Mesh Wi-Fi Node

Overview

The Mesh Wi-Fi Node is one element of a whole-home mesh: drop several of them around a building and they cooperate as a single network with one SSID, handing clients off as they move. Each node is a tri-band Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax) radio rated around AXE5400, roughly 5.4 Gbps aggregate across the 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz and 6 GHz bands, and covers about 250 m² on its own.

Everything lives on one Mainboard. The board carries the Compute SoC Module networking processor, DDR4 RAM, NAND flash, three Radio Front-End Module front-ends (one per band), the RF power amplifiers and filters, and a 2.5GbE Switch IC driving the wired ports. The radios feed six PCB Antenna elements wrapped around the inside of the vented Housing Assembly, which exhausts heat through a top grille and carries the status light pipe and the reset/sync buttons.

Wired connectivity comes from the Ethernet Port Bank bank, one 2.5GbE port plus two Gigabit ports, each with its own magnetics, alongside a USB 3.0 socket. A barrel jack and external 12 V adapter (Power Supply) supply power.

How it works

Mesh coverage depends on backhaul: the link that carries traffic between nodes back to the one wired to the modem. This node defaults to a dedicated 6 GHz backhaul, the third radio is reserved so node-to-node traffic never steals airtime from clients on 2.4 and 5 GHz. The 6 GHz band is wide and uncongested, so two nodes a room apart can sustain multi-gigabit backhaul. Where a wall is in the way, the same job runs over a wired 2.5GbE hop through the 2.5GbE Switch IC instead, which is faster and immune to interference.

The Compute SoC Module runs the mesh protocol: nodes discover each other, measure link quality, and elect routes so each client reaches the gateway over the strongest path. As you walk through the house, 802.11k/v/r steering moves your phone to the nearest node mid-session. Each band's Radio Front-End Module uses 2x2 MU-MIMO and OFDMA to serve several devices in the same transmit slot, and the RF Power Amplifier amplifiers push each chain to its regulatory power limit for reach. Running three radios hot makes thermals matter, so the SoC sits under a heatsink with thermal pads and an EMI shield over the front-ends.