Linksys has announced its first mesh Wi-Fi 7 system, the Velop Pro 7 MBE7000. It’s available in one, two, and three packs, offering coverage of up to 9000 square feet.
Wi-Fi 7 is the big news, of course. It might seem the same as Wi-Fi 6E because it uses the same 2.4, 5 and 6GHz bands, but with Wi-Fi 7, devices will be able to connect to the 5- and 6GHz bands at the same time for faster speeds and more reliable connections.
There’s a price for being an early adopter, though. Just recently Amazon unveiled the eero Max 7 which costs $599 / £599 for a single router, $1149 / £1149 for two and $1699 / £1699 if you want three.
Linksys says it has tried to keep the cost of the MBE7000 down as much as possible. And it’s considerably cheaper at $399 / £399 for one node, $749 / £749 for two and $999 / £999 for three.
What you get for this is a system capable of up to 591Mbps over 2.4GHz, 4324Mbps on 5GHz and 5765Mbps using the 6GHz band. It’s therefore called a “BE11000” system, with the be referring to the suffix of the Wi-Fi 7 standard’s technical name, 802.11be, and adding up the speeds of the three bands (actually 10680Mbps).
As ever, those are theoretical speeds, and your phone, laptop, PC and other devices will need to also have Wi-Fi 7 to benefit.
Linksys
Behind the scenes, the Velop Pro 7 uses Qualcomm’s new Networking Pro 620 platform, which is where those number come from. Each band is 2×2, which means two concurrent streams.
The eero Max 7 is a BE20800 system, offering 2×2 on 2.4GHz but 4×4 5- and 6GHz radios, providing a total of ten streams against the Velop Pro 7’s six. This is why it’s more expensive.
Linksys
The Velop Pro 7 MBE7000 system uses the same teardrop design as the Velop Pro 6E that we’ve already reviewed and each unit has four Gigabit Ethernet ports. Only the WAN port is 2.5Gbps, and Linksys says most customers won’t want to pay extra for 2.5Gbps LAN ports, so this is another of the cost savings.
The company told Tech Advisor in a briefing that customers don’t want complicated apps: they consider mesh Wi-Fi to be ‘set and forget’. So Linksys has simplified the setup process to the point where it claims it’s possible to set up a Velop Pro 7 three-pack in under 10 minutes.
It’s also added a new support option. Instead of guiding users through changing settings in the app, they can instead grant a Linksys agent temporary access for those changes to be made for them.
The Velop Pro 7 is available to buy in the US from 26 October direct from Linksys as well as Best Buy. It will be available in the UK mid-November from Amazon and other retailers.
If your budget won’t stretch to these prices, take a look at our recommendations for more affordable mesh Wi-Fi systems.