[jrref]

Because of the recent $35 price for 1Gbs bi-directional, non-shared internet service that Quantum Fiber has been offering, there have been many people, who can get the service, switching from cable and a lot of discussion on how to get the best WiFi coverage with Quantum's included WiFi7 equipment.
From my experience, you should get a premium installation without any intervention but here are some tips to make sure it’s installed optimally.
Quantum will install what they call a SmartNid device usually in the white data cabinet in your garage. This SmartNid is a combination Optical Network Terminator which terminates the fiber optic connection to your home and a Router. It has two 1Gbs ethernet ports, one fiber port and a power supply connection.
They will also provide WiFi7 Pods. One pod will be a larger “main pod” which has to be hard wired via an ethernet cable to the SmartNid in the garage. The remaining smaller pods work wirelessly off of the main pod and are installed in other areas of your home for maximum coverage. The number of smaller pods needed will depend on the size of your home. Because these WiFi7 pods provide wireless signals in the 2.4, 5 and 6Ghz bands, they give you effectively a “stronger” WiFi signal than previous versions of WiFi devices so the main pod might be all you need for a smaller home where in a designer home you may need one remote pod and in a larger premier home you may need two remote pods. The technician has an app that will tell them based on the signal strength in all of your rooms, lanai, etc, how many if any remote pods are needed. If there is any doubt, always ask the technician for at least one remote pod that you can move around your home at a later date if needed.
In most homes here in the Villages built circa 2012 and newer, the builder installed blue cat5 ethernet cables from the white data cabinet in the garage to most of the rooms in your home. They were installed and wired as telephone jacks even though no copper landline service was ever installed. Only 4 out of the 8 wires are typically wired in the wall jacks. I don’t know how older homes in the Villages were wired but I’m sure over the years they were done in different ways. The point is, if you have these blue cat5 ethernet cables, the Quantum technician will use them to provide the hardwired connection from the SmartNid in the garage to the main WiFi7 pod and if you ask them they can also use the 2nd ethernet port on the SmartNid to give you a hardwired connection for your computer in you office if you have one.
Given this background, here are the installation tips:
1) Make sure the main WiFi pod is installed as close to the center of your home as possible. This may mean installing it above or under one of the cabinets in the kitchen where there is an ethernet jack available or in a guest bedroom closest to the main living area. Most every home has a connection somewhere in the kitchen. You can also install it in your office near your main computer if you have one. The main WiFi pod has several ethernet jacks so if installed in your office near your computer you can hardwire everything you want in that room easily. If you install the Main WiFi pod anywhere except in the center of your house you may need a remote pod to get a strong WiFi signal throughout your home.
2) NEVER let the tech install the main WiFi pod in the garage with remote pods throughout your home. This will never work reliably.
3) If you install a remote WiFi pod in a room where there is an ethernet jack, ask the technician to hard wire that pod via the jack to the SmartNid. This will make the remote pod work better.
4) Before the tech leaves the installation, ask them to do a speed test to verify and show that you are getting the speed you ordered. Plugging directly into one of the RJ45 ports on the Main Wifi pod is best but with a not too old cell phone on the wifi should read in the "ball park" of the speed you ordered.
5) Be aware of what's on the other side of the wall where the Main WiFi Pod is installed to make sure there is nothing big and metal there potentially blocking the signal to the rest of the house. If there is, then choose another location.
6) Make sure if you are using a smaller remote Wifi pod for additional coverage that it's plugged in, in another room close enough so it gets a strong signal from the Main WiFi pod but far enough away that it doesn't interfere with the Main Pod.
7) I always recommend using the same existing WiFi network name and password for the new Quantum Wifi so you don't have to go to all your devices and re-connect them to the new WiFi equipment. Always give the technician the existing network name and password so he can configure the new Wifi with this information. Just be aware, even if you do this, there still may be some devices that don't connect to the new WiFi and in these cases you will need to reconnect them manually.

The exceptions for the advanced homeowners:
1) If you have your own WiFi equipment such as an Orbi, TP-Link, Amazon or any other favorite system, all you need to do is plug it into one of the ethernet jacks going to the SmartNid in the garage. You will be double NATing because your equipment will have a router butr the small delay is not noticeable. If you are a purest or have special needs then you can log into the SmartNid and put in ByPass mode which disables the built-in router but I personally don’t believe it’s worth the effort.
2) The WiFi7 equipment that Quantum installs is actually very good and will work great for a majority of people but an Orbi or other premium WiFi7 equipment will be better.

For the Advanced Homeowners who want to prewire your home in preparation for the Quantum Install:
1) Find a central location to install the Main Wifi7 pod. This can be under one of the Kitchen cabinets since almost all homes here in the Villages have an ethernet jack there or in one of the guest bedrooms that's closest to the main living area.
2) Find the blue ethernet cable running from the RJ45 ethernet jack in the room where you are planning to put the Main Wifi pod to the white data cabinet in the garage. There are many ways to "buzz" out the cables to locate the one you want to use. I prefer using a Kolsol AT338 Optical Wire Meter Tracer. It has an Optical power meter (which you won't need) and multifunction cable scanning and continuity testing functions. You can use the cable scanning function to "buzz" out and locate the correct blue ethernet cable at the data cabinet. There are many ethernet continuity testers on Amazon but I like this one the best.
3) Once the ehternet cable is found in the data cabinet, use a RJ45 Ratcheting Ethernet Wire Crimper / Stripper / Cutter, for Pass-Thru connectors such as the Klein Tools VDV226-110 to install the Rj45 plug onto the end of the cable. Always use RJ45 Pass-Thru connectors since they are easy to use and provide a perfect connection 99.9% of the time,
4) Next examine the connection at the RJ45 Keystone ethernet wall jack in the room where you plan to put the Main Wifi pod. You will probably see 4 out of the 8 wires terminated. Since they are almost never terminated properly, pull out what's connected so you can re-terminate the blue ethernert cable on the jack. Look to see if the pin-out on the jack has the T568B code. If it doesn't have the "B" pin-out code then best to replace it with a new keystone jack.
5) Once the blue ethernet cable has the RJ45 plug terminating it at the data cabinet in the garage and the RJ45 "keystone" wall jack on the other end use the Kolsol contunuity tester to verify the terminations are correct. If so, then put the wall jack and plate back together and lable the other end in the data cabinet in the garage for the tech when he arrives.

The Quantum tech will do all this for you but if you want to pre-wire then these are the steps you need to take.

After working at Verizon for 30 years and much of that with Verizon FiOS, I can say we are very fortunate to have fiber internet service in many locations here in the Villages. I hope this post helps provide potential users of Quantum Fiber with some good information. I’ve overseen many Quantum installs here in the Villages so my comments are based on my actual experience. If anyone has any specific questions I would be happy to help. And of course, if you have had Quantum fiber installed and made any tweaks to improve performance, please share them.

[jrref]

Did anyone with Quantum Fiber ever make changes to their installation or come up with a better arrangement?

[Pinball wizard]

Not sure what you mean.

I have their new WiFi7 pod in my living room (woodside) and it easily covers the entire house.

[MorTech]

Gawd I miss FiOS! 3ms pings! Seriously low latency!

Thanks for this! The CenturyLink ONT boxes in my neighborhood are large and mounted to the outside of the house. Nice they can terminate in the white cabinet now. You could really just use a WiFi7 Access Point. Does the SmartNid provide DHCP?

[Risuli]

Went with Quantum back in August of this year after the $35 "for life" offer with the WiFi pods. However, the fiber run pre-built into my home only went to one bedroom on one side of the home. Tech installed the "modem" there with a WiFi pod, but the signal wasn't all that strong in the living room, and even worse on the other side of the house. Tech installed a second pod in the living room area but signal still wasn't all that great (< 200 Mbps on wifi; it had been ~350 with Xfinity's wifi). Tech had no more pods and promised to return with an additional pod to hopefully strengthen the signal through the whole home (which is only about 1600 sq. ft.!?).

Long story short... Tech never came back as promised. While everything worked for my uses (streaming, emails, gaming, etc.) it was bothersome that my promised 950 Mbps was well below 200 Mbps throughout even when my PC was hardwired into a Wifi pod. Decided to swap the Quantum wifi pods and purchased and installed a TP-Link AX3000 mesh wifi (3 units across the home). Speeds improved markedly, and while directly hardwiring into a pod on wifi my speeds are about 500 Mbps (pod directly wired to Quantum's "modem" gives the 950 Mbps). Anyway, a bit disappointed with Quantum's install, but overall happy with the service after some "self-help".

[jrref]

Originally Posted by Risuli

Went with Quantum back in August of this year after the $35 "for life" offer with the WiFi pods. However, the fiber run pre-built into my home only went to one bedroom on one side of the home. Tech installed the "modem" there with a WiFi pod, but the signal wasn't all that strong in the living room, and even worse on the other side of the house. Tech installed a second pod in the living room area but signal still wasn't all that great (< 200 Mbps on wifi; it had been ~350 with Xfinity's wifi). Tech had no more pods and promised to return with an additional pod to hopefully strengthen the signal through the whole home (which is only about 1600 sq. ft.!?).

Long story short... Tech never came back as promised. While everything worked for my uses (streaming, emails, gaming, etc.) it was bothersome that my promised 950 Mbps was well below 200 Mbps throughout even when my PC was hardwired into a Wifi pod. Decided to swap the Quantum wifi pods and purchased and installed a TP-Link AX3000 mesh wifi (3 units across the home). Speeds improved markedly, and while directly hardwiring into a pod on wifi my speeds are about 500 Mbps (pod directly wired to Quantum's "modem" gives the 950 Mbps). Anyway, a bit disappointed with Quantum's install, but overall happy with the service after some "self-help".

I believe they switched to the WiFi7 pods probably right after you had yours installed. Initially they had a lot of issues getting the main and remote pods to sync up. That's all fixed now and they sync up very quickly and provide good coverage.

Do you remember if they were using the newer WiFi7 pods? If they were there would have been one large pod as the main and a smaller as the remote. If they were all the same size then they were the older WiFi6 pods which didn't have as good range. The new WiFi7 main pod has a better antenna system effectively giving you better and stronger coverage.

The TP-Link mesh wifi system you purchased is very good and I'm glad you got it sorted out. WiFi is not 100% so you need to "play" with it to find optimal placement for the devices depending on your specific home.

I feel the WiFi7 equipment that Quantum provides is more than adequate for most here in the Villages but if you want something better I like the Orbi and TP link Wifi7 WiFi systems since they offer several models at different price points depending on you specific requirements. You can't go wrong with either system. I have the Orbi 970 because I wanted the best backhaul system I could get because I didn't have an ethernet jack behind my main TV in the Living Room. The more affordable Orbi 770 works great as well. I installed one for my neighbor who teaches remotely from home. Both the husband and wife work from home.

Thanks for your feedback.

[Risuli]

You are likely correct with regard to the Quantum wifi pods. Both are exactly the same size and I believe the tech indicated they were only wifi 6 capable. I'm fine with my current set up with Quantum, though disappointed in their failure to properly provide the wifi they claimed.

My only question for the future is when they likely say I have the "for life" plan but try to impose a fee for their wifi pods, where do I take or send their equipment (wifi pods) back? I've looked online and don't see any locations to return equipment.

[jrref]

Originally Posted by Risuli

You are likely correct with regard to the Quantum wifi pods. Both are exactly the same size and I believe the tech indicated they were only wifi 6 capable. I'm fine with my current set up with Quantum, though disappointed in their failure to properly provide the wifi they claimed.

My only question for the future is when they likely say I have the "for life" plan but try to impose a fee for their wifi pods, where do I take or send their equipment (wifi pods) back? I've looked online and don't see any locations to return equipment.

Quantum's web site is very good although its very slow like they are running it on an iPad LOL. On the lower left side of their home page are a variety of links including returning equipment. Basically you print out a mailer and return via UPS. This is the link:
Equipment Returns | Quantum Fiber

Agreed, I sometimes think about if they start charging for the equipment what will happen? Although we will never know until or if it happens, my guess is they won't charge because the trend in the industry is to provide the WiFi equipment as part of the service.

Since i've been here in the Villages, Quantum's pricing for what they provide is very reasonable compared to the rest of the country and they let you easily switch between plans on their web site at no charge so I believe we will be OK for a couple more years.

And Remember, When the cable guy comes by your house trying to win you back with a "great" temporary offer, tell them to come back when they offer non-shared, bi-directional service. It's a shame how many here in the Villages don't realize that the cable companies offer good download speeds but terrible upload speeds that can vary especially during prime time due to the limitations of the copper cable.

[JRcorvette]

Originally Posted by jrref

Because of the recent $35 price for 1Gbs bi-directional, non-shared internet service that Quantum Fiber has been offering, there have been many people, who can get the service, switching from cable and a lot of discussion on how to get the best WiFi coverage with Quantum's included WiFi7 equipment.
From my experience, you should get a premium installation without any intervention but here are some tips to make sure it’s installed optimally.
Quantum will install what they call a SmartNid device usually in the white data cabinet in your garage. This SmartNid is a combination Optical Network Terminator which terminates the fiber optic connection to your home and a Router. It has two 1Gbs ethernet ports, one fiber port and a power supply connection.
They will also provide WiFi7 Pods. One pod will be a larger “main pod” which has to be hard wired via an ethernet cable to the SmartNid in the garage. The remaining smaller pods work wirelessly off of the main pod and are installed in other areas of your home for maximum coverage. The number of smaller pods needed will depend on the size of your home. Because these WiFi7 pods provide wireless signals in the 2.4, 5 and 6Ghz bands, they give you effectively a “stronger” WiFi signal than previous versions of WiFi devices so the main pod might be all you need for a smaller home where in a designer home you may need one remote pod and in a larger premier home you may need two remote pods. The technician has an app that will tell them based on the signal strength in all of your rooms, lanai, etc, how many if any remote pods are needed. If there is any doubt, always ask the technician for at least one remote pod that you can move around your home at a later date if needed.
In most homes here in the Villages built circa 2012 and newer, the builder installed blue cat5 ethernet cables from the white data cabinet in the garage to most of the rooms in your home. They were installed and wired as telephone jacks even though no copper landline service was ever installed. Only 4 out of the 8 wires are typically wired in the wall jacks. I don’t know how older homes in the Villages were wired but I’m sure over the years they were done in different ways. The point is, if you have these blue cat5 ethernet cables, the Quantum technician will use them to provide the hardwired connection from the SmartNid in the garage to the main WiFi7 pod and if you ask them they can also use the 2nd ethernet port on the SmartNid to give you a hardwired connection for your computer in you office if you have one.
Given this background, here are the tips:
1) Make sure the main WiFi pod is installed as close to the center of your home as possible. This may mean installing it above or under one of the cabinets in the kitchen where there is one of these ethernet jacks available. Most every home has this connection.
2) If you don’t want or can’t install the main pod in the kitchen then have the technician install it in your office near your main computer if you have one. In this situation you will need remote pods to get a strong WiFi signal throughout your home.
3) NEVER let them install the main WiFi pod in the garage with remote pods throughout your home. This will never work reliably.
4) The main WiFi pod has several ethernet jacks so if installed in your office near your computer you can hardwire everything you want in that room easily.
5) If you install a remote WiFi pod in a room where there is an ethernet jack, ask the technician to hard wire that pod via the jack to the SmartNid. This will make the remote pod work better.

Now for the exceptions for the advanced homeowners:
1) If you have your own WiFi equipment such as an Orbi, TP-Link, Amazon or any other favorite system, all you need to do is plug it into one of the ethernet jacks going to the SmartNid in the garage. You will be double NATing because your equipment will have a router but the small delay is not noticeable. If you are a purest or have special needs then you can log into the SmartNid and put in ByPass mode which disables the built-in router but I personally don’t believe it’s worth the effort.
2) The WiFi7 equipment that Quantum installs is actually very good and will work great for a majority of people but an Orbi or other premium WiFi7 equipment will be better.

After working at Verizon for 30 years and much of that with Verizon FiOS, I can say we are very fortunate to have fiber internet service in many locations here in the Villages. I hope this post helps provide potential users of Quantum Fiber with some good information. I’ve overseen many Quantum installs here in the Villages so my comments are based on my actual experience. If anyone has any specific questions I would be happy to help. And of course, if you have had Quantum fiber installed and made any tweaks to improve performance, please share them.

That is an awesome detailed article…. Thank you. Are you for hire???

[JRcorvette]

Originally Posted by Risuli

Went with Quantum back in August of this year after the $35 "for life" offer with the WiFi pods. However, the fiber run pre-built into my home only went to one bedroom on one side of the home. Tech installed the "modem" there with a WiFi pod, but the signal wasn't all that strong in the living room, and even worse on the other side of the house. Tech installed a second pod in the living room area but signal still wasn't all that great (< 200 Mbps on wifi; it had been ~350 with Xfinity's wifi). Tech had no more pods and promised to return with an additional pod to hopefully strengthen the signal through the whole home (which is only about 1600 sq. ft.!?).

Long story short... Tech never came back as promised. While everything worked for my uses (streaming, emails, gaming, etc.) it was bothersome that my promised 950 Mbps was well below 200 Mbps throughout even when my PC was hardwired into a Wifi pod. Decided to swap the Quantum wifi pods and purchased and installed a TP-Link AX3000 mesh wifi (3 units across the home). Speeds improved markedly, and while directly hardwiring into a pod on wifi my speeds are about 500 Mbps (pod directly wired to Quantum's "modem" gives the 950 Mbps). Anyway, a bit disappointed with Quantum's install, but overall happy with the service after some "self-help".

Having your own Mesh router is the best way to go. I have been using Eero system for years. They have been bought out by Amazon but I have not seen any changes. I believe that TP-Link is a Chinese company.

[Risuli]

President Xi!

[jrref]

Originally Posted by JRcorvette

That is an awesome detailed article…. Thank you. Are you for hire???

Sure if you need some help, please PM me.
John

[jrref]

Originally Posted by JRcorvette

Having your own Mesh router is the best way to go. I have been using Eero system for years. They have been bought out by Amazon but I have not seen any changes. I believe that TP-Link is a Chinese company.

Agreed, but for the majority of homeowners who live here in the Villages, most want a turn-key system from the internet provider which is why the system that Quantum installs, in my opinion, is very good.

[jrref]

Concerning the Pods that Quantum uses, the older WiFi6 pods were built and licensed by another company who makes and sells them. The new WiFi7 pods, Quantum had them either built specifically for them or have some arrangement where they own the device making it cheaper which is why I believe they are sending WiFi7 pods out to their existing customers. This is what a tech relayed to me. The new iPhone16 use WiFi7. Whats nice about WiFi7 is the protocol is much more efficient when you are using lots of devices and there are lots of throughput improvements too complex to discuss here. Good reading if you google WiFi7 or search YouTube videos.

[jrref]

One more thing about WiFi7. I'm not suggesting that everyone should go out and get WiFi7 routers. My point is, WiFi7 offers new technology that makes it more efficient, faster ( if you have newer devices ), and most importantly, More Reliable. Quantum and a host of other companies are starting to deploy WiFi7 equipment because 1) they are more reliable which means less call-backs and 2) as a selling point to get customer's to sign-up because this equipment, right now, is fairly costly.

WiFi7 technology is way ahead because there are not many WiFi7 devices available. The largest up-tick is the recent iPhone 16 which has WiFi7. Because of this, my guess is WiFi7 will be leading edge for many years until the newer devices catch-up.The next step will be higher frequency bands which may be problematic since the higher the frequency, the shorter the range.

From my experience with my iPhone 16, the most significant difference I see with WiFi7 is my phone switches to the strongest node in my home more seemlessly vs it hanging on to one node until the signal gets too weak. I also can get pretty close to 1Gbs speeds, not that I need it, on my iPhone when in the same room as the WiFi equipment.

It will be interesting to see what the future of whole home wireless networks holds and how all plays out.