Can be why Apple hasn't offered WiFi 6E on its Mac line yet... still testing how best to implement roaming between SSIDs/frequencies.
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New iPad Pro Includes Special Mode to Turn Off Wi-Fi 6E
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those work well. that’s what i use now.
but i’ve had issues with the apple airports. if signal drops even a slight, it would hang onto 2.4 unless you’re next to it. sometimes randomly connecting to 5ghz briefly… those worked better separating the networks
Exactly, 2.4 Ghz always has the strongest RSSI so most devices choose to roam to the 2.4 Ghz band and stay there, but then you have to deal with interference from neighbors or low bandwidth (20 Mhz on 2.4 Ghz vs 80 MHz on 5 GHz or 160 MHz on 6 Ghz) and lower speeds.
I ditched Airports when I moved to 802.11ac. Too slow to manage but they looked pretty.
This depends on your network. For some, it works best to have the same SSID because the router can put the device on whichever band has the best throughput. Some prefer isolating their devices, sometimes putting their IoT devices on one network band and the rest on the others. It should work both ways, but using the same SSID gives the router the most latitude. If you like your network with separate SSID's, keep it that way.
Weird article! My 2022 iPad Pro should arrive shortly... and I have a WiFi 6E access point on a 2.5G ethernet connection with 10G internet. I'm excited to give it a go...
Surely this means they can't launch M2 Max MacBook Pros without WiFi 6E... Surely...
I've tried it and depending on the router, it creates chaos. You don't have fine-grained control over what frequency your device(s) will connect to, sometimes devices roam frequently, and there is latency involved in switching SSIDs so if you're on a zoom/teams call and your device roams, your audio will stutter. And also what tends to happen is most devices hang on to the 2.4 GHz band... since 2.4 Ghz tends to have the strongest RSSI, but also the slowest speeds and most interfence with neighbors given the limited number of channels.
So if your device is connected to the 2.4 GHz SSID, when you go to watch video in 4K on youtube or other services, the video buffers or renders in much lower quality than it otherwise should. And when the SSIDs for each band are the same, you don't know if the device is on the 2.4 GHz band, 5 Ghz band, and now, 6 Ghz band. So you may think there's a problem with your network provider, when the real issue is your device is connected to the router on the 2.4 Ghz band and is suffering from interference from neighbors, especially if you live in a building with 10 or more neighbors.
Having a separate SSID for each frequency allows you to avoid this mess altogether. In fact, the 6 Ghz band was supposed to address the issue of interference from neighbors alltogether since only Wifi 6E and upcoming Wifi 7 devices can use the 6 GHz band (so it was supposed to be a 'clean' spectrum), and also 6 Ghz for 6E can operate on 160 MHz channels without any concerns about DFS/Radar. So it's odd to see this support article from Apple.
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Meanwhile I still have an 8 year old WiFi 5 router 🤣
I wouldn't have considered moving to 6 until my move. I got tired of Ubiquiti quickly and wanted something that just worked.
Unless your devices know about all the networks then it becomes a mess again. That's when iCloud sharing gets in the way.
I know that many current WIFI systems do this. I've installed about a dozen TP-Link WIFI6 mesh systems and they default to one SSID for both 2.4 and 5Ghz bands. I also have one installed at my home. Not saying that some people don't have issues, but I've not run into anyone complaining that devices can't connect and my home setup is flawless with lots of Apple and non-Apple devices.
Every time I add a HomeKit device to the house, it has all sorts of admonitions about not supporting 5GHz networks, has to be 2.4GHz, must disable the 5GHz network in order to do setup, etc. etc. It's far easier to give the 2.4GHz network and 5GHz network separate SSID's and then when I have to add a device I just make sure the phone is on the 2.4GHz SSID and turn off auto-connect to the 5GHz SSID then it works great. Throw in another band and ugh. Maybe only allow band steering between the 5GHz and 6GHz networks, have them share an SSID while the 2.4GHz gets its own?
Of course what would work better is not having to deal with the problem in the first place…
Of course what would work better is not having to deal with the problem in the first place…
Is that just a HomeKit thing? I don't have anything of the sort to compare it to.
Many HomeKit devices don't support 5GHz at all - they don't have the hardware for it.
It becomes a problem when the iPhone is on 5GHz when adding devices and it can't see the HomeKit device at 2.4 GHz.
Perhaps this has been fixed, I sure hope so. I also hope more HomeKit devices are coming with 5GHz support in them these days.
It becomes a problem when the iPhone is on 5GHz when adding devices and it can't see the HomeKit device at 2.4 GHz.
Perhaps this has been fixed, I sure hope so. I also hope more HomeKit devices are coming with 5GHz support in them these days.
yeah so gross when you pull up your wifi networks and everyone in the neighborhood has a HOMENETWORK-2.4/HOMENETWORK-5 networks.
Especially because it has led to so much confusion with 5G wireless networks and 5Ghz wifi networks.
You are getting downvoted but with all routers I've tried this setup is trash when it comes to select the right band. Claims of 'band steering' or 'smart connect' will almost always make your device sit on the slower band (2.4Ghz) with no recourse. I know it's the client who decides where to hang out.
I get it's the default for most people so there are no problems, but you usually get 4x-5x speed ups by going to 5Ghz with way less interference. It's not even close.
You'll be really sad when you learn you'll need a new system to support WiFi 7.
But why wasn't Wifi 6E included in the new iPhones? I don't understand Apple sometimes.
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Yea I think the main issue is legacy. We had the same for 2.4 and 5 but the harmony remote accessory couldn't see it unless 2.4 was separate. Don't use it anymore, so think we are back to the same SSID again
I do enterprise wireless for a living so,
1) yes 6Ghz has less distance , for example in my house the 6E basically dies upstairs (on a single AP no mesh) this is using an enterprise wireless AP. the ratio is normally to get the same spread as 5Ghz you need 2x the power on the 6Ghz radio. so for office environment this is fine since they never run full power (or should not). at home this is more of an issue.
2) single SSID is preferred but it works fine on a specific 6E SSID - I have the M2 and it works fine it just says limited comparability
3) roaming between SSID is always a full authentication, for PSK this happens fast (since its more or less a radio thing) but still anything like voice or video can take a hit
4) not sure about home but enterprise devices you can have the same SSID with different security policies, like SSID1-WPA2, SSID1-WPA3. now most wireless clients should handle that but some cant (older ones)
5) yes I dont understand why the iPhone didnt get the 6E
6) 6E gets you on 6Ghz with a higher data rate becuase of more channel bonding, but the underline protocol used for 6E is the same as wifi 6 , thats why it's called wifi 6e. as in extended , meaning wifi 6 extended into 6Ghz
1) yes 6Ghz has less distance , for example in my house the 6E basically dies upstairs (on a single AP no mesh) this is using an enterprise wireless AP. the ratio is normally to get the same spread as 5Ghz you need 2x the power on the 6Ghz radio. so for office environment this is fine since they never run full power (or should not). at home this is more of an issue.
2) single SSID is preferred but it works fine on a specific 6E SSID - I have the M2 and it works fine it just says limited comparability
3) roaming between SSID is always a full authentication, for PSK this happens fast (since its more or less a radio thing) but still anything like voice or video can take a hit
4) not sure about home but enterprise devices you can have the same SSID with different security policies, like SSID1-WPA2, SSID1-WPA3. now most wireless clients should handle that but some cant (older ones)
5) yes I dont understand why the iPhone didnt get the 6E
6) 6E gets you on 6Ghz with a higher data rate becuase of more channel bonding, but the underline protocol used for 6E is the same as wifi 6 , thats why it's called wifi 6e. as in extended , meaning wifi 6 extended into 6Ghz
The issue is that this rarely happens. Virtually all routers I test will put clients on 2.4Ghz because it has the best RSSI. Almost always, having selected 5GHz would have yielded 4-5x speed gains.
Eeros and Google Nests are special mentions. EEros pros go for $300+ and make clients roam on 2.4Ghz for max speeds of 100mbps when 5GHz which completely negates the premium you pay for them for the higher speeds.