The Wi-Fi connection of your box is complicated in certain areas of your house but you do not want to explode your electricity bill? In its last September issue, 60 million consumers tested several Wi-Fi repeaters that will allow you to have a better internet connection to help you find the most efficient in terms of performance, convenience of use and consumption. electric.
The consumer association recalls that the Wi-Fi repeater is a device that will “retransmit the signal by amplifying it” in order to increase the coverage area. This can be very effective in the case of a two-storey house or if you want to telecommute from your veranda in the middle of summer. “It’s the easiest and most affordable way” to cover an area out of range of connection to your home using a single box. As specified by Les Numériques, this “small terminal which takes place in an electrical outlet and will, as its name suggests, repeat the wifi signal of the operator box or router”. The repeater “will thus be placed halfway between the box and the area to be covered to optimize the speeds”.
In order to carry out these comparative tests, 60 million consumers evaluated the performance of six Wi-Fi repeaters during tests carried out in a three-level house with load-bearing walls. To find out how easy it is to install and use the repeaters, the consumer association had an expert assess the installation of the box as well as “the simplicity of the settings via the administration interface, the wealth of functionalities and the relevance of tools to help position Wi-Fi boxes”.
In the midst of inflation and when electricity prices are soaring, the energy consumption of repeaters is one of the major criteria to be taken into account. As a reminder, the wholesale price of electricity in France reached a record on Friday August 26, 2022, since it exceeded 1,000 euros per megawatt hour (MWh), against 85 euros/MWh a year ago. The magazine recalls that Wi-Fi repeaters use “half as much energy on average” as CPL Wi-Fi kits or mesh systems.
As a reminder, the CPL Wi-Fi kit is “made up of two boxes, one connected to the internet box and the mains and the other serving as a Wi-Fi access point, which communicate via the electrical circuit”. This system is suitable for two-storey houses with many load-bearing walls. 60 million consumers recall that the third tool to have a good internet connection in all rooms of your house is the mesh system. “It consists of a box connected to the box communicating over the air with one or more access points to form a unified network, unlike repeaters and CPL Wi-Fi kits which generate separate networks, which the you can enlarge at will. In practice, this makes it possible to have a single username and password throughout the house and is aimed at Internet users with a very large property.
In this case, to determine which Wi-Fi repeater is the most energy efficient, 60 million consumers first measured the power consumption of devices in operation, with or without data transfer. The consumer association specifies in its September issue that since these boxes are constantly plugged into an outlet, they also measured their power consumption when stopped for those which offered a function allowing the power to be cut. Discover in this slideshow among the 6 repeaters tested those which are the most energy efficient.