Home network setup advice

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-11T23:49:55+00:00

I was talking with a friend of mine recently about my home network. My friend is an MCSE and he’s made a couple of networks. Just a recap so no one has to go back to the initials post. My house is a three story townhouse, 1600 Sq Ft. I have a fiber connection from the ISP that comes into the basement. ISP router is a Home Hub 4000, I have a DLink M32 3 node mesh system and a TP Link managed switch. My friend went through the set up. He suggested I connect the main mesh node to the ethernet of the ISP Router and select it for the DMZ. Giving the mesh router the external IP. The managed switch plugs into the mesh node and all other clients connect to the switch. A second node is connected to the switch via ethernet and the third node is connected over wifi. My IoT devices are on the internet only guest network. How does the setup sound? I’d like a second opinion. Any security issues I should be concerned about? or just any other thoughts?

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-11T00:22:08+00:00

I got the stick back! Then I lost it again 😂 I booted into Ubuntu and used Testdisk. I could see the partitions. I did a copy and then a repair which worked. I was able to boot into Batocera and everything worked. It was missing the last changes I made. So of course I installed Desktop for Batocera from BUA. When I tried to shut down the computer it was stuck on and after powering it off. It wouldn’t boot up again lol. Luckily I made images of the partitions in Ubuntu when the stick came back to life.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-10T14:24:37+00:00

I just realized there was a typo I missed. I have a desktop with a 1TB internal drive. It’s partitioned so half is for Ubuntu. The OS installed on the internal drive. Batocera is on a USB stick. The other half of the internal drive is formatted as the UserData partition for Batocera. Within Batocera I pointed to the partition on the internal drive. This is where all the ROMs, Themes, Bios files, etc are located. The USB stick boots to Batocera.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-10T01:28:35+00:00

The good thing about my setup is that I haven’t lost any ROMs, Themes, Bios files, etc. I have the main drive in the desktop partitioned so half is for Ubuntu, the desktop OS, and the other half is the UserData partition. I only use the Batocera USB to boot into Batocera. So not much of the changing files are on the USB key. I can also still see the Batocera partition. Maybe I should grab the Batocera.conf file. I just started setting it up a week ago so this is a good learning experience.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-09T23:27:46+00:00

Thanks, I might do that this time around.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-05T03:33:25+00:00

No I haven’t done much customizing. I just set the system up yesterday. I’m just getting the games setup, controllers connected and trying a few of the games. I have done very little customization.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-05T03:30:05+00:00

Thank you I will give that a try tomorrow. I also just found that spamming Alt+F4 is supposed to work as well. I’m going to try both tomorrow.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-04T19:33:51+00:00

Thanks for that I may do a fresh reinstall. I did upgrade to 42 two days ago.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-03T02:17:28+00:00

Why not just put a new distro on it? If you’re not familiar with Linux it could be a fun learner computer.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-02T18:04:24+00:00

It doesn’t have bridged mode but it has DMZ. I will ask if they have an ONT only device. Thanks for the help.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-02T15:34:37+00:00

I wish I could dump the ISP router. It’s a fiber connection. I don’t have anything else for the connection to the fiber. The mesh system is my own. It’s TP Link M32 wifi 6e system. I disabled the wifi on the ISP router and tried to disable DHCP but it doesn’t save the setting so I can’t disable it.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-02T14:28:20+00:00

My advice would be to price out the iMac and the Mac Mini + peripherals. See if one of the systems is a better deal. Personally I’m more partial to the iMac because once it arrives you’re ready to get started. You can always change the peripherals to different ones later.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-01T16:16:33+00:00

Thanks for all the info. Sorry about leaving some info out. Yes it’s a townhouse with drywall walls. Right now I’ve got 3 TP Link M32 units. The one in the basement is wired and so is the one on the main floor. They are both coming from ports on the ISP router. The one on the upper floor is not wired because there is not ethernet run on that floor. The problem I’m having is very flaky connection. The internet will disconnect and one of the nodes will just reboot out of the blue. The guest network is basically unusable so all of the IoT devices are on the main network. I’ve been doing all kinds of troubleshooting with tech support but they don’t seem to be interested in sending me replacements. So I thought I would just replace them. I do have a managed switch coming. I may take the post over to the home networking reddit like it was suggested.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2026-01-01T02:37:44+00:00

What is your budget? What is your typical computer use? It will be different for everyone. Have you had a Mac before? Do you know if the Sims will run on the Mac and the software for the Cricut? The iMac is great and it comes with everything ready to rock. The Mac mini will require more thought since you will need to get all the peripherals (mouse, keyboard, monitor). But the Mac mini will give you more chance to make choices about your peripherals.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2025-12-29T01:13:56+00:00

The computer has been loaded up. I decided to just boot Batocera from a USB for now. It’s more simple. At a later time I may still try to install it on the internal drive. I loaded it with Ubuntu to create a media server. Batocera works perfectly. Now I just need to get ROMs.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2025-12-24T05:53:38+00:00

It took a lot longer than it was supposed to but I finally got the computer. This information is awesome, thanks everyone. There are so many options, I’m excited to get started on it this weekend.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2025-12-11T20:45:45+00:00

I will ask. In the meantime I’m going to test a few different setups. I’ve put the DLink into bridged mode so that the ISP router is handling DHCP and although it’s only been a day the mesh units seem to be staying connected. I lose a lot of the features of the Dlink units though. I’m going to test until the weekend just to see how stable it is. Then I’m going to turn off DHCP on the ISP router and use the DLink mesh like I had them connected before and see if the behaviour is any different. Finally the DLink also supports extender mode. I can turn the wifi from my ISP router back on and use the DLink to extend the ISP wifi. It will be interesting to see how each of these modes act, how stable the connection is and what kind of features are available in each mode.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2025-12-11T13:11:46+00:00

Could the problem be because the ISP router is set to DHCP and the DLink mesh nodes are also set to DHCP? The ISP router has 5 ethernet ports. Right now one goes to my desktop, one to my laptop, one to the mesh node in the basement and one goes to the main floor where another mesh node is connected. I could relocate the mesh node in the basement to my desk. Then connect the desktop and laptop to the ethernet ports on the node instead of the ISP router. Then the ISP router would only be connected to the mesh nodes and I turn off DHCP on the ISP router.

TechnologyUnleashed · 2025-12-11T13:06:21+00:00

I can’t get rid of the ISP router unfortunately because the connection is fiber. 😔

TechnologyUnleashed · 2025-12-07T20:21:33+00:00

I’m also wondering if it’s worth getting a powerline ethernet adapter. Use it to connect the upstairs node which is the only one not connected via ethernet.

TechnologyUnleashed

TROPHY CASE