self-isolation sucks guys it really does
the streets are empty it's affecting
everyone
but it's the responsible thing to do at
this time and I hope you guys are doing
the same thing right now but getting
back to the video you see over these
past few years I've upgraded my PC my
smartphone a lot of the household items
tech items but one of the things that
definitely needs an upgrade is my
current Wi-Fi setup i've been using the
asus RT 66 you it's a really old router
in fact it was handed down by Mike when
I moved here to Montreal it's not an AC
router so it's really really old and
it's been getting the job done but I've
been experiencing some dropouts
especially when I'm upstairs so the
Wi-Fi signal strength isn't the greatest
and now that I'm spending a lot of time
at home working on multiple projects
doing a lot of uploads on YouTube and of
course downloading steam because gaming
is definitely a priority it's it just
needs an upgrade so our friends over at
asu's hooked us up with their latest Zen
Wi-Fi six and routers and I'm just gonna
try and eliminate the bottleneck that
I'm currently experiencing and see what
this whole deal about Wi-Fi six is so
just to give you an idea my router is
sitting behind this closet as you can
see it's right over there my modem is
behind that box or sitting inside that
box and I've channeled the ethernet
cables and all that stuff to the router
and yeah this is this is what I have
right now this is my existing setup so
what I'm gonna be doing right now is
running a few tests on my notebook to
see what kind of performance how fast
how reliable my existing Wi-Fi router is
all right so I'm on my five gigahertz
Network right now I'm just gonna quickly
run my speed tests okay we're getting
about 150 down and then our uploads are
about 54 ok so my next test is basically
downloading four episodes from ozark
that's on Netflix highly recommend is a
great show so let's just do that I'm
gonna hit the stopwatch it took three
minutes and 20 seconds to download four
episodes okay so our next test is to hop
into a Skype call with Mike and
I'm gonna go through video because we're
trying to use as much as bandwidth as we
can technically I shouldn't have any
issues because I've been pretty
successful with video calls in my living
room but I have experienced drops when
I'm outside or when I'm upstairs so it's
[Music]
well quality like it looks pretty good
for a notebook and I can hear you love
clear so yeah that's good all right guys
so I am outside about a hundred feet
away from the Wi-Fi router and I'm gonna
run a speed test on this laptop the
signal strength is really really bad
okay so we got about 52 megabits per
second download and about 23 uploads so
yes it's significantly slower for sure I
expected that but let's move on to our
next test next up we're downloading
Ozark for episodes I am gonna start my
stopwatch and the speeds are roughly
yeah it's like forty forty-one guys we
have a problem there is no internet
connection I think it dropped the Wi-Fi
dropped so I guess that's a fail I
haven't moved a laptop whatsoever it's
just that the Wi-Fi connection dropped
alright so now it's time to give Mike a
call hello I know okay so just to let
you know the Netflix download failed you
can't hear me can you alright so with
our baseline test complete on our
existing router it's time to upgrade to
the Asus Zen Wi-Fi ax now this is the
2-pack variant which is essentially a
mesh system but I'm gonna be running
these tests again with just a single
modem to see how much stronger Wi-Fi 6
actually is and then maybe in the end of
the video I'll walk you through how to
set up the mesh network which should be
pretty straightforward so let's go ahead
and quickly unbox this and what do we
have here let's go through what comes in
the box having trouble there's a
toll-free number that he can reach I've
got a quick Scots QuickStart guy here
I'm definitely gonna need this when it
comes to setting it up and then we have
our two systems here so
this is our look at how beautiful that
is this is one beautiful looking router
I've never seen routers as pretty as
this one right here good job you Suze
the next thing of course is another
module which is right over there I think
that's about it very very
straightforward packaging you know what
this reminds me of this reminds me of
unboxing a motherboard but it's a router
it's just a router we have the power
supply for both of our routers and an
Ethernet port and that's pretty much it
now one of the main reasons to consider
a mesh network is to increase signal
strength or network coverage throughout
your household so say for instance
you're living in a 6000 square feet or
larger house a single modem is just not
going to cut it it just won't be able to
cover those spots where you typically
find Wi-Fi very very poor in terms of
signal strength or not even be able to
connect to the internet that's where a
second node comes in because you can
place this a little further away from
your main router and this would create
its own Wi-Fi hotspot covering those
weaker areas within your household where
you typically not get the best Wi-Fi
signal now if you're living in a smaller
apartment you wouldn't necessarily need
to invest in a second node you'll be
perfectly fine with a single router
especially if it's within 1,500 square
feet so with that of the way let's move
on to setup guys I really have to get
credit to a SUSE for providing a very
simple and straightforward QuickStart
guide as you can see there's not a lot
of junk you need in fact you just need a
single app to get this thing started so
the next thing I need to do is replace
that router right over there with this
beautiful think so let's get this set up
the next step is to properly set the
router and in order to do that you have
to download the Asus router app on your
phone whether if it's iOS or Android you
can download it through the Play Store
or the App Store keep in mind it would
be a good idea to download before you
switch everything to the new router
because then you would lose your Wi-Fi
connection so that's a quick tip right
there but nonetheless it's pretty
straightforward as you can see I'm gonna
choose in Wi-Fi right over there it's
gonna ask me to enable location services
and all that stuff it's gonna start
searching for the router and hopefully
it should be able to find it and it
looks like it did so I'm you
tap that okay so now it's asking me to
set up my note which is the second
module that did come with the 2-pack but
I'm gonna skip that option because like
I said earlier I do want to rerun the
test with just a single modem to see how
strong that is so I'm just gonna skip
that and yeah I just get started so I'm
just gonna fill out my Wi-Fi settings
here I don't want you guys sneaking in
so let me do that and I'll get back to
you right right in a moment so we're in
we're in the Wi-Fi is functional I am
connected to the network all right so
now comes the moment of truth I'm gonna
rerun all of those tests on the Zen book
15 with this new router and see if
there's any improvement keep in mind
that that laptop does feature a Wi-Fi
six network card so it will be
interesting to see how we can leverage
Wi-Fi 6 okay so we have speed test
loaded up moment of truth my friends
let's see if there's an improvement what
I literally just want to go outside and
cry because I that is exactly what I
paid for that's beep 450 down 50 up this
is crazy
all right now let's do the Netflix down
low because this is more this is getting
even more exciting one minute and 17
seconds okay that is definitely a
noticeable improvement so next up let's
let's hop into Skype you sound perfectly
fine I think the I guess a million
dollar question is when I test all of
this outside alright so I'm running in a
speed test outside with a new router
about a hundred feet away and as you can
see that is really fast guys I have
connected this laptop to the fastest
hobby hits channel downloads faster
uploads faster let's move on to the
Skype call test so can you hear me well
I can actually hear you perfectly -
we're not skipping there's no audio
video lag and you can hear everything
that I'm saying there that you're not
hearing like five words over a thousand
no
Wow well there you have it guys Skype
conference that's a success it worked
just fine okay so the next test is to
download the Netflix episode so I'm
gonna hit the stopwatch and quickly hit
download guys it's downloading all of
those episodes at close to a hundred and
ninety two hundred megabits per second
what's really fascinating about this
upgrade is the fact that the Wi-Fi
signal hasn't dropped it's still
downloading so it took three minutes and
36 seconds to download all four episodes
that is basically the same time it took
for me to download when I was inside my
house with the old router Wow alright so
let me explain what Wi-Fi six is and
what it's actually doing to help me out
here let's start with what you need to
look out for a product that supports
Wi-Fi six might have a label like one of
these and in the specs area
there'll be 802 . 11a x or in this case
of routers it could just use a x and its
name the evolution of wireless
technology really highlights how our
lifestyles have changed and why Wi-Fi 6
might be really important you see these
days we have everything from our smart
phones to home security systems to
thermostats and even some home
appliances hooked up to our home network
but all of those online devices are
fighting for the same connection and i'm
sure some of you might be experiencing
Wi-Fi issues at home especially during
this quarantine period as everyone in
the household is trying to connect to
the same network at the same time so
think of these as multiple data streams
trying to access the internet like a
bunch of people all trying to fit
through a small door where the door is
your routers wireless network sure some
of you will get through but there's
still a bottleneck preventing smooth
traffic flow putting this as simply as
possible Wi-Fi 6 can add more doors by
opening up additional access points and
making sure that each one of those doors
is bigger to let more data through i
hope that made sense so about that
bigger door Wi-Fi 6 is rated for up to
10 gigabits per second of bandwidth but
there's a catch it's a theoretical speed
that can't be hit by a single connection
or even under perfect conditions I'll
use the issues router that I have here
as an example some boxes show a X
followed by number like 6600 here on
these n Wi-Fi a X X D a technically that
means 6600 megabits per
second but if you look closely at the
specs you'll see it's coming from a
combination of speeds from Asus is three
Wi-Fi six channels in this case you can
see that the 5 gigahertz second channel
will offer the most performance it's
super important you run your most
bandwidth hungry devices on that band so
the focus on Wi-Fi 6 is to really
increase the number of devices that can
access the network without experiencing
any slowdowns they also rolled
improvements to increase performance and
maximum range and I was clearly able to
experience that with a new router about
a hundred feet away from it and you just
have to make sure that you have clear
access if your neighbors are also using
Wi-Fi the last point that I want to
touch base on is efficiency supposedly
these new Wi-Fi disk controllers are
much less power-hungry compared to
previous generations so that could help
increase battery life on notebooks and
smartphones alright so before I wrap
things up I do want to quickly walk you
through how to set up an AI mesh node so
this is the second module that came with
the tooth pack so all you have to do is
fire up your app and hit up the AI mesh
node over there and it's gonna start
looking for the second module which
shouldn't take too long so we're just
gonna click on that select device
location and yeah hit apply and that's
it the second node is already paired it
was a simple two-step process and it was
perfect for a noob like me when it comes
to networking the app itself is pretty
amazing and there are a bunch of things
that this can do like show the status of
your mesh network or if you want to add
a third node you can certainly go with
that option if you really need to and
control network settings let's just say
the options from the routers main
control menu are all here I'm really
happy with this Wi-Fi upgrade guys I
mean the speeds are super fast and
consistent throughout my house I just
can't be even more happier now I do need
to mention that you might not see a huge
difference moving to Wi-Fi 6 unless if
your current household is maxing out on
your current network so that's it for me
guys that's pretty much been my upgrade
path to Wi-Fi 6 I'm very happy with this
Meade's let me know if you guys are
happy with your existing Wi-Fi setup and
if you're actually looking into
upgrading your Wi-Fi routers would you
consider Wi-Fi 6 or a Wi-Fi 6 router let
me know the comments down below
any bar with harbor connects thank you
so much for watching stay safe and I'll
- guys the next one