaluate myself, and now I so happy I have done so. Yes, the product App was a bit dodgy at the setup for the first time, and had to reboot, and then use other device, which is strange for linksys, Same App work smooth with Linksys WRT AP I already have. However, once the Velops got the setup done, and place them at the right places, it has given me the best reliable connection on WiFi at home. no Matter how strong the signal is, still I got decent connection, with speedtest results tops the link from the ISP. The app has limited things to present to end-user, from advanced settings, like enable or disable the 5GHz WiFi. but honestly for the first time I didn't as the Velop designed to take care of it, and make reliable connection. comparing with other products that may have much on GUI for End-user, but less reliable and cheap hardware. To summarize I am Network Engineer with 15 years of experience. have been using Linksys WiFi products over the past 7 Years, they are a bit pricy compared with other products, but I have never regretted once the investment that I made. always worth it, peace of mind for me, and family especially with Covid-19 and online schooling....etc

Hasta el momento llevo 1 mes con producto y me tiene encantado, la verdad es que había investigado varias marcas y protocolos para saber si realmente valdría la pena dar el salto de mi módem tradicional (el que viene con el Internet que pago) y efectivamente hay muchísima información sobre el Wifi-mesh así que estaba entre este sistema y el utilizado por google. Al final opté por este debido a las recomendaciones que leí en diversas páginas web. El sistema de nodos que compré me tiene siempre la máxima cantidad de MB en todos los dispositivos de la casa (aunque el ancho de banda no es mucho 60 MB approx) incluso aunque coloqué un nodo bastante lejos de los otros (está a 2 muros de concreto separado y hay una cocina en medio) pero ahora siempre tengo ese mínimo para todos los nodos y mi pin para los videojuegos tuvo igual una mayor eficiencia, no tengo retardos de conexión, fue muy fácil de instalar y su aplicación es muy sencilla de entender, aunque me gustaría que los servicios plus que ofrecen vinieran incluidos con la compra del dispositivo. Conforme vaya pasando el tiempo iré actualizando mi comentario para ver si el rendimiento sigue igual de bien. 05/04/2021

Awesome device connects well in all parts of the house itself.... would recommend to get it if the house is huge✌️👌

Extremely easy to setup and works great with a very easy to use app!

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