BT Additional Disc for use with existing BT Whole Home Wi-Fi
BT Additional Disc for use with existing BT Whole Home Wi-Fi (AC2600) only, App for complete control and 3 year warranty
Bedtime controls
Set schedules to control wi-fi access for individual users or groups of devices to make sure bedtime is free from screen time.
Pause the Internet
Want to get everyone down for dinner? Temporarily pause the internet with one tap. Only want to pause it for the kids? It’s easy to set schedules so individual users or devices get some time offline.
Secure Guest Network
Create a separate network for guests and keep your home network secure. It’s easy to share access details via the app, see which devices are connected and block any you don’t recognise.
 |  |  | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Speed | Dual-band AC1200 | Dual-band AC2600 | Tri-band AX3700 |
| Perfect for | Families or households that want all their devices connected to a strong, fast wi-fi signal in every room. | Busy families or households that want to download and stream films on any device, in any room. Boosts super fast wi-fi to every corner of the home. | Bigger families or households with multiple users streaming content or gaming at the same time. The best solution for maintaining faster, stronger wi-fi in every room. |
| Level of app controls | Medium | High | Full |
| Works with all UK broadband providers? | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| No. of ports | 1 WAN/LAN Gigabit Ethernet port | 1 WAN/LAN Gigabit Ethernet port | 2 WAN/LAN Gigabit Ethernet ports |
| Weight: | 600 g |
| Dimensions: | 16.5 x 7.7 x 16.5 cm; 600.1 Grams |
| Brand: | BT |
| Model: | 91073 |
| Colour: | White |
| Batteries Included: | No |
| Manufacture: | BT |
| Dimensions: | 16.5 x 7.7 x 16.5 cm; 600.1 Grams |
Very good product. No more wifi blackspots in the house. The app is very good too.
Easy to set up, works seamlessly with devices. Dead spot in the house eliminated. Overall very pleased. Not wholly convinced by delivery options and prices, though – to keep cost down I needed to collect from a locker.
Since installing this my wifi has always worked. Amazing after all these years of vigin wifi getting dropped. I dont have to think will it work now. It does. Fantastic ki
Had this for many years now with no complaints. Once you get the disks positioned optimally, it’s solid and even provides a useable signal in the garden.
We are getting fibre to the premises shortly, so I was looking for a possible update. To my surprise, several reviewers still rate this as a best buy product. So I will see how it handles 25x the previous speed! As a bonus, because the BT system stores all the WiFi connections, it will just be a simple case of connecting them to the new router and disabling it’s inbuilt WiFi.
Amazon only offer 2 years guarantee however BT the manufacturer offer 3 years. So when one of mine went wrong just after 2 years Amazon wouldn’t help me.
I see that some reviewers had difficulties configuring this and I feel your pain. I must have been lucky. It only took ten minutes. I had to try a few different locations for the the furthest device. The house is very old with thick stone walls and not WiFi friendly. I am really pleased I sprung for this set up. Finally I have a full signal on every floor.
This BT disc system was very simple to set up, you download the free App and it guides you through step-by-step including helping you choose where to locate the discs. I could not have got it wrong if I tried.
Within minutes, I had Wifi/Internet speeds of >100mps in every room. It is a “mesh” network, so you only need to link your device to once disc and the system automatically connects you to the best signal from different discs as you move through the building.
The discs are sleek and quite discreet. The App seems user-friendly, you can change various settings and apply time limits to devices one-by-one or all together.
It is too early to say if there are any reliability issues but it looks like this will be very good value for money.
Maybe it’s just me but I followed the setup instructions within the BT app given we already have the BT smart hub2 (although this product is compatible with any router). Tried repeatedly to get it to connect and no joy, but that was user error 101.
Whilst this is a BT disk it is not whole home WiFi BT disk – primarily why I bought it as I wanted a product I could use should I move away from BT and thus use another router.
The instructions weren’t clear enough to me that despite being a BT disk it has its own setup, so if you try to use the BTapp and set it up within there it will not work. Safe to say it worked perfectly when I did it the right away and it’s done a brilliant job of making sure we’ve got flawless coverage throughout the house.
One thing to note, the first disk has to be connected vie ethernet cable to the main router so be prepared to have space for that. The others can go wherever you have a power supply, just plug it in and you’re good to go.
I spent quite a time looking at mesh Wi-Fi devices and finally decided to buy the BT version. It was easy to set up and we now have a continuous signal throughout the whole house. We can also get a signal in the garden and in our double garage which is a surprise. I also completed Wi-Fi speed testes before and after installation and was amazed to see a very good increase in speed. I know that they don’t claim to increase speed so the result amazed me. I have no hesitation in giving this a 5 star review.
Does give you tonnes of controls
But it does give you a nice UI and a few nice features ontop of the mesh network
It takes a while to add all the devices (we have several smart light bulbs/speakers in addition to the usual devices like smart phones, tv, iPad, Nest stat, Nest cams etc).
A BIG PLUS is that if we change internet provider we don’t need to re-add all the devices to the Wi-Fi, as they are stored on the BT mesh thing, so it will just be a case of changing router, disabling it’s built in Wi-Fi and plugging in the first disc to the new router. Bosh.
My best advice (if adding multiple devices) is to add each one individually and change the name of it which BT app identifies it as (e.g, “hallway light” or “front room tv” etc, otherwise your list of devices on the MESH network will look like a load of numbers and you’ll not know which one you want to control/switch off etc.
The guest network is a winner too, as we can now only make sure guests use that rather than being able to join our main network and be able to control some of the smart devices if they downloaded the app (a friend tried to play a prank with our SONOS speakers on the old network).
I upgraded to this Wi-Fi mesh. I had doubts, but this has been a game changing upgrade. I require solid 5Ghz network between my PC and VR headset and this delivers, as well as stretching a decent 2.4Ghz to my garage. Simple to setup, and despite the lack of ability to dig into customising every aspect of the mesh, I’ve found everything just works.
The reviews steered me here and the Amazon sale helped clinch the deal. Pricey, but less than the powerline adapters I previously had which delivered one third the connection speed and frequently de-synched.
Well done BT.
Easy to set up- it just needs to connect to your existing router via an Ethernet cable in the back.
WiFi coverage is pretty good, but won’t work too well through thick walls. You don’t get much coverage in the garden for example, and old buildings with solid internal walls may need extra discs. For most houses, coverage will be really good throughout the house with 3 discs.
It’s best to turn off your router’s WiFi to avoid random switching between than and the BT WiFi networks around the house.
Each disc has a single Ethernet port. Other than the one connected to your router, these can be used to hard work devices to your network, which can be very handy- a shame there aren’t at least 2 ports on each disc.
The discs look fairly ok, and have a fixed stand. Annoyingly, this isn’t easy to remove- there seems to be a screw hole for wall mounting, but the feet still stick out and the power adapter is the straight kind rather than right angled, which makes wall mounting very awkward (you have to prise off the front cover to unscrew the feet if you’re interested).
Overall though, it’s pretty good system for the price, and gives a pretty fast and robust WiFi coverage throughout the house.
I’ve been in IT since wireless was an impossible dream! I’ve used wireless products from lots of vendors, enterprise mesh systems and basic access points and repeaters. But do not consider anything but a mesh system nowadays. I chose this one as based on 2 basic factors – price and ACxxxx rating. It was 149 for 3. AC2600 at that price is tricky to find.
Performance is superb frankly, and in my 4 bed, 3 story house, I have only deployed 2 disks – 1 in the lounge (ground floor) at the router, and 1 on the landing on the 1st/middle floor. This gives solid signals in every room in the house. Even extending a fair way into the garden compared to the BT home hub router. The software is really simple for anybody, but it can be a bit flaky to be fair. Already after 2 days use I’ve seen it say I have a problem, or one disc is offline, but then it sorts itself out. It does everything it’s supposed to do really well. Do not expect content filtering and app controls – you can easily pause internet and set schedules for each device but you won’t be able to monitor usage, bandwidth, real time activity or stop certain applications or websites. But it’s not marketed to do that. Just be aware that their is a premium product in the range too, and other solutions offer these sort of controls in as standard. But at this price it’s nailed my coverage problem.
Overall a slightly harsh 4 stars, think of this as a 4.5 star review!
I’m probably tempting fate with this review but having had this now for two months I am seriously impressed, it has made a massive difference since I bought it given the increased demands on our broadband. We have Virgin Media broadband and while speed has always been good we have struggled with the Wi-Fi reach and stability of the SuperHub for months. While VM do offer a solution with their Wi-Fi pods they are regularly out of stock so I took matters into my own hands and bought these instead of wait much longer.
Installation is easy and just needs the download of the app to start you off. There’s a video review elsewhere on this page I found very helpful and can recommend, so won’t go into it here. Note to VM people – there’s no need to turn your Superhub into modem only mode, the first disc just plugs into a spare Ethernet port.
Stability has so far been excellent. Seemingly no contention despite very large simultaneous demands in our household and only one drop out in 2 months and easily rectified by the old switch off/on solution.
Speed is also excellent. We have a 500Mb connection into the house. In the same room as the first disc we still see that speed and can easily achieve 200-300Mb anywhere else in the house, even in the dead spot areas where previously we could get barely anything at all. That’s a massive improvement.
The app is useful too as you can control access at a device level, including grouping devices and setting regular access times (really useful if you have kids), as well as creating guest networks and managing individual discs features.
Really have nothing bad to say about this. Highly recommended.
Ok, so I’m one month into using this kit, here’s a breakdown of my findings so far:
Setup could be easier, but pretty good in fairness. The only slight issue was adding more disks into the setup, but was still doable with some knowledge or google.
Signal quality… is absolutely amazing… I’ve been using a basic Virgin Media Wi-Fi router for years, but two of us WFH has pushed it beyond its abilities. I’ve held off spending the money for months and decided to invest. This is money really well spent, we have a 4 bed house and the signal now spans across all rooms, up the drive and down the garden, so looking forward to some spring and summer days working outside. Not only that, but for months we’ve had connection issues, drop outs, freezing video calls, all of which has just disappeared since installing this kit.
The disks are ok to look at and blend into your decor with no major issues, most of this sort of kit looks horrible and this is definitely at the better end of the scale.
I’m yet to restart any of the disks and this is a massive surprise. With most other cheaper network extension equipment I’ve owned (and I’ve tried a lot!!!) you find yourself rebooting it once or twice a week. With this kit, I’ve just forgotten it’s there, which is exactly what you want from a home technical solution. Whilst it’s great to put it together in the first place, you don’t want to constantly be tuning it, especially when you’re trying to use it for work.
Frankly, for most homes with more than a single occupant and Wi-Fi signal issues, this is worth buying. As I said, I’ve used many other devices in the past and they’ve simply not been robust enough to do what I was looking for. Honestly, in the consumer market, I can’t think of anything that stands up to this at a lower price point – although I do notice there is a mini version of this kit also on Amazon which may be worth a test, it doesn’t come with some of the extra features included here.
Id say if you’re having Wi-Fi issues, look no further.
I purchased the 3-disc system and each disc comes with it’s own power supply. There is one Ethernet cable in the box.
To setup, one connects a first disc to the router using the Ethernet cable. After a couple of minutes a steady Blue light shows it is connected and working. Each disc in the box has the same Userid and Password displayed on a removable plastic tab on the back. At this point the new Wi-Fi system can be used by connecting to it.
To extend the network, the other discs (as many as you want) need to be plugged in around the house. For this, trial and error is needed to determine the best locations since it is necessary that they are close enough together to be able to relay the Wi-Fi from one disc to the next through the air. Each in turn will display the steady Blue light if they are working well. However, an Orange light indicates that the disc hasn’t really got a good enough connection back to the router, and you will need to move it to a better location.
Of course I now have 2 Wi-Fi networks – the original one on the router and the new BT mesh one. I have kept both networks active since I can now choose which devices I connect to which network. Fixed devices near the router use that, whilst mobile devices use the Mesh one. Alternatives might be to turn off the Wi-Fi on the router, or to make the 2 networks use the same Userid / Password.
Because of the thick walls in my house I still had difficulty placing the discs to cover the whole house. However, I already use Powerline Adapters to route the internet signal via the electric cables to other rooms. What I have found is that it isn’t necessary to connect any disc directly to the router. Instead, two discs connect indirectly to the router via Powerline Adapters and only the third one acts as a relay.
Great product – happy custome
3-storey house with extensions and RSJs abound, thus lucky to get 60% of speed into house over WiFi. Techy and sick of researching reviews for power line adaptors and replacement routers, and a review brought me to the BT mesh disc solution.
Am techy, but could have been installed by an 8yr old so credit to BT.
Setup in less than 10minutes.
Results/need to know
* Getting virtually the quoted speed over WIFI now, with some devices going from 45mb to nearer the quoted 100mb down.
* With my original BT Superhub sitting in kitchen I got 45mb (service is 100mb) so I switched off the WiFi on the BT router (so it just feeds the internet to the discs) and in the same spot the same device got 96MB – difference is entirely clear.
* Placed all 3 hubs on ground floor owing to extensions/steel, reception exactly the same with speeds no different on middle floor. Tested in loft and genuinely shocked to see 91mb down instead of a poor signal and barely 5mb/sec
* This is mesh technology not an access-point or JUST a new router, this literally floods the house with quality WiFi – every single device I have that can use 5GHz is connected to 5GHZ – never had that before.
* Can now stream 4K uninterrupted in the garden
* Each disc has a handy RJ45 if you want to hardwire something (console / TV box / laptop or PC) if wanted
Just buy this – would be worth double the price I paid
I’ve been battling WIFI problems since the COVID-19 lock down began. I first thought is was the broadband into the house, but after some discussions with BT and a remote diagnostic, the problem was traced to the number of Wi-Fi devices I have on the network and the router struggling with prioritising traffic and a dead spot in a remote part of the house (it’s not that big, but far enough to case a drop in signal)
The discs were easy to install, following the instructions on the app which help you place the discs across the house to get the best coverage. It took about 10 minutes to set up. You can turn off the home hub (or whatever router you connect to) but I chose to keep both allowing me to spread the load of the various iPhone, iPads, smart TVs and lightbulbs across the various access points to the networks. You don’t even need to change the SSID and Password for the hub or discs. Use done on the back and any device connects to the network and has full access.
I now have a fairly even spread of devices connected to the hub and any one of the three discs across the house dependent upon their proximity to the access point. I have full WIFI signal across the whole house on every device. If you walk between rooms, any devise you take with you seamlessly transfers to the access point with the strongest signal.
What’s even better, is that the multiple discs appear to have also boosted the signal into the far reaches of the house and the garden. It’s a little expensive but there are deals to be had and it’s made a massive difference to the network speed. No drop outs, it’s super stable.
I’m glad I went for these devices. Having a web interface as well as an app it important to me as apps tend to have a lifespan, and you could end up with devices that cannot be managed. Also, having to register with some unknown company to be able to use a device worries me. Suffice to say, none of those worries applies to these units.
The BT devices were simple to set up, and I was up and running within 30 mins. I now have very good consistent speeds throughout the house, compared to what I originally had.
For a common 80/20 broadband connection these units fit the bill perfectly. I get a solid 60-75 Mbps in all rooms but the dining room where it is about 25 Mbps Previously, connection speeds were variable throughout the house.
Worthy note is that the Gigabit ethernet port on the rear of each unit can be used either as a backbone or as a wired connection to a device. Nice. If you move the units around the house they re-organise themselves. Nice. The LEDs can be dimmed or turned off. Nice. Lots of control through the web interface. Nice. They look like they can be wall mounted. Nice. I have yet to find anything that I don’t like. Early days, I guess.
I was tempted with the mini version of these units, as I could get 4 of them for less than these three, but I was put off by some reviews. I would have liked to try them. Maybe I should have tried them first…
To summarise, I was worried that mesh WiFi was all just hype, and that I was spending another huge sum on more kit that would prove disappointing. I have been pleasantly surprised.
I went for the 3 disc pack. It was easy to setup, and I have left my router wi-fi on as I have my main workstation ethernet wired as it is in the same room. I have connected up 3 TV’s (one 4k) 4 other PC’s, 3 phones, 3 Firesticks, Smart Blu-Ray player, Now TV box, Panasonic home security with 4 cameras, Hive controlling the heating and a couple of lights, a PlayStation, and the printer. We have stress tested the system by using the lot at the same time, and so far everything has excellent connections with no dropout. The house is 2 floor 4 bedroom, and we do have Fibre + with BT, with a Smart Hub 2. The first disk connected to BT router is in the hallway (had to use a longer ethernet cable, although the one supplied is a good length) the second disk is just inside the conservatory which is open to the lounge, and the third is on the upstairs landing. There are no ethernet connections to disks 2 and 3, so everything is through the wi-fi.
The only mystery is why the Lounge disk is picking up 8 of the devices, when the kitchen tv and firestick is closer to the hallway disk. Don’t know if it is possible to re-assign devices to spread the load as it were. Also, on the app device list, it is showing two other devices which I have still to find! I have renamed the devices for easier tracking.
And, BT should really have made it possible to wall mount.
So far so good, certainly seems to be doing the job, and I can now ditch the 3 old extenders I was using, which were never that reliable.
Conclusion: Easy setup, good coverage (for my house) would recommend.
I have to confess my instillation is not like most as I have a LAN cable which serves as a backbone. My house is across 3 floors with thick walls and we have a history of struggling to get our wifi signal round the building. It doesn’t help that the Fibre to the premises, and hence the smart hub, comes in next to a thick chimney breast so a double layer of bricks shields much of the property from the hub. However I do have the advantage of a LAN to the top floor where I have a study. Rather than start at the hub (like the instructions say) my first disk went to the study and it set up fine using the BT home wifi app even though it was going through two different 5 port gigabit network switches to get to the hub in the lounge. My second disc in main bedroom connected by wifi to disc 1. This serves primarily the bedroom and kitchen extension below, but also throws a strong 2.5GHZ signal down the length of my garden (30ft). Initially the app told me the received signal at the bedroom disc from the study was only “good” and I should move the disc closer – popping it on top of the wardrobe improved its signal to “very good” and my LG smart tv certainly has no streaming issues. The third disc location was a conundrum, I thought about the dining room where there is a network switch but the signal was then not strong in the lounge where I spend more time, so direct into the hub it was plugged “Excellent”. So I have 2 on LAN cables and only one has a wifi connection (in between Disc 1 & 2). the My BT App now throughout the house shows my data as 76MB to hub and also 76MB hub to phone – am about to upgrade my Fibre to the Premises above 76 so will be interesting to see what happens to my in-home speed.
Problems: Getting my sky Q and 2x mini Q to work on this new network proved problematic possibly due to interference between the mesh networks and this is where I dropped a star – though truthfully I suspect the poor sky boxes software rather than the network. My final solution after 2 hours was Sky Q connected via a cable to Hub. Mini Q 1 connected by LAN cable to Disc 2 (using it as a wireless access point), and Mini Q 2 with a sky wifi link to mini Q 1. This means the data of a telly programme streamed on Mini Q 2 comes from the Sky Q via LAN to a BT Smart Hub 2, LAN to Gigabit switch 1, LAN to Gigabit Switch 2, LAN to Disc 1, BT Wifi to Disc 2, LAN to Mini Q 1, sky wifi to Mini Q 2 – It manages this without any buffering. Ideally I would add a 4th disc in the dining room but I do have a signal in there so I will save myself the expense.
I wish I’d bought one of these years ago. We only have a small house so I’ve been getting by for some time with a PlusNet router and another old router repurposed as a wi-fi access point upstairs. The problem with this was that as you moved around the house devices wouldn’t necessarily switch to the strongest signal so you would have to manually switch over. Also the PlusNet router is a fast ‘ac’ router but the older Netgear router only has wireless ‘n’, running at half the speed.
I did a bit of research before opting for the BT system. Most of the rivals expect you to replace your broadband router whereas the BT system runs alongside it, which helps keep the price down. Although the BT disks use dual-band radio rather than the tri-band of some of the newer systems, it runs the transceivers at a higher speed to compensate, meaning the effect on speed is less than it would otherwise be the case. Again, this will help to keep the price down. As a result the Whole Home Wi-Fi system punches well above it’s weight in terms of price.
The BT Whole Home system is very easy to set up. Plug in the first disk, run their app and scan the QR code on the back. The app then basically holds your hand for the rest of the process, including helping you to site the second disk (I went for the two disk pack). I now have strong, fast wi-fi all over the house and right down the end of the garden. It’s such a novelty to see all four bars on the wi-fi indicator on my phone light up! I’m loving it.
I’ve not needed tech support so I can’t comment on that. It’s also only been up less than 24 hours so I can’t comment on stability. It has been around a long time, though, so I’m sure that any early niggles will have been ironed out by now.
My family and I were sick and tired of the constant dropping out of the Netgear WiFi Extenders we’ve had for the past few years connected to a fairly new TalkTalk Hub (2019 model) with our Superfast Fiber connection. The house is big with stone walls so that makes it even more challenging.
After I read a very positive review in a PC Pro (they just did a huge Mesh WiFi Review), I opted for this 3-pack option which was among the top recommendations in the magazine.
After setting them up using the very well designed BT App, I found that the performance, stability and coverage of the 3 discs was absolutely fantastic. (Note: I logged into the TalkTalk Hub and deactivated the built in WiFi which is recommened)
I had extremely low expectations of the quality of the hardware and the BT App.
I was DEAD WRONG.
The quality of the discs is fantastic. The Power and WPS buttons, the quality of the plastic, the weight of the metal stand/legs… were all superb.
The App is VERY well designed and I take my hat off to BT. I was expecting the app to be absolute garbage, but again, I was very wrong.
There was a slight niggle when setting up the 3rd and final disc. I had to turn it off and on several times and managed to finally get it working after I started to understand how the App and the Mesh network, worked. But that only set me back about 5 minutes.
I can’t recommend this BT system highly enough. If you’re thinking of saving money buying Netgear WiFi Extenders, don’t. Just buy the Mesh system and you won’t have to worry about it again.
(It also made me realise that the TalkTalk Hub (2019 model) which I have is actually very fast when it is used with Ethernet only with one port used for connecting the main BT Disc)
Our property is a bungalow with a fair size footprint and many walls. The BT home hub struggled to cover the area.
The Whole Home Wi-Fi provides an interconnected mesh network your wi-fi device attaches to the disc with best signal. This is advantageous compared with a single additional Access Point but it is far more expensive.
Three discs are just about enough for us but it did take quite some time to optimise the disc locations. The BT app is superficially intelligent but not very robust – especially in the context of moving discs and adding additional ones. However it does provide a simple interface to control user access during specific times of day and to create/control a guest network.
Overall technology is good, app could benefit from some further refinement
Update June 2020: I have had a couple of questions from potential buyers about this product
I. Will it work for providers other than BT- Yes- it will work with any router
ii. Will it appear as another network: Yes it will appear as BTWholeHome-3MC. Ideally you should disable the wireless on your main router and then you will roam around the house flipping between disc nodes. This means that you can use the groups feature and limit access hours for the children etc
We’ve had these setup for a day now and so far its been a mixed bag but with some positive results especially in getting Wi-Fi in our cottage close to the house. The setup process was more challenging than I assumed. On the first two attempts the BT disc connected to the router, failed to connect to the internet however, after rebooting the router and removing an existing Devolo setup things were ready to go! What I discovered when setting up the additional decks was firstly that there range is both impressive and not at all at the same time, it really dpendes on where they are but in my setup it mainly comes down to luck in terms of getting good reception on all the discs. In particular I found one disc very difficult to pinpoint which was surprising since it was located one floor above another point. The app is a tad shabby truth be told with several glitches and I found myself rebooting the app around 10 times in just the first day ! That said it’s really simple and intuitive to use it’s just disputing that it has the these glitches and in setup it makes the process far more drawn out than it needs to be. In terms of internet we now have a great connection throughout the house so in the end the hard work was worth it! Whilst the setup was challenging and the app fails to impress overall these provide a comprehensive system at an attractive price point.
I had a couple of reasons for looking for something like the Whole Home system. Firstly to replace the flaky supplied router from our broadband provider and secondly to finally get a decent connection extended into our cabin in the garden which is now my office during lockdown.
We’ve tried other range extenders in the past with pretty poor results and have just lived with a 3-4Mbps connection in the garden and cabin. Working from home everyday has made that less than ideal so based on a recommendation from a colleague I thought we’d give these a try.
The entire experience has been a breeze. We have one disc connected to the original router via the supplied Ethernet cable, one in the Kitchen which covers the other side of the house and out into the garden and one in the cabin completing the set-up. The connection throughout is now as if you were standing next to the router. It’s really very good.
Set-up took less than 20 minutes from opening the box, the “locate disc” feature in the app was not very helpful as it insisted that the location I was choosing was “poor” but the disc connected in that location with an “Excellent” connection and works perfectly. This happened with both stand-alone discs so I just ignored it.
Once the discs were up and running I disabled the WiFi on the router to leave just the Whole Home network. This did mean that I had to go round and reconnect every device to the new network but I took the opportunity to rename every device as it connected so we know exactly what’s on the network.
The guest network feature is really simple to set up and we’re using it for work laptops for the time being.
I’m hugely impressed by the product and how easy they’ve made the set up. The app for the system is also excellent, allowing you to see exactly what’s on the network and on which disc it’s on. You can also disconnect single or groups of devices from the network at bedtime etc. We haven’t used this yet but the time will come 🙂
I haven’t found any issues at all with the system so far. Great stuff!
Our BT HomeHub6 is a good router but we live in a converted chapel with thick stone walls and it just couldn’t reach the back of the house. As for the garden – no chance at all. With the Coronavirus lockdown forcing ever more reliance on WiFi we wanted finally to sort the poor coverage issue. Eventually chose the BT Whole Home 3-piece kit because of very good reviews and our BT router (although it should work with any router).
Arrived within three days. The time from unpack to fully up and running was about 30 minutes. The BT app is downloaded on your phone then you simply follow its instructions. The first dish sits next to the router and plugs into one of its available ethernet sockets. The next two are then sited in sequence around the house using the app to gauge signal and suitability.
WORD OF WARNING! the app repeatedly told me that there was zero or poor signal, even when the phone was placed right next to the previous dish. My phone was connected to the 1st WholeHome dish and displayed full WiFi bars so I just ignored the app and placed according to actual WiFi signal. The annoying thing is that you have to have signal indicated on the app to proceed, so I just held the phone next to a connected dish and accepted the ‘poor’ signal.
Once all three dishes were set up and running, it was just a matter of reconnecting my various devices to the new network. Be aware, the original router retains its signal and coverage so you will have two networks available within the range of the original router. You decide what your devices should connect to.
The coverage throughout the house is now very good, even out in the garden out to about 80m. Two weeks in and so far no signal drop. The overall speed is slightly slower (40Mbps via the mesh vs 48Mbps via the original router) but a small price to pay for whole house coverage.
Overall I am extemely pleased with this, just the odd niggle during setup reducing the five stars to four. A good buy!
A lot mesh starter kits come with a controller and maybe on access point (wifi signal generator).
If you have a large house, solid wall or are using this for your business, you’ll need to spend your hard earned cash on yet more access points.
BT have a clear winner with this low cost solution.
Like a Mesh system there are no seperate wifi zones and the one network name (SSID) does the whole house, so you don’t have to flick networks as you mooch around your home into poor signal areas.
There is a switchable guest network that you can name yourself and only turn it on when you have guests or visitors that would like to use your wifi.
That helps with security a lot.
You can pause your wifi and once the kids have stopped moaning, it’s time for bed or quiet! Have that kiddie-winkies!
Parent win!
Say goodbye to dead spots. Since purchasing the set of three, I have no areas in my house that doesn’t have a full , yes full wifi signal.
Got an alexa or google home hub pugs and lamps around the home? If you’ve found they drop on and off the network then this could be the solution for you.
With improved signal stability, you’ll find those pesky dropouts where your lamps won’t turn on or off will be a thing of the past.
It took 20 minutes to set up all three access points (The white disc thingies).
Everything you need is in the box.
The whole home app for iphone and andriod phones works virtually fool proof.
I would have liked to have seen a few things I felt were missing.
1. You can only set your BT access points down using the stand provided.
Although they look sleak, if it were possible to screw them to a wall or ceiling, say like a cisco access point, then that would be better.
2. I am lucky enough to have a home where a lot of nework socket outlets were put in during it’s refurbishment.
I would have loved to have seen a row of four network outlets on the prime disk and be able to use it to manage my other discs via a wired network. Or, even be able to mix and match between wired and wifi piggy backing.
That said, they are hard to critise and the pricing point is brilliant.
Personally and as an IT guy, I can recomend these.
The hardware feels strong and robust and is easy to install physically.
The fact that the back stand is not removable is frustrating. I sawed the legs off onedisc to mount it flush against a wooden panel with success. This unit would be ideal for roof installations if they had made the stand removable and added more attachment options.
My issue is that I have an outbuilding 20 metres away from the rear of house that requires network whilst network was originally transmitting from front of house and powerline switches have been unreliable. However this system has resolved that by having one unit at tue router on the front of the house, a 2nd disc by the back door with clear vision through a window to a 3rd unit in the outbuilding window within line of sight.
After one month I’ve had no losses of connection across all 3 doscs and considerable improvement in reliable network speed in the outbuilding that has a PC, TV, smart switches and an alexa running on the network together. Added a few pics to show modification and perspective of distance between discs.
Like others Software install using the phone app was frustrating. Turn off your existing wifi for a better experience, don’t follow the next option to add a new disc, do it from the menu as add a new disc.
Once installed, I renamed my mesh wifi to my existing wifi name with same password and everything reconnected seamlessly.
Works on both 2.4 a d 5ghz frequency. Smart plugs work on 2.4 ghz work fine.
I had tried many times, in vain, to speak to VM customer service, who constantly had me trying all sorts of stupid things that made no difference whatsoever! Basically, VM customer service lied to me and just would not admit that Hub 3 and it’s firmware have ongoing issues and the equipment is basic. Date of issues November 2019 – they’re still happening!
So, finally, after going to the VM online forum, someone had recommend BT Whole Home. I did some research and for my small, two bedroom bungalow, I purchased the 2-disc BT Whole Home mesh wi-fi system and it has transformed my wifi to an extremely strong wi-fi bubble around my home, with no dead spots! I wish I’d purchased it earlier.
Some people had mentioned, in the forum, turning the VM Hub 3 onto “modem” mode, but you DO NOT need to do this with this BT Whole Home.
The system is extremely simple to set up. No deep tech knowledge is required!
Download the BT Whole Home app to your smart phone or iPad. Then you simply plug in disc 1: ethernet cable goes to back of VM Hub 3 router and power cable to mains. Then let the BT Whole Home app do it’s thing. It will tell you when it’s ready to plug in the disc 2. It then transfers a signal to the 2nd disc to tell you where the most suitable location is. When you’re happy with the location, simply let the app finish it’s thing, then voila! I then experienced a fully functioning wi-fi service!
I am extremely annoyed that I have had to purchase other hardware to get the wi-fi service that I am already paying for. However, Virgin are so extremely poor with their customer service, that I just couldn’t bear speaking with them again. Also, Virgin are the only company offering the higher wi-fi speeds of 100+, in my area, so I feel that I’m stuck with them.
(Come on BT, get your higher speed sorted – you’d make a fortune from customers running screaming of frustration from Virgin!).
Hope this helps – I would definitely recommend this system! Good luck! 🙂
When BT first released this system the reviews went from excellent to appalling due to BT badly messing up the update process. Things have improved
I bought this system for a local arts venue that’s scattered over several converted farm buildings. I installed a ‘normal’ system of individual wifi repeaters, but this had the inherent problem of the user constantly having to manually switch to the strongest signal and, for their first visit at least, enter the (same) password for each repeater. We really needed a mesh system.
The instructions tell you exactly how to proceed (flawless) and my fear was realised when it became clear that the four discs were going to be too far away from each other. But my hope proved correct, in that each disc will work as part of a mesh even when beyond the range of other discs so long as they have a cabled connection back to the router. So whilst a mesh system is designed to give seamless coverage, even where there are gaps between them the Whole Home discs will communicate via their cabled back-channel to allow users to hop from one to the other as and when they’re in range without any further user intervention. This means that the CAT5 port on each disc can act either as a feed from the disc to a networked device (at home I use this ability to feed the BT TV box) or as a cabled feed from the router to an isolated disc.
The iOS app then adds the icing to the cake (and this is where this system is slightly ahead of BT’s rented Total WiFi system) by allowing control of the network. At the venue, for example, the duty manager can pause the wifi network during a performance, thereby massively reducing the disturbance caused by unmuted mobile phones. She loves that switch! In a domestic setting, that ability could also be used to entice the family to the dinner table, or allowing guests to have access to wifi separate from your own domestic network. There’s much to like here.
I work in IT and have tried multiple solutions from putting my router in modem mode and using a Cisco 1U router and multiple wireless access points to using a single nighthawk. I am using the dreaded super hub 3 with virgin that has earnt its bad reputation. Mainly for me when suddenly out of no where devices couldn’t stay connected, could see them on the DHCP scope and able to ping but amazon echo devices and ring doorbell would not respond on the network. Since having this mesh network setup I have had ZERO issues, maybe once or twice the Wi-Fi has gone slow when it’s switching disc or Wi-Fi band but genuinely it’s nothing to be of concern purely because I have came across enterprise grade Wi-Fi networks that are either worse or on par with this setup and for the price it’s really a bargain. I would 100% recommend at least you try this out. I have one in my office at the front of the house (plasterboard wall) then one at the opposite end of the house in a conservatory and one in our annex at the end of the garden and I can get 112mb (megabits not bytes) download speed at the end of the garden by the annex or in neighbours gardens. Our internet speed is 100mb however credit to virgin for some reason we seem to be getting around 120 and haven’t yet (touch wood) had an outage. The only issues I had was the SH3 randomly selecting devices and not allowing them to communicate on the network. Huge credit to BT on this and especially not tying it down to their own equipment is fantastic. One comment to note in an 1950’s built house we could potentially do with one upstairs at the opposite end of the house to the master (in the office) but I still haven’t bothered so can’t be that bad !!!
When I moved in I chose BT to provide broadband (a rural location, so figured BT would be the best choice as I would be ahead of the queue when they upgraded the exchange to ‘real’ broadband), and worked through the BT hubs 4, 5 and 6. None of them were able to penetrate the thick walls and give me wifi throughout my property – which I understand: I don’t doubt they are predominently designed for newbuilds with walls that allow the signal to penetrate.
I have tried numerous signal boosters, but all have suffered from one draw back or another, and none have proved reliable. I also replaced the BT hub with an [expensive] ASUS gamer router with multiple antena – again, it was not able to provide a good signal throughout my property, and definitely wasn’t as reliable as the BT hub …. but that is the subject of a different review!
About a year ago (when I moved from BT to EE for my broadband provider) I invested in a BT 2 disk system, on the assumption that I could use the second disk to utilise mesh technology and provide a decent signal to the rest of my property. Hey presto – it works!
The ‘base’ disk is plugged directly into the router, and the second disk has a decent line of sight to the base router, and this provides more than a good relay signal (completely workable) to the rest of my property.
Move on another year, and I decided to go with Blink cameras for security. To explain for the purpose of this review, the Blink cameras (located outside) need a good wifi link to my broadband in addition to a good link to the Blink hub – something which I would imagine is difficult in many households, and although my two disks provide me with a ‘good’ signal throughout my property, the second disk doesn’t provide a great signal throughout – I don’t blame this on the device but on my very thick and old walls!
Given previous positive experiences with the BT disks, I invested in the three pack to expand my existing network, locating the disks in rooms near the Blink cameras.
The results? I now have EXCELLENT wifi throughout the whole of my property, which extends to the nearby perimiter completely sufficient for the Blink cameras which show a 5 bar wifi signal …. and inside, I have absolute coverage of excellent strength wifi in all rooms.
I haven’t needed to contact support, hence no rating, but I would happily recommend this product as a best buy for a number of reasons:
1) if you can have ‘rough’ line of sight between some of the disks, they can extend your wifi signal transparently to all devices throughout your household (my smart home technology just links to the best signal, and yes, I have seen an improvement in responses since I expanded ‘the mesh’).
2) even if you don’t have line of sight, you could potentially use a network over mains adapters to connect the devices remotely to your base router and share the signal throughout the house – I have tried this with numerous options, but I really didn’t find it as reliable as allowing the disks to be able to relay
themselves. In my experience, providing one disk has a semi-decent line of sight to the ‘base’ disk, the others all work very very well and provide a good signal: useful if your phone point it located somewhere with thick walls.
3) numerous devices nowadays need a wired connection to your router – I have an alarn and CCTV (separate to the Blink) which need a hardwired connection to ‘the router’ – the RJ45 network connection on the back of one of my disks (each disk has a connector to plug in a network lead) works perfectly well, and each devices ‘believes’ they are plugged in to the router.
4) I really like the guest wifi option – this is a separate wifi network you can set up which is kept isolated from your main wifi network, so guests can connect to the internet without being able to connect to any of the devices on your home network – great, as you don’t have to rely on your guests having antivirus and malware protection, and potentially infecting your network devices (it’s also useful for connecting ‘suspect’ devices to your network when the company doesn’t have a clear privacy and security policy, e.g. IoT monitoring cameras, though I’m not talking about Blink … of which I’m a huge fan!).
5) linked to 4, you can switch the guest network on and off without impacting your main network, and you can also pause your network – stopping internet access – the nice part being you can specify which devices this affects. I would imagine this would be useful for adults with kids, or guests who are streaming annoying music!
6) I like the phone app (also available via a web portal) that allows you to see what/who is connected, the signal strength between the disks, and to easily control reboots, guest network and numerous other settings such as if the disks lights are on or off.
7) I like that you have the ability to block specific devices from connecting to your wifi – my guest wifi is setup with the default BT Hub 4 settings, as this is what my guests previously connected to. As the network is quite easy to hack, several uninvited guests took the opportunity to utilise my broadband connection – I don’t blame them ….. but their MAC addresses are now blocked. Not infaliable, but it makes it harder and so hopefully they will move on to another wifi network.
The only downside, and I wouldn’t say this is a reason to not purchase [more feedback for BT], is that there is no option (currently) to turn off the LED on one disk – the option is for all disks and it is either off, low or bright – personally, I want to keep the LED switched on for my disks as it is a good indicator that things are working well (or not!), but for the disk in my bedroom, I would like to be able to switch it off – but you currently can’t for a single disk. In the meantime, duck tape means my bedroom isn’t lit up with the [good status] blue LED.
No matter who your broadband provider is, I would highly recommend this product – it’s REALLY easy to setup either via the web portal or preferably the phone app, and it works. I am a very satisfied customer.
I bought these to replace a rather convoluted network based around wireless and powerline adapters, the latter proving to be increasingly unreliable.
We are fairly heavy users of wifi. As well as the usual HD video and audio streaming in the house, I have half a dozen wireless webcams around the garden for both security and wildlife, and a weather station which is constantly chattering to the Met Office and other weather sites. Chuck in a couple of laptops and a handful of tablets, iStuff, Alexa devices and phones and you have more or less the complete picture.
Setup was very straightforward, although it’s good to have a rough idea in your mind of where you would like to place them to avoid the signal going through walls at oblique angles etc. Once the disks have been set up, they replace the router’s own wifi, which can then be turned off. If you then rename and set the password of your new network the same as the old, all your devices will transfer to the new network, without having to set them up individually (no fun with 37 devices).
In a 4 bedroom brick built house, I have one disk covering the front, one covering the back, and one in the summer house, which covers a 120ft garden.
Performance has far exceeded expectations.
Most noticeable has been a drastic increase in framerate from the cameras, allowing them to be used to full potential (and also causing the operating temperature of the host PC to increase by about 15C to cope with the extra data).
Dropouts, once maybe several times an hour, are a thing of the past, and I’ve yet to get anywhere near the capacity of the network.
Overall, the network is noticeably more responsive and crisp.
For me, these tick all the boxes in transmitting data quickly, easily and reliably, at a price which doesn’t break the bank.
Anyone want to buy some powerline adapters?
Having got the WholeHome system up and running, I’m delighted with it, and it’s a massive improvement over the old WiFi system which was not a bad one. WholeHome is working very quickly and reliably, and my devices switch their connections from one disk to another seamlessly as I move around the property. Whilst it took a bit of trial and error to place the disks in the optimum locations, it has now completely eliminated the previous dead spots that always annoyed me with the old system. And the WiFi signal is equally fast and reliable in all parts of the property now.
Setting it up was pretty straightforward and quick. I’m reasonably tech literate but you don’t need to be. The app guides you in deciding where to place each disk to maximise coverage and connection quality. This was actually very helpful – I finished up placing disks in locations that I wouldn’t have thought of, but the end result is great coverage everywhere. The disks really do work together to create an effective and comprehensive single network. It’s a clever system.
I needed to speak to BT Technical Support at one stage – not because of an issue with the WholeHome system itself but to work out how to connect a separate internet access point to cover another part of the property in a way that wouldn’t mess up the WholeHome system. They were very knowledgeable and helpful and solved the problem quickly once I was able to get through to the right person. So technical support was good when needed, though it isn’t needed for a normal installation.
And managing the system once it’s installed using the app is easy and powerful. It’s a good app and very intuitive, and it lets me do everything I want to to manage the system in the way I want.
My only annoyance (and the reason for four stars rather than five) is that getting the app to work on my iPhone proved impossible. And you cant install the system without the app. Googling the problem it seems that I wasn’t alone in finding this. Even today, the app on my iPhone tells me that the WholeHome system isn’t connected and so my iPhone version of the app is entirely useless. If you have this problem too, the solution for me was to run the app on an Ipad, where it worked perfectly first time. No idea why this should be the case, and incredibly annoying and frustrating before I found the solution. It all works well now on my iPad though, so I’ve got what I needed in the end. But this isn’t a problem that should happen. BT please take note.
Overall I’m delighted with the system now it’s up and running and would recommend it highly. Just make sure you have an iPad and not an iPhone when you’re installing it.
Anyway, me being me I like wired connections as far as possible. This is probably due to the fact that on construction ships for offshore work we have to make everything as foolproof and reliable as possible and that means hard wiring. And I figured as each of these WiFi units had a LAN port they must be able to be used with a cable, right?
And, well, yes.
They are designed so that the first unit is wired in and then you wifi daisy chain them around the house using the BT app on your mobile to determine the best spot to achieve good connection and maximise the distance.
However, you can use Cat 5 or 6 – although it does not say so in the manual. Essentially you plug them all into a switch and run LAN cable wherever you want and then plug each one it. It all works perfectly as they are all set to the same login and passwords. Using cable guarantees a good connection and I like that.
However, the app does not which may or may not be important to you. When I tried to use the app with all the units wired in, it refused to allow me to name each one and set it up. That isn’t a problem per se because just plugging them in and entering the WiFi login details into your device allows you to roam your house using each of the units in range.
However, if you want to use the app and use these as intended – and avoid running Cat5 everywhere – then its also simplicity itself.
Plug in the first one, follow the app instructions, then do the next in turn. You can name each one as you go and all you need is a power socket close by.
The only thing I noted is that the range between these is not huge using WiFi only so if you have a particularly massive house then you might need another couple to cover everywhere. Regardless, these do work really well and give great WiFi everywhere using the same details for simplicity.
Now, onto other things. Design is neat and pleasing on the eye with a very good tactile feel and build quality. These do come across as being well made and high end.
The weird bit is the fact that on the back there is a hole for hanging these on a wall which, frankly is hard to understand. It would be nice if it could be done, but the stand is integral and can’t be taken off and of course the Cat5 cable on the master unit will stick out the back. I could I guess take one apart and remove the stand but I run the risk of damaging it in the process. I may give it a go and see if I can neatly wall mount one and if I can, I’ll update this.
Overall, a fantastic bit of kit that works brilliantly and well worth the money if you need better coverage.
Note – this system does require a separate modem-router, unlike some others like Google Wifi. Setting up was fairly straightforward using the BT Whole Home app. In the box are three discs, one LAN cable to connect the first disc to the router, and three power cables. All the cables are decent length to give some flexibility to siting the discs. The first disc installed close to the router and the second where I thought it best for our needs. The BT Whole Home app (on Android for me) said signal at this site OK but not excellent, but the system has been stable for a month thus far. We haven’t yet had to install the third disc.
After installing I switched off the wifi from HomeHub5 and renamed the Whole Home Wifi to exactly the same log-in and password as the HomeHub. I thought this would be quicker than reconnecting every device to the new, default log-in and password of the Whole Home Wifi. It wasn’t as convenient as I thought – all static devices (wifi printers, tvs, sky box, radio) needed to have the log-in and password entered afresh to make a working connection even though I had changed the Whole Home Wifi to the old log-in settings. Time saved was marginal!
The Whole Home Wifi app is OK. It kept showing alerts to update Whole Home Wifi software even though I had set it to update automatically. I clicked on manual update, it said my system was up to date and stopped nagging me.
A month on, our wfi and connections are much more stable with only occasional blip (much less than before) sorted by either restarting the responsible disc or re-entering log-in credentials. Bit pricey, but competitive compared to most other big name mesh systems. I hope the system will cope with further wifi equipment as we purchase them, and remain reliable.
I got these and the main one is set up plugged into the Sky router and the setup was relatively simple (however I do work in IT). Once all three were setup, it became apparent that I still needed more and bought another two. The setup on these was harder, as the first three came pre-configured to work together, and so did the second two, Unfortunately the two sets didn’t see each other. However, I found some help videos on the internet about how to get a separate unit to join an existing configuration. To me it seemed wrong, you have to plug the unit into the same LAN switch / router (so if your router only has one LAN port, you need to buy a small LAN switch), and then do a factory reset on the added one. I thought that it would cause LAN issues, but it does work, although it is a bit distressing as it does that thing of downloading new firmware and the single indicator light isn’t very clear about whether it is resetting, downloading firmware, rebooting etc. However it does work in the end and my advice is just to leave it until everything settles down. A useful tip that I came up with was to configure the existing discs so that teh indicator light was dim. When you add the new disk, it is by default bright. Therefore I found that I knew that the configuration had successfully been copied across to the new unit and it reloaded properly when the light went dim. I now have whole house coverage with 5 disks, but my case is extreme as I have in some places 12 inch stone walls between rooms.
One warning however. The 2.5Ghz and 5Ghz bands use the same SSID. In most cases this is not a problem and the end device uses the most appropriate band. However I have found that WEMO devices and ewLink how automation switches have a problem with this. If they can see the 5Ghz band at setup they fail and complain that they only work with 2.5Ghz band, even if it is also still present. I have found that the only way to set these up is to find somewhere where the 5Ghz does not penetrate, but the 2,5Ghz does and do the setup there, so that it only sees the 2.5Ghz band. I wasted a lot of time on this.
I struggled at first and then moved the first disk away from the router (using a 5 metre ethernet cable) so it was more central in the room. This improved the signal to the second disk which I placed where my old WiFi extender was. Signal from the first disk was rated as excellent, but the second (4 metres and two brick walls away) was only good. However, the second one was able to transmit a signal that was good enough to watch streaming HD video throughout the house and down to the end of the garden (another 20′ parst the end of the house).
So it works. It’s not quite the wonderful solution they say as it took some messing with and I child only get an “excellent” on the second disk if I moved it to within line of sight of the first which seemed pointless and the second could not serve the rest of the house after that. They also run a bit warm.
I’ve turned off the WiFi on my router and just use these now. I changed their WiFi name and password to match the one the router had so my existing devices need not be changed. This also got rid of the three Wi-Fi names i had with my old setup.
My hp printer struggled to connect at first after this (some don’t like multiple devices with the same WiFi name) and i needed to download the latest drivers to fix it.
Is nice knowing i could add another disk if needed to this system, though it’s reaching every where now and it’s simple to use and maintain. I like the extras like being able to group devices and pause their WiFi use at at times (so kids devices) and being able to clearly see who is connected and with what at anytime.
You can use this as a pure Mesh system with the central disc connected to your router to serve WiFi, the other discs can then piggy back off the WIFI signal to “boost out” the signal to cover more square footage. Setup is relatively easy and as I had a quite a few devices rather than use the default SSID from the mesh system, I mimicked my old SSID and password and turned off WiFi on the BT router.
However I decided to go the whole hog and have each disc connected directly or indirectly to the router via Ethernet cable. One disc I have connected directly to router, the other two I have indirectly connected via Ethernet Over Mains adaptors (TP-Link) so in effect each disc is physically connected to the router. I now have high speed WiFi coverage across the entire house. Works a charm with the 4K netflix stream in the far corner of the house!
The control app is relatively easy to use and you can set some basic child controls which effectively just stops internet connectivity to selected devices during scheduled times. It won’t, however, stop the child using the device for something that is stored locally!
As a summary it works well, not too obtrusive and means I have full wifi coverage so no complaints!
I did quite a bit of research about Whole home wifi network products and the best two were TP Link and BT. I plumbed for BT (as it was cheaper and had great reviews by Which). You will not be disappointed. Just download the app to your phone and follow the instructions on the app and within 10 minutes I had a fully functioning whole home wifi network.
I have a Sky router with a TP link Extender in the middle of the bungalow. My PC is in my office in the middle of the bungalow, just by the extender and it kept losing signal and would drop out. I also have an Amazon fire stick in my TV and it kept losing the network connection and so I couldn’t watch anything.
Those days are over! What a transformation. I placed the 3 discs, one in my kitchen, and the others in my office and living room and what a massive change. Very strong Wifi signal throughout the home. I even managed to connect my TP Link extender to the system, just to give it a boost!
I watched a movie via the firestick last night for the first time in ages and not a hint of dropping out. I have connected my printer to the wifi and I printed off a document from my laptop (in the conservatory) to the printer in the office, which is four rooms away, bingo!!! Never been able to do that!
The app is excellent, as you can manage each disc and see what devices are connected. You can control all devices’ internet access from the app and even set up a guest wifi, so they can’t access your network.
The discs are quite funky and look like mini satellite dishes, just a little larger than a CD.
I have never posted a review before but felt compelled to do so with this product. I have done so much research about this and spent ages agonising about which one i should go for (as not a cheap option) and I was not disappointed. I am over-the-moon. I have wifi everywhere and my firestick works!
I didn’t know about this product until I made a rare visit to a PC World for something else entirely and saw a large display board. They had no stock and the staff of course, knew nothing at all about them, or the rival TP-Link system they sell.
Having tired of listening to somebody read to me from a display box, I went home and looked this up on Amazon of course and decided to give it a try.
For me, ease of use is paramount. If it doesn’t work out of the box, I tend to give up.
Following the instructions was easy, download an app to my phone, plug in a disc to my router and watch what happens next. That’s pretty easy.
It worked immediately and I then went around the house with another unit and the app. Without plugging the second unit, the app was able to tell me whether the positioning I chose was poor, good or excellent. I chose excellent and plugged the second unit in.
It connected like a dream, so I repeated the same thing with my third unit upstairs.
That was good, but what happened next was better!
I got my son to “forget” the Virgin connection on his phone and also the various repeaters and extenders I had plugged in all over the house (each with its own password). I then asked him to navigate to the BT Whole Home wi-fi and as he did, my app pinged and asked if I wanted to grant him access.
As I confirmed this, it automatically entered the password into his phone.
There was nothing else to do. Even my technophobe wife managed to connect in the same way!
I can’t believe how long I’ve struggled with those plug-in extenders that are so slow, they’re almost a waste of time.
I’ve freed up lots of plug sockets and now have full signal throughout the house for the first time ever.
As I move around the house, the signal transfers automatically to the best signal seamlessly.
It’s like discovering new technology all over again. Absolutely brilliant and very fast browsing speeds too.
My first disk is necessarily positioned near the hub, linked by ethernet cable, and my other two disks are positioned in the top centre and top left of the house. Positioning was constrained by the availability of suitable power sockets, so the optimum spacing could not be achieved, but I got as close as I reasonably could. Set up was straightforward, and the iphone app works OK.
Since setup, the wifi connection has been pretty strong and pretty stable. The disk near the hub is consistently blue (strong signal), as you would expect, and the other disks are mostly blue and sometimes amber (moderate signal). So it is definitely effective. For functionality alone, I’d rate this as 5 stars. However factoring in cost, I’d rate it an overall 3.5 stars, rounded up to 4 stars. The cost in Oct.2017 was 200, current Amazon cost 170. One thing that I found slightly annoying was that the first disk must be connected to the router via ethernet cable, which for most people means that you are only really getting 2 disks (not 3) in the remainder of the house, which is where they are are needed. So in reality I considered that I paid 100 for each extended unit, which is quite expensive considering that a reasonable hub/router itself costs about 100.
More recent firmware versions have fixed my problems. Very happy with the set of three discs. Changed to 5 stars.
Updated Aug 2018
Was previously 5 stars, now 1 star.
Came back from holiday a month ago to find that the discs had updated themselves to the latest firmware, which is rubbish.
If I try renaming devices to be more identifiable it renames the wrong one.
Restricted/schedule internet access is unreliable. Thought I had a problem with our Canon printer with it intermittently not being recognised on the network. Turned out to be the time schedule for the kids internet disabling it in the evening even though it wasn’t in the restricted group.
Coverage and handover between discs is still good though 🙂
Updated 14 Dec 2017
I had high hopes for this BT setup in solving WiFi dropouts as the kids moved between rooms with their iPods. Its not that large a house but it has had an extension, which involves foil backed plasterboard and insulating foam.Several weeks on and the connections are still rock solid and much better than the mix of range extender/access points we had. Coverage is good, handover between discs is seamless. I have two networked with ethernet and the third using wifi for the mesh.
Updated with the latest firmware released a few days ago. What a difference. Intel Centrino Wifi problem fixed – laptops now connect at 5GHz. It adds guest network capability and also timed access for devices and groups – good for controlling the kids internet access.
Previous comments from November – NOW FIXED 🙂
Main problem so far is any laptops with a Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6205 WiFi chipset don’t connect UNTIL you force it to prefer 2.4G over the 5G in the advanced WiFi driver properties. Googling for the issue finds others with the same problem, recently introduced with the latest firmware upgrade. Also affects a HP 840 G3 laptop with a newer WiFi chipset.
Apart from that the Web management interface and the App are lacking in features, at least compared to those in Fibre/WiFi Routers.
All that said hopefully BT fix the Intel Wifi incompatibility soon and enhance the web management interface at which point it should be excellent, so I will be carrying on.
Before buying this, I spent quite a lot of time figuring out ways of getting WiFi boosted in our two-floor flat in an old Victorian house with an extension that is close to a Faraday cage owing to the steel frame and metal stud internal walls. We have Ethernet cabling to various rooms, and use Virgin Media, Hub 3.0. My starting point was: something that I can plug into an Ethernet port that will extend or bring WiFi to the room concerned. If you try to connect an old router then a) you need to spend time getting your Hub 3.0 into Modem Mode, and b) you may need to spend a while fiddling with IP addresses and installing new firmware … and then it may not work. See four of five reviews and articles and forums for the sorry tale.
Next stop: Powerline with WiFi boosting: very high speed TP-Link devices with mains power “passthrough” (three-pin UK socket in the device enables it to be used as a normal electric socket too were all looking good, with “WiFI synch” (i.e. they all offer the same WiFi network id or SSID and use the same password), until I realized that to buy more than one of the latest, smartest “range extenders” (the devices that go into a room away from the router to provide boosted WiFi) … I would have to buy more than one “Starter Kit”, meaning that I would end up with two base stations (the devices that plug into the router via Ethernet) to get two range extenders. And to get three … I would need to buy three Starter Kits. I could not believe that a company had product-managed themselves into such a hole, but sure enough, people reported the high price of a working solution for this very reason. And I also noticed that the range extenders are not actually mains power “passthrough”. So I thought again. And read more reviews.
Which brought me to the BT Whole Home WiFi product.
EXTRA PLUSES: things it does that I didn’t know about when I bought it.
1. I would expect this, but you never know: I plugged the primary disc into an Ethernet port away from the actual router location (and in a much better place to form the WiFi “mesh” with the other discs) and that all worked just fine.
2. You can plug each disc into an Ethernet port if you have on available. Then each disc “just” acts as a synchronised repeater of a single SSID with a single password, boosts WiFi, operates directly off Ethernet etc. All without touching the Hub 3.0, no switching it into Modem Mode (and losing an Ethernet port) etc etc.
3. There is a web admin interface as well as the iOS/Android apps, and it is very good, clear, easy to use (in fact both are OK once everything is working, see MINUSES below).
MINUSES
1. No information in the app, online at BT’s generally very good FAQ/knowledge base, or from their technical support department about the VPN problem: that took more Googling. Remember to switch off your phone’s VPN to administer the network (and to set it up if that’s how you are doing it) and also remember that you can use the Web interface (http://mybtdevice.home) once the primary disc is connected via Ethernet to the router.
2. The app guides you through set up, and two things went wrong: it asked you to test connections before switching on the second and subsequent discs, but when used to test the connection (signal level) in close proximity (a foot away) or at a reasonable distance (a location that actually works for a second disc) is showed a red disc and No Connection, which was a lie. I was wrongly told by BT tech support that you cannot test connections before plugging the second disc in (it will show signal strength when only one disc is working, at a potential location, if the app is reinstalled).
3. The quick start doc available on line (but not in the box, bizarre) says: don’t switch on discs until the app says so. If I had followed this advice I’d be writing a different (one-star) review. Once the first disc is up and working (plug into mains, plug via Ethernet cable into router Ethernet port, power on) then WiFi works, devices can be connected etc. Take the second and third discs. Plug them into mains and power on, successively, and they hook up and work too. You don’t need the app to make this work.
4. Minor niggle: you can’t turn off the LED on only one or two discs: all three or nothing. But at least you can turn it off.
5. If these discs were Power over Ethernet (PoE) then it would be a happy day, but I’m sure that the next generation will be. And if BT are smart they won’t make you buy a whole new system to get PoE, they’ll let if all work with the old discs. Don’t make the TP-Link mistake.
The system seems to be really good, and the price, given the alternatives, is not cheap, but not unreasonable. The simplicity of setup (given the info above) is amazing. The admin is really simple and effective. This is a class product!
Summary to save reading the rest: The kit arrives in an excellent package which feels very upmarket so initial impressions was good. It is expensive compared to wifi plugs but it initially looks like money well spent especially at the price I paid rather than the original 299. It has managed to get wifi coverage everywhere in my house on a single SSID and with better performance than before. Would have been a 5 star review except for the mandatory BT app which let’s it down in my opinion.
** After submitting the review with 4 stars I decided the BT app did not warrant losing a star so I’ve put it to 5 stars.
Background info: I have BT Infinity2 (unlimited data and upto 70Mbps). When hardwired to the router I get 62Mbps via speedtest regularly. My house is really bad for WiFi. To visualise it, imagine a rectangle split into equal thirds. The BT HomeHub5 sits just inside the left third and wifi in this section is strong. The middle third starts getting patchy and the final third which happens to be where my lounge and bedroom are is usually no reception. I used a Solwise repeater in the middle third to help until now which has been great but when at the furthest point from it in the bedroom it was sometimes hit and miss. Plus we had three different SSIDs in the house.
Setup: Opened the great bit of packaging and the feel of each disc was of really good build quality. I had already read that the BT whole home app was required so I had downloaded it already on Android. For me this is the only reason I haven’t awarded it 5 stars. The first issue I have with the app is that it requires location services to be on or it just wont start. WTF? Why does it need to know where I am? I know I’m in my house and the devices are connected to the hub in my house and my broadband is in my house. I don’t have location turned on as it eats my battery plus I’m paranoid about being stalked 😉 So now I have to switch that on, tell google to take a run when it then wants me to allow all and sundry to access my location just so the app will start (and also having to remember to shut it off when I’m finished). That was issue one with the app. After that the setup was easy, plug ethernet cable into the router, plus other end into the first disc, power it on, wait 2 mins until the LED went solid blue and then I had a new SSID which I could connect to using the key that you get on the card that slides from the back of the disc (like with all BT hubs). The app then offers you to add more discs. It says go the spot you would like and click test. It tells you if you are in a good area or not. Once you have a good location for disc two, power it on, wait 2 mins for solid blue, then onto the third disc (same procedure). Once I had all three in location, using the app I changed the SSID to a different name and also changed the admin passwd (on the pull out card). I also clicked check for new firmware and it found some, download and install took a few mins. That was it for setup. You could easily do it in under 30mins but I tried a few locations and made sure I had it looking tidy with cables out of sight, etc so spent a bit longer.
Testing: I used the speedtest app on my Sony Android phone for measurements. For reference – My usual results from speedtest show no more than 30Mbps down and 18Mbps up in the house when I have peak performance. The BT app shows you a graphic of devices connected to which disc so I could see where I was connected for my testing. I did various runs from different locations connecting to different discs and my performance generally was higher than I’ve ever had before with an average of low 40s for download and a peak of 58. uploads were a bit down though never peaking above 16 and sometimes in single figures. Not too worried about this as the majority of wifi traffic in my house is download. The only issue I experienced and it could be just the bedding in phase is that sometimes when I moved around the house and the passing on function of the devices (to the better reception) seemed to take a while so my first attempt at speedtest had network comms error. I will see how real life usage and movement affect the device over the coming days.
BT app: i have already mentioned the app is mandatory which is acceptable to me although as they each have an ethernet socket you should really be able to connect a PC direct but most of us have mobiles so whatever. I also said I hate the fact you need location services turned on. My other gripe is that you cannot control the hub settings in particular parental controls. I have this set on the hub to stop my kids being on their phones all night. The only option via the app is the whole wifi off or on which will then affect sky, fire tv, my phone,etc… I think the hub still controls their access but I would like this ability on the app. I can also see devices connected to each disc but cannot do anything such as block them.
Conclusion: Although I only set this up in the last 24hours from my initial impression of the hardware, through the ease of setup and resulting in wifi coverage getting the whole house with a single SSID, I am very happy with the outlay of cash. The bonus that the download performance has increased too is the cherry on the cake. I hope I have not reviewed too early and I don’t start getting problems but if I do I shall report back. I highly recommend this as a solution if you had issues like mine especially as if it turns out not to work in your case you can simply box it back up and return to Amazon (that was my plan if it failed).
The system has been running for a good 3 months now with no issues. One thing to note is that the disks kept dropping off my old iPhone 4 and seemed to be locking up after every night. Following some googling I changed the wifi channels to 1 & 36 and enabled compatibility mode using the web link (just type in the IP address of your master disk to a web browser). That solved the stability problem and they have been rock solid ever since.
Also last week I added another 3 disks for a total of 6 to extend the range even further and provide higher speeds to my devices. It works well, however you will need to manage the disks using the web app instead of the iPhone app. Setting up the extra disks was painless. Just plug in the new disk on the router and turn it on. Wait for a solid blue light and you’re done. Then unplug and relocate to its final location. I now have full wifi 5ghz coverage in all my holiday home floors!
I am dropping a star to 4 due to the compatibility mode and channel setting changes being necessary to achieve a stable system in my case.
——
I’ve been struggling to get decent wifi signal across my 4 story holiday home in Athens for years. For context the house is built with steel reinforced concrete slabs, pillars and brick walls. Definitely a challenging environment for any wifi installation. I’ve played around with repeaters and power lines but they have been unreliable. WiFi was dropping when roaming from one access point to another, poor coverage and overall slow speeds. I’ve taken a punt with this BT Whole Home wifi as I was not sure whether it would have the range to fill the whole house and garden. After installing the three access points across three out of the four stories in the house I’ve been greeted with a solid wifi connection across the whole house. I wasn’t expecting full 1300mbps speeds as three access points are on the low side for the size of the house. The connection has been solid across the house with the access points being able to max out my ADSL connection from any point in the building and garden. Excellent results and seamless roaming between the access points.
Once the single AP’s become available I might go ahead and buy a couple more to make the signal even stronger in the far ends of the house.
The first BT WH disc is in the study connected by the supplied ethernet cable to the router with a second disc in the lounge (hard-wired to the TV) and the final one in the kitchen at the rear of the house. I was pleasantly surpised when the setup app reported each of my chosen locations had ‘excellent’ signal. Having disabled the router’s Wifi (2.4GHz & 5GHz), setup was quick and easy and each unit soon displayed a steady blue light.
Had one strange issue though when I subsequently upgraded the firmware as the kitchen disc, having gone through its startup process following the upgrade and reached the steady blue light stage, then changed to orange (or was it red?) after one or two seconds. A power recycle and then a factory reset on the unit, resulted in the same condition. Despite the app declaring its location was ‘excellent’, I ended up moving it to a new position after which it has remained in a ‘blue’ state. For this I have docked one star as I hope there is not a problem with the unit.
Anyway, the final result is we now have strong Wifi signal throught the house including the upper storey bedrooms each of which is approximately situated above one of the discs (separated by plasterboard ceilings, 9-inch wooden joists, 18mm flooring, carpet etc.). Even on a patio approximately 50 feet (15m) from the kitchen, I have a reasonably fast signal far superior to anything before! As for streaming video to the TV, so far no stutters after a week of use.
Conclusion, so far this solution has proved to be very effective so I am a happy bunny!
Being able to seamlessly move around the house and garden without having to reconnect is also a welcome bonus.
Firstly, I’d like to make it clear that I’m not the biggest fan of BT. Billing problems in the past and poor customer service etc means I don’t have the highest opinion of them…so why did I buy this product? Exasperation. We have an old house with thick granite walls, that was extended twice, making the problem even worse. (Thick walls where you wouldn’t expect them.) They are also all lathe and plaster which makes running cables a chore and to cap it all, the master socket is above a door in the porch…problems, problems, problems…
Anyhoo, I had tried TP link powerlines which were unstable and needed repairing every other day…these were ‘rage unplugged’ and then I ordered the Devolo 1200AC wifi plugs with passthrough. These were horrendously expensive compared to most plugs. These were more reliable than the TP link plugs and faster too, but still they would just pack in from time to time and require a restart which you couldn’t do from the app. Cue dashing about unplugging and replugging. Old wiring…bad product…who knows? I was sick fed up. I tried the Ubiquiti Unifi too, but that brought its own problems. I wanted simple. Something that works with the router out of the box. With little ones, I haven’t the time for faffing about now fixing networks, nor the inclination.
I’d viewed various WIFI systems and bridging routers, but in the end I purchased the BT Whole Home WIFI simply due to positive reviews, well specced and because they were the cheapest option at the time for a MESH style wifi network. Google is double the 200 for just two units compared to the BT’s three. Plus having the backup by purchasing from Amazon…
The box arrived. It’s massive and there’s definitely a nod to more premium brands with the design and packaging. Almost similar to Apple. The discs are weighty with strong curved metal stands and have an almost pearlescent finish. In fact, if they had toned down the BT logo on the discs or hidden it altogether, they would’ve looked superb, but sadly the logo has its connotations. Everyone likes to bash BT (Me included at times) and their Hubs get a lot of deserved flak too, but I can’t really fault these. On to setup.
You download the app to your phone to walk you through the set up. There are no instructions in the box. Connect the first disc of your choosing to the mains and your router and wait for the solid blue light. Then you go through each step of adding each additional disc. The only slightly confusing task was you had to position yourself with your phone in the location you wanted to place your disc and check the signal before powering it on and naming it. This wasn’t entirely clear from the instructions and I plugged my second disc in before checking, but as it happened, it connected pretty much straight away. Same with the third disc. There’s an option to add more, but at the time being there aren’t single units available to buy. Probably be in the next version I would imagine. Then the app tells you to forget your old wifi (from your router) on all your devices which is a bit daft in my opinion. I preferred to switch off the wifi on my router so they aren’t competing and rename the Whole Home WIFI to my routers name and password. Therefore not having to reenter the new passwords on every single device in the house. Seems more simple.
Anyway…performance is pretty amazing. Streaming HD movies from our NAS is wonderful compared to before. No buffering, it just plays. All three sections of our house have full coverage and I’m actually a little bit in love with the kit, which pains me a great deal. I can’t believe it’s a BT product. Sigh.
There are several other options on the app such as being able to dim and turn off the lights on the discs (they will still display if there’s an error or your connection is down) Plus you can monitor all the devices in your house and their connection speeds plus there’s a pause button to stop the wifi and grab everyone’s attention too. Not really any more options than that. No guest network etc, but you could use your router for that I suppose. Oh and we still have one of the Devolo units connected for our Drayton Migenie with the ethernet only which works away fine. No interference with each other. The only other slight negative is that the discs have only one Ethernet socket which is a bit mean, but an ethernet switch could be added.
I really recommend them quite highly. A bit of a surprise really. I hope you have the same experience.
Update: I have revised my opinion on the SSID setting. Don’t set it the same as your router and here’s why…
I found that the main unit was stuttering with barely there wifi. Restarting both router and Whole Home Wifi didn’t help. I switched back on the wifi from the router and paused the WHWifi, but the problem was still there. It turned out that something must have cycled the power on my Devolo Home plug and therefore switched its Wifi back on. Having the three items all displaying the same wifi name with the same password made it nigh on impossible to diagnose. I ended up resetting the WHWifi and choosing another name. It’s a pretty unique scenario and perhaps I should have renamed the router and Devolo instead so I could have kept all my device logins, but its the other way I went as I’ve always wanted a Chortle-some SSID…
Oh and my Samsung TV’s could not connect via Wifi at all. I fixed this by using fixed IP addresses and they are connecting better now than they ever have.
Update 2
Well that’s a surprise. In fact a bit of a game changer. I saw that there was a firmware update available. Obviously being BT they don’t bother to notify anyone to tell you what it is. Well it’s brilliant. Utterly brilliant. Like, it’s a different product brilliant. You may have noticed some people complaining that all three discs need to connect to the router based disc instead of daisy chaining as a mesh system would. Therefore although you switch seamlessly from disc to disc, the discs all need to be within reach of the first, router based disc. NO MORE! The latest firmware which is v1.02.01 build22 has actually transformed them to daisy chain. I was experimenting with positions before and at the far end of the house, there was a more suitable location for the third disc, but it was too far from the initial router disc. Not now, they are daisy chained to the far end. The third is now connecting to the 2nd for a signal and that signal is buttery smooth and sublime. For goodness sake BT, if it wasn’t for the fact you’ve been messing me around with my fibre internet for the last two months, I’d kiss you.
Oh and have a look….they are just about to release an extra disc for this system. For this actual system!! Not the next one…this one. So daisy chaining and the possibility of increasing range even more. Honest to goodness, this is a brilliant system. We’ve had it well over a month now and it is just phenomenal. So much better than homeplugs. Utterly fab. I still can’t believe it’s BT. It’s truly a bargain at the current price too. Cheaper than our home plugs and so simple to use. The firmware update is as simple as clicking a button and it’s sorted in two minutes. If you have the system, update and relocate your discs. Just try it!