Just a few months back, we noted how the Wi-Fi market had seemingly gone stagnant. With Wi-Fi 7 so far out of reach for many due to cost, consumers had few options to upgrade to the latest technology. When upgrading our home network, we found a diamond in the rough with the TP-Link BE550, a solid single router solution for those in the market that enabled us to upgrade our own network.
That said, the market might be coming around. MSI, which last released its series of gaming routers called Radix a little over a year ago, is sticking with its Wi-Fi ambitions and releasing its own Mesh lineup for consumers. Dubbed Roamii, this portfolio includes three SKUs: BE Lite, BE Pro, and BE Max. Luckily enough, we did get an early sample of the BE Lite from MSI, so let's get into it!
Before we get too far into it, we hit specifications for the two-pack BE Lite. As mentioned, this Wi-Fi 7 Mesh system is built on a Qualcomm 1.5GHz Quad-Core platform; system memory is listed at 2GB, while flash comes in at 256MB. The BE Lite is slightly different from what we usually consider Wi-Fi 7 as it does not use a 6GHz band. Instead, we have a 2.4GHz band with up to 688Mbps throughput and a 5GHz band capable of 4323Mbps.
Additionally, this mesh system uses channel widths up to 240MHz to reach peak speeds, along with technologies like MU-MIMO and MLO, to increase bandwidth further. As for wired ports, the BE Lite offers 2.5Gbe WAN support and dual 1Gbe ports on each node; MSI says the BE Lite can handle up to 120+ devices.
The pricing of the MSI Roamii BE Lite comes in at $299.99.
The mesh system's factory packaging gives it a solid look. MSI uses an artsy triangle design for the nodes to give the kit a modern feel.
The rear of the packaging highlights Wi-Fi 7 features and additional security from their FortiSecu platform.
The BE Lite includes a wall mounting kit with hardware and an ethernet cable.
As mentioned, the BE Lite uses a triangle shape, with the LED at the bottom left denoting status.
The backside includes a sync button at the top, followed by the two 1Gbe LAN ports and 2.5Gbe WAN in yellow.
Roamii has a stand-alone app available on Android and iOS platforms. We are using it on iOS 17.
Continuing, we first choose our type of internet connection for the BE Lite.
In this next step, we set up the admin account complete with password.
Wireless SSID setup is the next step; the defaults are seen above.
With the setup complete, we have the dashboard seen above. This includes network status at the top and options for enabling the guest, child, and IOT networks.
The security menu allows you to monitor devices for vulnerabilities and provides a report that you can view within this menu.
Parental Controls are pretty robust, with options for adding family members and setting up possibilities via blocking websites, time-based, or even blocking apps.
When you access the more advanced settings menu, you can see we have all the standard options available. This includes an internet wizard to set up your WAN, Wi-Fi settings, and internet management. The system supports a VPN server and DDNS, while additional options like LED management are more suited to personal preference.
Advanced Wi-Fi settings for the BE Lite offer a tick box for MLO. This allows your Wi-Fi 7 devices to use the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands simultaneously for increased throughput.
Testing 2.4GHz, we did pull some solid performance from the BE Lite at 276Mbps peak.
5GHz was quite a bit better than expected. That said, our testing was limited by the 1Gbe LAN ports. Even so, we picked up 938Mbps downstream and 963Mbps upstream.
Last, we have the backhaul, which, in our testing, was once again limited by the 1Gbe LAN. That said, we ran right up to the limits of this quite easily, pushing 956Mbps down and 951Mbps upstream.
The Roamii BE Lite was remarkably easy to set up out of the box, as MSI has enabled a QR code on the system that integrates with the app to streamline the process. Once connected, there are just a few steps, like setting up the admin account and your SSID, before you are really up and running, minus adding additional nodes, which is just as simple.
The Roamii app is quite good overall. It offers all of the basic features we expect, including the ability to set and manage parental controls, manage Wi-Fi SSIDs, and set up FortiSecure for additional network security. This includes intrusion prevention and IoT protection, which pushes all your smart devices to their network; you can also choose to use child or guest networks to push unwanted traffic off your network.
Connectivity on this router is good but not great. The good is that we have the ability for 2.5Gbe WAN, a solid feature, especially as more ISPs roll out fiber networks with increased speeds. That said, any wired connectivity is limited by the 1GBE ports, and with just two ports, many could be left needing additional hardware like a network switch to complete our networks. The plus is that this is a two-pack kit, so the range should be no issue for the Roamii BE Lite, and it tested quite well at 15ft on both its 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands in our scenario. Further, with its 5GHz band backhaul between the units, it should have no problems with throughput between units. Again, we tested it to reach the limits of 1Gbe quite easily, but its capabilities are upwards of 4000+ Mbps.
The pricing of the MSI Roamii BE Lite comes in at $299 for a two-pack and will be available at the end of September 2024 at many retailers. This puts a solid option on the shelves for consumers as many current whole home mesh kits are double the price; the cheapest we could find was a $539, two-pack Deco kit from TP-Link, which does offer better specifications overall, which intrigues us how good the Roamii BE MAX could be with its full 2.5Gbe + 10Gbe support!