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Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 10:55:42 GMT

Hey All

I'm stuck and need some help. i have shocking wifi in the house, the house made of old school bricks..

I have upgraded to the halo 3+ with wifi disc but need some help because i cant figure this out

I have

BT Smart hub
4 x wifi disc
4G smart hub
then for work i have a draytek vigor running a vpn to multiple sites, Draytek current manages the wifi network via a CISCO access point

most all devices in the house has a hardwire to it, got 8 port routers in all rooms conencted to the Draytek network

I want to remove the cisco ap for wifi and use the BT Smart wifi network

What i want to be able to do is connect the Smart WIFI discs to the BT main router using CAT6 cables so the Wifi from the disc to the main bt hub is not used.

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 10:57:17 GMT

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

licquorice — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 11:12:39 GMT

The BT WiFi discs are not intended for that configuration. You simply need 4x wireless access points rather than a disc system.

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 11:32:17 GMT

I'm also not sure if the wifi discs do a hand over from Disc to disc to maintain a good connection or does the connection drop and your device then need to reconnect to the next closest AP.

shame really.. Bt solution is good but not really intended for best practice.

Any recommendations on decide AP's that works with BT Home Hub??

thinking ubiquiti?

Drayek has been hit and miss and not sure Cisco is the way for ward for home purchases with costings

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

licquorice — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 11:42:50 GMT

As the APs will connect via Ethernet, any will be suitable.

You do not need or want a mesh system, you need discrete APs.

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Ewan1 — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 12:34:27 GMT

Hi Oldskoolsandhu

I have successfully connected a single complete WIFI disc to a BT Smart Hub 2 using Ethernet and I get the same speed out of it as I do the SH2.

As you have 4 discs and the Smart Hub has only 3 available ethernet ports you will need a good quality switch to give you enough ports to plug into

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 12:37:30 GMT

thanks mate!! i have a number of 1GB switches and will connect each to a single port on the back of the SH2.

So getting the feeling connecting via the network cable is good

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

licquorice — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 12:54:29 GMT

One disc may work connected via Ethernet, I'm not convinced 4 that are intended to be meshed will do.

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Ewan1 — Wed, 23 Aug 2023 13:01:53 GMT

I agree with Liquorice, I was not convinced that it would work until a community member posted a video showing using a single disc connected via a switch to the SH2. There have been community posts on doing this in the past which come up on an internet search. However you cannot access the posts as they have possibly been archived.

Let us know how you get on

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Thu, 24 Aug 2023 10:35:19 GMT

hey guys.. here is a question.

do you know how i can confirm the ethernet cable is being used and not the wifi?

just making 4 50 meter cables to run then to the west/north/east and south wing 😉

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Monir — Thu, 24 Aug 2023 12:02:17 GMT

It should be evident with the difference in speed. I'm pretty sure the disc favours ethernet over WiFi

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Monir — Thu, 24 Aug 2023 12:06:21 GMT

Just make sure that when you plug the ethernet in, the disc should be turned off, turn it on again after the ethernet is plugged in otherwise problems might occur

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 16:33:35 GMT

Thanks - new network cables came in today and will try this shortly

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Monir — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 16:41:29 GMT

I'm not sure if 4 discs will work in unison as a mesh, I'm not sure of the max no of discs that you can have in a mesh, when you've plugged them all in, log into the hub manager and check the discs

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 17:10:49 GMT

I have got 2 discs plugged in something really strange has happened.

disc 1 - hallway IP address from smart hub 192.168.

disc 2 - kitchen IP address from my Dratek route 10.1*

they both are hardwired to the smart hub. I've ordered a 1g switch that i will plug into the route and then all 4 discs into the single 1g switch (port3 of the smart hub will service all wifi discs)

BUT how did disc 2 get the DHCP from the second network.

the BT hub is connected as a WAn device into the draytek. I need to check BT firewall settings and maybe lock down DHCP requests to the BT device only.

who knew wifi at home can get super crazy

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 17:18:06 GMT

so far doesnt look like they work as a MESH network. seems to be the case that the wifi has to drop and then reconnect to the next closest disc.

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Monir — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 17:22:41 GMT

Could you please clarify what you mean, aren't the discs connected via Ethernet to the hub? Or is it that the WiFi connection from the discs is unreliable

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

wkirkman — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 17:29:40 GMT

From my experience, I have two discs, both Ethernet connected going back to a switch that is hardwired back to the Smart Hub 2. And between the two discs and the hub itself I get continuous Wi-Fi through the main house and annexe and in the garden, down the drive… etc.

Connecting via Ethernet just makes the connection back to the rest of the network more robust and allows you to extend the network further that the repeater function of the Wi-fi would normally do (especially when using metal backed insulation which messes up Wi-fi due to the faraday cage or whatever it’s called).

So all in all can’t see why OP’s idea wouldn’t work… just in my experience.

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

oldskoolsandhu — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 15:31:43 GMT

Hey @Monir

So yeah the house has crazy wifi dead zones, so if i have a disc on wifi it just will not service the room. imagine a line that you cross and the wifi disconnects.

The wifi is just hit and miss. just got the other cables so will plug them in very shortly and see if the discs work ok with the ethernet cables.. if not i will return all the kit and downgrade my package.. not worth the extra power being used in the house

Re: Hardwire Full Fibre 900 with BT Halo 3+

Monir — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 18:09:44 GMT

What's the distance between the hub and the discs?