A while back we took a look at D-Link’s first foray into mesh networking the COVR-3902 and were left impressed with the performance of the dual band mesh setup. Since then many competitors have upped their game and so too has D-Link. Recently they sent over the D-Link COVR 2202 which is an AC2200 Tri-band mesh network. The inclusion of the extra 5GHz channel as a dedicated backhaul should make a significant improvement in my Wi-Fi, so let’s see how this actually stacks up.



As mentioned, the D-Link COVR-2202 is a tri-band AC2200 mesh router with 400Mbps for the 2.4GHz channel and 866Mbps for the each of the 5GHz channels. Unfortunately, when some people read that the router is an AC2200 they somehow expect that their transfer speeds will be that high. I have never been fond of the way wireless routers are marketed, but this isn’t a D-Link only issue. The truth is the best you will ever see is 866Mbps minus losses. These speeds are not additive for a single device. But for most these speeds are good enough. But a big adder to this system over the 3902 is the dedicated backhaul on the 5GHz band. This means there is one channel dedicated to communicating with the base and one for field devices connected to the satellite. Since they are not sharing that channel and antennas, you can theoretically have faster transfers.

This router also claims to unlock DFS channels on the 5 GHz spectrum. These are channels that are also allocated for other uses; if the router detects these uses it has to switch to another channel to avoid interference. These DFS channels can be very useful for those that live in very crowded areas, like cities, since the chances of finding a clear channel are slim.

Features and Specifications:

Below are some features and specifications from the product page on the D-Link site.

» Powerful Tri-Band AC2200 Mesh Wi-Fi
   » 400Mbps (2.4GHZ) and 866Mbps x 2 (5GHz)
» High power amplifier covers up to 6000 sq ft
» Voice control with Google Assistant and Alexa
» Easy to expand and scale you COVR mesh Wi-Fi
» Smart steering automatically guides your connected devices to the optimum wireless band
» Smart roaming creates one seamless network with the same network name and password throughout your home
» 6 powerful internal antennas per unit (2x2 + 2x2 + 2x2)
» Parental controls
» WAN/LAN 10/100/1000
» PPTP, L2TP, PPPoE, DHCP, Static IP
» Guest network
» Flash memory 32MB
» SDRAM 256MB
» MU-MIMO with beamforming
» WPA-PSK & WPA2-PSK (personal)