Mesh Networks and 9 Spiders

Range extenders and mesh networks, are they important?

As the number of smart devices in our homes is increasing, so the is the need for reliable Wi-Fi.

A pat answer would be to “buy more megabits per second.” That may help and it may not. Your home, or apartment, may be full of Wi-Fi inhibiting barriers, killing the signal before it has a chance to reach every one of the things in your place that requires an internet connection to function.

First, determine the things in your apartment/home that might block or impede the Wi-Fi signal.

Second, if you find out that something is blocking the signal, ask if you can move it to where it will get a good signal. This option may help a little bit, and it may end up forcing you to move everything to one corner of your place.

Therefore, if you up the megabits per second, you may end up wasting your money when you discover you’re still dealing with slow downloads in certain parts of your home.

Options one and two are meant to help save you some money, and headache, before you entertain another option. Don’t be too quick to decide “we need more bandwidth” before you understand what the real issue is.

Without this understanding, you’ll only cause yourself unnecessary frustration. Also, the logic mentioned above is part of the reason why there are so many Spider-Man movies that have cropped up in the last two decades. So far, the count of Spider-Men, or spider-themed superheroes, in those movies sits at nine.

Instead of rebooting the Spider-Man franchise, yet again, why not take a step back and find a different way?

Logic such as this doesn’t seem to be in vast supply in Hollywood. However, it can be when it comes to solving your Wi-Fi problems.

We come now to option three; range extenders and mesh networks.

Range Extenders

Range extenders are as their names imply; they extend the range of the Wi-Fi.

Maybe there’s that exposed brick wall in your apartment that you like, but the computer on the other side of it is super slow. Well, a range extender would help with that.

The device comes in two forms; desktop and plug-ins.

The desk-top type looks like another router. They plug into the wall in the area you need a boosted Wi-Fi signal.

The plug-in extenders also boost the signal, but not at the expense of space. Some will take away access to a plug, but there are manufacturers, like Linksys, that make plug-in extenders with an extra socket. You can boost your Wi-Fi signal without sacrificing another outlet.

When buying a range extender, take note of the AC number on your existing router. If it’s a single-band AC1700, for example, look for a single-band AC1700 range extender. If your router is a dual-band AC2400, make sure to get a dual-band AC2400.

The range extenders work by amplifying the signal and rebroadcasting it. By rebroadcasting it, however, it creates a separate network. At the same time, it also cuts the available bandwidth in half to make it happen.

You may get signal on the other side of that wall now, but you’ll have to switch networks to do so. The rest of your place will have less bandwidth available.

Sony did something similar with The Amazing Spider-Man films of 2012 and 2014.

As opposed to continuing the previous trilogy with Tobey Maguire, the choice was made to reboot it. This was hardly a bad idea, given Spider-Man 3 made a mockery out of Venom, and produced more memes than cash. The Marvel Cinematic Universe had launched also and was doing well.

Instead of Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield was brought in to play Peter Parker, and he did a good job. Given the script was just another origin story of Spider-Man, which everyone should have known by that point as well. All they really did was move around a few details and put in a different bad guy than the last origin story. They could have just gone the route of The Incredible Hulk and set up the origin as a quick flashback and then gotten on with a different story altogether.

Then again, what do I know?

After the second sequel, the returns weren’t good. So instead of trying a different tact, Sony allowed for Spidey to join the MCU and let them worry about how to handle the origin story.

However, they did keep the rights to some of his cooler villains, like Venom...and we know how that turned out.

Sigh.

Mesh Networks

We'll get back to Spider-Man in a minute here.

Let’s take a moment to talk about mesh networks; a mesh network doesn’t cut into the bandwidth from the router and make a different network. A mesh network operates as a satellite system. The little nodes get plugged in around the house or apartment and use the router as the base. The nodes network the signal amongst themselves, like a series electrical circuit. If one is unreachable, the other nodes will pick up the signal and link it back to the router. The nodes involved boost the signal, providing you with download speeds close to what you’d experience if you were standing next to the router itself.

By putting all these nodes into one network, in one home, your house will be able to support multiple devices easily.

Overall, this option is a better choice than range extenders. This isn’t to say they’re inadequate. For what you’ll end up paying for a mesh network, you’ll have a more reliable network in your home or apartment, and that will more than make up for the difference in cost.

Now, let’s look at how this applies to the latest Spider-Man offering from Sony.

Instead of setting up Peter Parker’s origin story, which we all should know by now…if not, that’s okay, no judgment here, check out his Wikipedia page and get back to us after you finish reading.

This time Sony decided to incorporate six different Spider-Man type superheroes; Miles Morales as the new interpretation of Spider-Man, Spider-Ham (a Marvel sanctioned parody of Spider-Man), Spider-Gwen (a “what-if?” scenario that has spawned a series), Spider-Man Noir (another “what-if?”), Sp//der (a mech suit operated by Peni Parker), and the original Peter Parker himself.

Now we’ll have six different Spider…people(?)… working together to stop Wilson Fisk from doing something terrible and hurting a lot of people. We'll be getting six different backstories, and six different ways to convey them without slowing down the overall story arc.

Unlike a mesh network, there could be some degradation of the story because of all the characters involved. This author is sure that with the right amount of marketing, the story will be largely unimportant. What’s essential, to Sony at least, is that they set up their own Spider-Man continuity and not worry about losing all their rights to the character.

What Sony fails to understand here is that if the story is bad, then everyone loses.

The Original Spider-Man

Let’s back up here and talk about the first big-budget Spider-Man film.

Premiering in 2002, Spider-Man had Tobey Maguire don the suit and the character of Peter Parker. Directed by Sam Raimi, it was a good movie that pleased audiences. By today’s standards of comic book movies, however, it can come across as a basic origin story. Keep in mind though that this was one of the first comic book movies to “get it right.”

It didn’t skew the overall narrative to pump up just one character as they did with Wolverine in the original X-Men movie from 2000. Nor did they corrupt the characters to make them more “marketable” as they did with Daredevil in 2003.

So Spider-Man brought hope to the comic book enthusiasts of the early 21st century. ‘Maybe now,’ we all thought, ‘they would treat our beloved heroes with the respect they deserve and not make some campy b-movie with sub-standard productions.’

Sadly, that was still going to happen. Even with Iron Man in 2008 and Chris Nolan’s Batman Begins in 2005, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man devolved into a joke. Not to mention we’re still getting superhero films that lack respect for their subject matter.

For those who’d like to argue the point, take a look at the fact that Cyclops has yet to be redeemed.

Just saying…

An Option That Works for You

While Tom Holland is playing Spider-Man in the MCU, and the Spider-Verse is launching in December of 2018, there are more options for watching your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man save the day. You can still catch the other versions of Spider-Man through your favorite streaming service, make sure you have the best internet deals and packages first.  Also if you are considering using AT&T or Frontier internet service check out our reviews

Also, if you’re wanting to watch them in another room while someone is playing their Xbox, then make sure you have a mesh network set up first. This way you don’t have to sit right next to the router to enjoy all the web-slinging action!

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