I am so sick of streaming....

This looks like an interesting product 

http://www.tp-link.com/us/home-networking/deco/

Yes mesh  systems can be great.. but care is required in their implantation to ensure you have sufficient wired mesh access points if congestion isn't to cause issues in sustained transfers. About 18 months ago did some analysis of mesh system with a major Chinese IT manufacturer and it was quite interesting.... certainly not a silver bullet. I do think some consumer mesh systems are targeted to consumers as a remedy to provide extended wifi range with one or minimal wired connected access point... it will work but performance will fall off if the mesh gets busy in many circumstances.

My view for the simple home user implementation with max performance and sustained transfer for hidef streaming and extended reach  is overlapping wired access points running an ESSID with hand off and load balancing between the participating and wired access points.

Mike-B posted:

Re Ch-11 on 2.4GHz,  a friend in the city had a 'crowd' problem & I changed her ISP hub smart (auto) channel selection to fixed.  Ch 1, 6 & 11 are the only channels that do not overlap with each other & looking at the area with my analyser it looked like all the hubs defaulted to only those three.  I set hers on CH-13 & she's been on it ever since without problems.    Annoyingly my own new hub is limited to 1,6 & 11,  my old one had all channel numbers selectable,  but as I live in a village edge area were I only 'see'  three neighbours at most, sometimes none,  at wireless hub level/location,  it's not a problem.    If you can select & fix a channel outside 1, 6 & 11 it might be even better.

Mike the generally  accepted preferred way of handling channels is to use multiple access points operating an ESSID that will adapt their channels based on conditions. This approach is usually better as the wifi signal used is more attenuated and causes less interference and the channels can vary between access point zones. Having a single access point 'beaming' out potentially a highish power signal (with the client also potentially needing to use high power) is usually deemed bad practice and most susceptible to interference and causing interference as well as liable to much data loss/poor performance , but sadly is the default for many home users who use bundled broadband router and wifi access point. It's quite telling when you do a spectrum scan there is often much interference/sharing of the bandwidth with sources nothing to with wifi or wifi channels, and also increasingly you 'see' vehicles with their own wifi zone and this can be quite transient. Also I wouldn't get too concerned by overlapping channels per se... you really should let your wifi access point auto select it's channel and NOT lock it down, unless there are specific reasons not to... i.e. Your access point auto selection process is faulty, doesn't exist or you have specific point to point requirements.

I agree with Simon that multiple managed wired access points will give the best overall performance. But there can be a technical and financial cost. I use Meraki, which is both highly performant and easy to use, but it's expensive.

Consumer mesh wifi is improving quite quickly. eero's second generation kit for example includes a third radio which significantly improves performance over the original units.

I think for most people products like Netgear's Orbi and eero are a great solution to whole house wifi if you don't have a wired network and need a plug and play solution to work with your internet providers router/modem. In the early days these systems didn't quite deliver on the promised enterprise class wifi at a fraction of the cost and complexity. They are now getting closer especially if they have a third radio.

Indeed, I forgot to say.. the other gotcha if you are in a crowded area is best ensure on 2.4 GHz you are using 20MHz channel spacing as opposed to 40 MHz, especially if you are using a single highish power access point ... otherwise your performance may well suffer as well as neighbour's performance as you may well be causing interference. If using 40MHz best use multiple participating low power access points, and you should see a significant performance boost on 2.4GHz

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Yes mesh  systems can be great.. but care is required in their implantation to ensure you have sufficient wired mesh access points if congestion isn't to cause issues in sustained transfers. About 18 months ago did some analysis of mesh system with a major Chinese IT manufacturer and it was quite interesting.... certainly not a silver bullet. I do think some consumer mesh systems are targeted to consumers as a remedy to provide extended wifi range with one or minimal wired connected access point... it will work but performance will fall off if the mesh gets busy in many circumstances.

My view for the simple home user implementation with max performance and sustained transfer for hidef streaming and extended reach  is overlapping wired access points running an ESSID with hand off and load balancing between the participating and wired access points.

Afternoon Simon

If I have multiple Wireless Access Points is this as simple as assigning the same name to each, or do I have to also set one WAP as a slave to the other and also manage the IP Addresses?

Hi - don't worry about IP addresses - wifi works at a lower layer than that. if you have have multiple wireless access points on the same wired network subnet and SSID then you have created an ESSID. Now assuming your security settings are common to the wireless group of access points your client can roam between the access points - and your client should do this when the signal level gets low on the connected access point and it can see a stronger access point within the ESSID. IF you do set up your ESSID this way you should ensure your access points either select their own channels or you manually assign different channels for the access points.

Now when this roaming happens there is a small interruption to the network connectivity which can cause issues with some applications. Therefore there is something called Fast Roaming (802.11r) which tries to improve this and this is a protocol that allows the access points to assist the roaming of the client more quickly. Now this is where you find different vendors implement this as is or with their own proprietary extensions .. Ubiquiti for example add proprietary extensions with their second generation access points to enable a smoother and quicker roaming experience... - but ideally this should be transparent to you...

So to your point there should be no master or slave - you simply add the access points via ethernet to your switch with the same SSID and security - and depending on vendor of access point you use you  will get more smart features that help  clients to move between access points - but without any smarts and using a basic service set  access point (BSS) it will still work but the  client does all the work and the roaming decision will be based on signal strength (a bit like mobile phones) as opposed to an advanced ESS access point which can encourage clients to roam for other reasons. 

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Hi - don't worry about IP addresses - wifi works at a lower layer than that. if you have have multiple wireless access points on the same wired network subnet and SSID then you have created an ESSID. Now assuming your security settings are common to the wireless group of access points your client can roam between the access points - and your client should do this when the signal level gets low on the connected access point and it can see a stronger access point within the ESSID. IF you do set up your ESSID this way you should ensure your access points either select their own channels or you manually assign different channels for the access points.

Now when this roaming happens there is a small interruption to the network connectivity which can cause issues with some applications. Therefore there is something called Fast Roaming (802.11r) which tries to improve this and this is a protocol that allows the access points to assist the roaming of the client more quickly. Now this is where you find different vendors implement this as is or with their own proprietary extensions .. Ubiquiti for example add proprietary extensions with their second generation access points to enable a smoother and quicker roaming experience... - but ideally this should be transparent to you...

So to your point there should be no master or slave - you simply add the access points via ethernet to your switch with the same SSID and security - and depending on vendor of access point you use you  will get more smart features that help  clients to move between access points - but without any smarts and using a basic service set  access point (BSS) it will still work but the  client does all the work and the roaming decision will be based on signal strength (a bit like mobile phones) as opposed to an advanced ESS access point which can encourage clients to roam for other reasons. 

Cheers Simon

I'll give that a try then and see how well it works... Be interesting to see how it fares, and whether I can then use Multiroom with the Uniti and Qb

If you set up correctly it should work fine (remember the access points must be on the same subnet connected via a switch).. good luck

Penarth Blues posted:

Afternoon Simon

If I have multiple Wireless Access Points is this as simple as assigning the same name to each, or do I have to also set one WAP as a slave to the other and also manage the IP Addresses?

Hi PB,

It's not that simplistic ... if you simply dot around access points with the same SSID and passkey then your wireless device will often simply connect to the first access point that replies to is (not necessarily the closest / strongest) and will hang on to that access point until it can no longer hold a connection to it and will then try to reconnect again and will often reconnect to the first access point that replies ... again, not necessarily the closest / strongest one.

If you do want to do it properly then you should use Access Points that have at least basic co-operation or hand-off *OR* you can set the access points with different SSIDs and manually connect to whichever one you want to.

I've never been a fan of manually setting WiFi channels as - unless you have absolutely no-one else close enough to be visible to you on a WiFi scan - then you can't guarantee that the channels that you pick because they're clear one day will still be clear another day - you could end up in a far worse situation by fixing channels.

Cheers

Phil

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

<< SNIP >>

Now assuming your security settings are common to the wireless group of access points your client can roam between the access points - and your client should do this when the signal level gets low on the connected access point and it can see a stronger access point within the ESSID.

<<SNIP>>

I'd like to emphasise the *SHOULD* there ...

Phil

Dr Mark:  I may have missed this but from your reference to AT&T U-verse and dollar costs, I assume you are in the US?  (I wish people would put their locations in their profiles.)  You can get an AT&T modem without router capabilities and use any router you wish, which may help with WiFi signal strength.  I also don't know if the 272 can use 5 Ghz WiFi - if it can, there is usually much less interference ("crowding") on this bad that the 2.4 GHz band.

I feel your pain - Most Naim dealers in the US are cr_p  when it comes to technical support, hence the popularity of this forum!  

Nil carborundum!

Only the new Unitis (Atom, Nova & Star) can use 5 GHz wifi. But you can use 5GHz wifi with your smartphone to control Naim kit using 2.4 GHz wifi or wired Ethernet.

best

David

Phil Harris posted:

I'd like to emphasise the *SHOULD* there ...

Indeed, and to be a little deterministic about it, it does all depend on the on the protocols the wifi client and to some extent the AP supports.

802.11k support allows the client to listen around and create an optimised list of channels that it will try when it's current AP falls below a certain threshold

802.11r support allows Fast Roaming or Fast Basic Set Transition or FT for short that allows the client and access points  to undertake  high speed secure hand offs. 

802.11v support allows the client to learn about the topology from a participating access point so the client can switch to a more appropriate access point based on various criteria like congestion etc. This is ideal for static clients with dynamic wifi loading.

So unless you look at the tech small print on your client and know the capability of your access point you won't know the exact behaviour to expect, however the very latest Apple iOS devices for example support all three, with 802.11r being the most recently added.

So a question to Naim, Phil?, does Naim support 802.11v in the streamers, Muso and Qb ?

It used to be so simple when we used to put a record on, shoved the radio on or dare I say it put a cassette on. These days it seems you have to be a computer programmer - heeelp - beam me up!

Cassette, I don't think so.. different bias types, different tape types and different Dolby settings, not to mention bias current and frequency when recording... 

and don't get me started on vinyl replay with weights, pressures, arm lengths, cartridge impedance matching, phono preamp gain, Yada Yada Yada  ... give me streaming any day at least that can be simple, plug and play  and sound good with the right equipment...... and yes CD is pretty fool proof as well as long as the wretched things aren't scratched...

Ravenswood10 posted:

It used to be so simple when we used to put a record on, shoved the radio on or dare I say it put a cassette on. These days it seems you have to be a computer programmer - heeelp - beam me up!

yes, "plug and play " was before streaming era. All was so more simple.   Only difficulty:  stand up from the sofa and find a cd to play.

And I also run a fully restored Revox B77 - no Dolby, no hiss and just one RMG 911 tape formulation. Jason G from Naim was here a couple of weeks ago and had an oggle. Put a tape on and the look on his face was priceless. I suggested they took one to shows to demo with the Statements!

French Rooster posted:

Ravenswood10 posted:

It used to be so simple when we used to put a record on, shoved the radio on or dare I say it put a cassette on. These days it seems you have to be a computer programmer - heeelp - beam me up!

yes, "plug and play " was before streaming era. All was so more simple.   Only difficulty:  stand up from the sofa and find a cd to play.

Just think of the exercise though!

Ravenswood10 posted:

And I also run a fully restored Revox B77 - no Dolby, no hiss and just one RMG 911 tape formulation. Jason G from Naim was here a couple of weeks ago and had an oggle. Put a tape on and the look on his face was priceless. I suggested they took one to shows to demo with the Statements!

Good for you , apart from a secondment I had with the BBC, where one of the engineers impressively demonstrated  to me an awe inspiring  BBC  studio filling sound from a humble Philips C60 I provided that he carefully optimised his Nakamichi for,... my experience with cassette was less successful, lot of faff. and usually mild disappointment, but reel to reels I did have more success with..... but hardly plug and play..

Only a glorified piece of eye candy. Fancied one since I was a student in the 1980s. Lots of so called servicing people  out there but only one outfit who still works on the big Studers and Otaris for recording studios. Labour of love with new heads, capstan and a  complete electronics overhaul. Daft really but I had to do it given the history of this machine. I still have the original purchase receipt from 1980. Sad but true. Even the original Nextel case was resprayed in a Germany.

Ravenswood10 posted:

French Rooster posted:

Ravenswood10 posted:

It used to be so simple when we used to put a record on, shoved the radio on or dare I say it put a cassette on. These days it seems you have to be a computer programmer - heeelp - beam me up!

yes, "plug and play " was before streaming era. All was so more simple.   Only difficulty:  stand up from the sofa and find a cd to play.

Just think of the exercise though!

Yes indeed Ravenswood... the exercise is the only reason I've kept a record player (or two).

(Well alright, if pushed I'll admit I do rather like the sound of vinyl... but the exercise is still a very important reason for owning a deck).

Phil Harris posted:

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

<< SNIP >>

Now assuming your security settings are common to the wireless group of access points your client can roam between the access points - and your client should do this when the signal level gets low on the connected access point and it can see a stronger access point within the ESSID.

<<SNIP>>

I'd like to emphasise the *SHOULD* there ...

Phil

Thank you Simon and Phil for taking the time to post on this. I currently have my two WAP's set up with different SSID's and the transition between them is not well handled by any of my phones or laptops so I'm guessing that this won't improve by having them both with the same SSID. On the other hand, it's already rubbish so at least I might be able to finally use multi-room with my Uniti2 and Qb

I'll have a play at setting them to the same SSID and see what happens...

Ravenswood10 posted:

French Rooster posted:

Ravenswood10 posted:

It used to be so simple when we used to put a record on, shoved the radio on or dare I say it put a cassette on. These days it seems you have to be a computer programmer - heeelp - beam me up!

yes, "plug and play " was before streaming era. All was so more simple.   Only difficulty:  stand up from the sofa and find a cd to play.

Just think of the exercise though!

i was more thinking of the diffculty to find the cd to hear.....it is simplier on the ipad. But it is the only thing that is simplier, the rest can be a nightmare, and i hate computers.  If the sound quality was not a step better than cd replay, i would never bought the nds.

While I use a Naim DAC with XPS Power Supply, I do not have a Naim Audio streamer. This was a cost decision. I couldn't afford it so I have a computer based front end. I run a dual PC setup with JPLAY/Audiophile Optimizer/Process Lasso/Minimserver. Connection between the two PCs is by Ethernet cable. I remote control the system from a Samsung tablet. It has been a long and difficult road but now it works ... Sort of! Has it been worth all the grief? In so much as my computer front end and DAC produced a better sound than my CDS2 then it probably was.

Despite the fact that David Tennant will appear on TV advertisements extolling the virtues of the a certain ISP, the problem is without doubt, WiFi. There is one thing that you need to know about WiFi. If you want to send an email or order a CD from Amazon then it works fine. To provide a stable linkage in an audio replay system, it is about as much use a a chocolate teapot! WiFi performance can also be variable. Some days it works better than others. One solution is to move the Samsung tablet to the kitchen, where WiFi reception is better. Another more workable solution is to control the system using software installed on my Control PC (Upplay) so that the system is not WiFi dependent.

It seems advisable when setting up a streaming system, to ensure that one is educated in computer science, preferably to master's degree level! I cannot really office advice as I don't have that technical knowledge. The only advice that I might offer is to ensure that you leave some of your budget to have the system professionally configured. If I had a lot of money, which I don't, I would go to my Naim dealer and ask them to do the installation. Prior to this installation, I would put it in writing that if their installed system did not work reliably, then I would expect a full refund.

I guess that the optimal solution to an unreliable streaming system is to turn it off and get out a vinyl album. It sounds better as well!

Good luck to all those who are struggling to establish reliable streaming in their systems