How to Get Fiber-Grade Coverage at Home with Mesh Wi-Fi
Place the modem near the center of the home and link it to the main mesh node over ethernet to avoid loss. Put the second node away from load bearing walls and, if possible, in an open spot between floors; enable wired backhaul whenever it is offered. If wireless uplink is unavoidable, place the second node halfway between the modem and the far rooms.
Pick non-DFS channels on 5 GHz, keep 160 MHz on if your hardware supports it, and enable fast roaming (802.11r) to avoid drops while moving. Turn on QoS/SQM to stabilize gaming and video calls. Keep a single SSID, move IoT devices to a guest network, protect the admin console with WPA3 and a strong password, and tune transmit power so nodes overlap evenly instead of blasting maximum power.