So it’s a month into summer vacation for the kids….and all of a sudden the alert comes in…..you have exceeded your data allowance for the month.  How can this be???  The kids are home – they should be on Wi-Fi.  After some digging – it appears they are not on Wi-Fi.   Next question – why are you not on Wi-Fi when you are home?  Answer:  IT’S TOO SLOW. 

Pretty sure this conversation has happened in most households with teens and tweens.   How can this be?  I’m paying a ridiculous amount of money for internet service, be it bundled or stand alone as you have cut the cord (more on that in a future blog).

The likely culprit is that your home router is buried in a corner that is too far removed from your devices.  A simple solution might be to move the router to an area that will provide more coverage.  A more likely scenario is that you have a few different areas of your home (or small office) that you need better Wi-Fi coverage.

Enter a mesh network.  What the *(&*(& are you talking about????  And I have a trash mouth, so imagine some spicy words buried in there :-).  Basically, a mesh network gives you broader wireless coverage with multiple devices instead of just a single router.  If you want the down and dirty details, check out Wikipedia:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_mesh_network. 

There are many options for a home wireless mesh network.  Ease of use is pretty important.  If you have Xfinity you probably have heard of Xfi and their Pods.  I started there, and while it did help – I monitored which devices where connected to which Pod – and I didn’t find it optimized for my devices.   A few weeks in, Wi-Fi wasn’t even working if you were connected to a certain Pod.  So that one got unplugged and Wi-Fi worked again.

Not impressed with the Xfinity option.  Next up….Google’s Wi-Fi solution.  It’s Google – it must be great, right?  Stay tuned!!!!!

THE VERDICT IS IN! CHECK OUT THE UPDATE: http://www.myeverydayhacks.com/home-mesh-network-update/