Linksys Velop Pro WiFi 6E Mesh System MX6202-KE — Cognitive Mesh Router with 6 Ghz Band Access & 5.4 Gbps True Gigabit Speed — Whole-Home Coverage up to 6,000 sq. ft. & 400 Devices — 2 Pack

I was upgrading from Google nest WiFi which struggled to penetrate the brick walls in my house and led to painfully slow WiFi when my phone refused to switch between the closest WiFi points. Also having had the latest phone with 6e i wanted something that was going to be future proof. There weren't many reviews around in the UK site so i scoured US sites and ready others experience of the device and it did fill me with hope. What can i say other this lives up to expectations. The main router and nodes were set up easily enough. One node didn't connect properly and had to reset it and do it again but after that it was relatively plain sailing. One observation i had was that the parental controls are not great unless you are prepared to subscribe to their subscription service. I got round this by setting my own dns settings to 1.1.1.1. However, the android app suggests that one click save browsing is being introduced soon, and this was verified by the help desk. I did have one problem with the Internet. I have samsung soundbar, tv and projector but i couldn't get them to see each other. After trying a few things like testing the router i decided to phone the helpline. As this is the latest flagship router, i had to have my case diverted to the dedicated helpline and received a can within 30 minutes. They helped me sort the issue out by changing some of the channels on the router and after doing that it sorted it and my devices saw one another and i could listen to sound via WiFi without any problem.

I can barely find the words to articulate the level of burning hatred for this product and the deep resentment I have after having spent as much as I did on something that persistently inspires thoughts of smashing the hardware up with a 10 pound hammer. TLDR; do not buy this under any circumstances but if you'd like to know why you will regret the purchase decision, read on. I should start by saying that I work in technology, software engineering specifically so my expectations are perhaps higher but then so is my technical ability. I would not consider a product of this type to require significant technical competence though to establish the network using the setup wizard. You may have more patience than me (I shipped from birth with nominal amounts, my wife would suggest a figure closer to zero) but you will need a lot of patience to use this product. It's not unreasonable to hope for ease of setup and stability in a network product at this price point which are its two greatest failings. In the world of working from home, dependability and resilience are paramount and it is not an unfair expectation that your entire day not be derailed by your network product failing to cope with a power cycle. I can assure you that there are dictatorships borne of the bloodiest of circumstances which offer greater stability than a network established atop a Linksys product. A precarious peace when the connection is working properly is generally short lived. I bought the system on the strength of WIFI6 to serve a property of over 3500 sq/ft and to replace the Netgear product whose stability and price resulted in similar levels of disappointment. The grass may have been greener on that one but money didn't fix the problem with an upgrade to WIFI6. To compensate for the flaws of the Netgear product, I over specified the network to ensure coverage. Even though WIFI6 is purportedly better at penetrating walls and thus has better range, the reality of this promise is not borne in what I've seen with how the nodes have connected to the router. I've tried varying placement options and used a signal strength tool to determine optimal position based on signal quality versus taking a place it and pray it works approach. More nodes equals more frustration when the network falls over it seems. Setup starts with the app. The app store offers promise with a 4.9 star rating averaged over 12k reviews. That's a promising endorsement. But to sort by latest reviews paints a picture of the most saintly and reserved customers being willing to raze the offices of LinkSys and all responsible in it. Setup is an excruciatingly painful and arduous once the app is loaded and one which relies upon a solid light on the node to be able to detect each node before it can be incorporated on the network. Trying to initiate a state where the node light isn't flashing is statistically less likely than predicting the next round of lottery numbers. Allow yourself a good amount of time. A week perhaps. Buckle up because the app will crash or serve you with an interface consisting of a status indicator floating on a white background innumerable times, so much so, it will be etched into your retinas and replayed in your most vivid nightmares (see attached image). Status indicators provide no interface feedback beyond a progress indicator that offers 'This could take a minute' which actually translates to 'There goes the next hour of your life'. In general, the app bears the same level of consideration to interface design and user experience logic that came to Twitter when Elon Musk took over i.e. absolutely zero. Coaxing a node light to turn solid for the app to detect it so configuration can even start consumes an ungodly amount of time and you may have the patience of a saint but the veil of red mist will assuredly come. The red mist will probably blink too just like the spiteful little node lights. When you have multiple nodes, feelings of elation at adding one will be displaced by the torture of adding another. While hoping the first doesn't lose connection. We suffer from auto-reclosing thanks to UK Power Networks in England. If you're unfamiliar with the concept, it's when the supply network detects an electricity supply anomaly, it then diverts power and this results in an intermittent interruption consumer side. It can range from 1-2 seconds or can be 1-2 minutes. But it completely throws out every single node, every single time. You'd think that a reset of each node or restarting the network would re-establish everything but no, red blinking node lights all round and only the node that is hard wired as the router remains solid white after multiple network resets (for the uninitiateid, this is Internet connected or the unattainable grail). The significant expense of uninterruptible power supplies on each node or having a master for the house is an option but compensates for the failure of the product to reestablish connection. The troubleshooting guide is a work of uselessness that offers the blithe suggestion that it's a simple matter of pressing a button and the magic of Linksys will seamlessly re-establish the network. I have manually reset, updated firmware, flashed the system by leaving it disconnected for 20 minutes. Every conceivable method that works with network hardware has been used. If the troubleshooting guide was to be believed, this would be a different review. It's a genuine miracle that one of the nodes has not found itself embedded in our walls for the sheer unfathomable logic which governs its addition to the network. You've heard that definition of insanity - expecting a different outcome from persistently repeating the same action? Not so if you have a Linksys product. Connection is apparently your reward for persistent, indomitable refusal to accept that it doesn't work and trying in the absence of any other option. Then seeing the node suddenly and inexplicably connect. I could go on in some degree of technical detail but take a look at the Apple app store. You'll find commentary that echoes my views from a wide range of people. This is the first and last Linksys product I will ever buy, don't make the mistake I did in becoming a customer in the first instance.

Set up was simple enough. I live with in a standard mid terrace 3 bed and signal strength is good. I have a 1GB download speed and getting good rates on my IPhone etc. what lets this system down is how you interact with it via the iPhone and web page. It’s slow, clunky and you feel like your doing admin. Use and functionality of the system feels like I’m using a web page during the dial up modem years. To sum up, whilst it’s up and running it does it job well but if anything needs to be changed or fixed it’s going to be a chore and a headache. Would I buy this with the information I know now. Probably not, I would pay a bit more and get a more user friendly option.

The units are well packaged, discrete, and easy to setup. The good: - Units look good. They are small and light. - System set up via the app is simple, but you need to place the units close but if they are too close multiple units don’t detect easily. - The app enables you to manage the network remotely which is helpful when you the family say it needs a reboot. App is very robust, works very well. - Reliability of the network is okay, I find the system needs a reboot every 2-4 weeks and sometimes a hard power cycle at the unit is needed to get everything working okay. We heavily use the network with 2 adults working and 2 children streaming/ gaming. - Reliability is better than my previous system (BT WholeHome WiFi Premium), my old system needed a hard factory reset every 6-9 months and this hasn’t happened with the Linksys Units. The bad: - Sometimes the app reports failure to add nodes but the unit light is white (ie working). A unit power cycle needed to get the app/ system working and reporting correctly. - Coverage: The units don’t seem to daisy chain very effectively in my 4-bed Victorian house, I had to buy more units to make them work for the full house without dropping signal or slow speeds. The most distant node kept trying to connect to the main unit rather than the intermediate unit. - Speed seems to work best horizontally, with speed drop offs on the fist floor and loft. - Casing feels a bit cheap, but only when you are holding the units. The ugly: - It’s expensive, especially with me needing 5 nodes to get acceptable signal in the house. - Add on subscriptions, I haven’t signed up for these but after spending so much money I felt annoyed by being asked to subscribe for extra security.

I've had this for about 8 months at the time of writing. It replaced a Velop WHW0303 system from 2019 when full-fibre finally made it to my neighbourhood. The fibre connection is 900Mb/s both ways and the 1Gb WAN Ethernet port on the router is fine. The fibre company has just announced 2.3Gb/s and 5Gb/s options to be available before Christmas 2026 so I'd have to upgrade the router to make use of that, but 900Mb/s is more than enough for my needs for the foreseeable future. They're OK looking boxes that sit discretely in lounge and bedroom. Set up was easy and straightforward - run the app on your smartphone, let it do its thing for a few minutes, it'll update the firmware as soon as the Internet configuration is completed, reboot itself and away it goes. I changed the 2.4G and 5G network names so I could choose which one to connect any particular device to, gave my Raspberry Pi streaming box QOS priority, and set up the guest network for friends' kids to use when they're here. I set them to auto-reboot once a week and to auto-update as needed. I love that the blindingly bright LED can be switched off altogether, or be on a timer, so it's off from 11pm until 8AM. Solid and stable, I've not had to do anything to it since setup. There's a few pages of performance statistics that I looked at once on installation but as long as things feel fast I'm never going to go and look. All in all, great stuff. Negatoves? None really. I did find an improvement in the fibre speed when I replaced the Ethernet cable supplied with a brand-name shielded CAT8 between the ONT and the Velop, but that might easily have been the connection doing its initial training too. Now, I just ignore it and let it get on with doing its thing.

Easy setup. Reliable. We live in a 3 story old thick walled Victorian house. Used 3 towers. One on each floor. Excellent reception. Before that we had no signal on top floor and kept getting thrown off on second floor. We did have very good reception on ground floor. Highly recommended this product.

Can’t complain as the item does what it says on the box and does not sideshare your data usage to some offsite location. Connection between nodes is strong and can help extend wifi range in larger areas or even smaller areas with compact spaces (like mine). The app works really well and 90% of what you might want to access is available, with the missing 10% being those options either unavailable to network professionals or restricted (such as the inability to name guest devices while connected to the network?!). The only thing to look out for is that if you are using a device that heavily requires stable connection, you might want to keep it near one of the nodes as permanently as possible, as once you move around it will automatically connect to the nearest node, and this can cause a little dropout. Particularly noticeable if you are using a gaming device, but in fairness it only lasts about 2 seconds and then reconnects itself. If you are playing competitively then it would be wise not to move around during these sessions. Otherwise it’s a great Mesh set up and I picked up the two pack version for a heavy discount during Black Friday, but expect to see similar pricing for January sales and other promotions throughout the year.

In a nutshell: if you are used to use your phone for setting up/controlling almost everything and all you need is to cover your living space with Wi-Fi this would probably suit you. If you are halfway technical and have a precise idea of what you are trying to achieve with this, you might be in troubles. I’m working as a software implementation engineer from home. My broadband router is in one corner of the house downstairs, my office is upstairs in the opposite corner of the house. Wi-Fi is possible but reception is between 1-2 bars out of 4. I used to have an old setup of netgear Wi-Fi repeaters to connect to my broadband router. The setup worked fine; I had the same speeds in my office as on my broadband router (30Mbps-ish download, 5 Mbps-ish upload). In preparation of Full fibre being deployed in my area, I was looking for a WI-Fi Mesh solution which would be capable to deal with the speed (1Gbps). After reading through tests and reviews I decided to give Linksys a go, by far not the cheapest but also not the most expensive solution. Setting up the system was a nightmare! I have no words for the thing called APP to be used for setting up the nodes. Sitting surrounded by 3 nods, the broadband router, staring at a little screen saying “no nodes were found, please try again”. After resetting the nodes I don’t know how often, finally it managed to setup the router (the node connected to the broadband router via ethernet cable). Then it tries to connect the remaining 2 nodes…. And after several minutes asks you to reset the router and nodes. You think “but that would reset the router I just managed to configure”, and you are right, it starts the whole process over again. I ended up spending almost 2 hours with someone from support on the phone, in the end we managed to setup the system by connecting an older laptop with ethernet cable to the nodes. I should have taken screenshot of what we did….. At least, the system was working. From my broadband router to the router node A next to it (connected via very short ethernet cable) to node B upstairs in the room above the broadband router to node C closer to my office. For whatever reason, node C always connects to the router node A downstairs with only 2 bars of reception rather than to node B which is much, much closer (sitting in my office, my phone was connected to node B with 3 bars). Next to the broadband router downstairs I have 900 Mbps down and upload, in my office 250 Mbps. I tried to place the nodes in different ways, even placing node C as far away as I can having only 1 bar reception with the router node, it still connects to the router node rather than node B. Apparently there is no way to force a node to connect to a particular node. Comme on Linksys, how hard can it be? We are 1 quarter into the 21st century, time to catch up! I read that after some time the nodes would connect in the most efficient order, I’ve been waiting for 3 months for this to happen. I then did what I should have done in the beginning: drill a hole through the ceiling and use an ethernet cable to connect my workstation directly to the broadband router. The cable conduit doesn’t look as bad as I had thought and finally, I have full speed. Call me old school, but cable is still the way to go. I still wanted to use the Linksys system for the Mesh Wi-Fi. I decided to connect node B and node B via cable, now that I have drilled the hole. Troubleshooting guide on the Linksys webpage says “Connect an ethernet cable to the child node and connect the other end of the cable to the parent node. The nodes will automatically switch to a wired connection.” – no they do NOT! Tried different ports, rebooted, nothing to do, it only connects via Wi-Fi. And yes, I tested the ethernet cable, it is working. The troubleshooting guide mentions to go into the router administration CA router Setup to add the node as wired child node. Not working either. And that’s it, I’m done trying to get this work, my Wi-Fi stays as it is at 250 Mbps. This is the first and definitely the last Linksys product I will ever buy.

I added it to my mesh network with eight other old Velop, and it is really easy to set up and it is very stable.

Bardzo fajny i wydajny sprzęt

Was easy to connect to my other nodes

Good product

Als het een maal werkt, werkt het goed maar de app is dramatisch slecht, zeker als je hem vergelijkt met andere merken. De app geeft veel te weinig informatie, is veel te beperkt, als de eerste installatie niet lukt dan wordt het een drama. Voor extra functionaliteit moet je al uitwijken naar de website van Linksys. Dus een optie zit hier, een optie zit daar en iedere keer weer hopen dat de boel na het instellen weer online komt anders alles resetten en opnieuw beginnen.