Enlarge / The new Google Wi-Fi pucks look much like the originals—the substitution of a DC barrel jack for the original USB-C charging port seems to be the biggest difference. (credit: Google )

This week, Google launched another, cheaper version of its Wi-Fi-mesh product line. A little more than a year after the introduction of Nest Wi-Fi , this new product line resurrects the original Google Wi-Fi branding and is sold in one-, two-, or three-piece sets.

For the most part, the new Google Wi-Fi seems pretty similar to the original—each device is a small, squat white cylinder sporting twin gigabit Ethernet ports, dual-band 802.11ac, AC1200 (Wi-Fi 5, 2x2) radios, along with Bluetooth Low-Energy support. The 2020 version of Google Wi-Fi has a simple DC barrel jack in place of the USB-C charging port on the original version.

The more expensive Nest Wi-Fi offers an integrated smart speaker in each node and a fatter Wi-Fi backhaul pipe—although both Nest Wi-Fi and Google Wi-Fi are dual-band 802.11ac (Wi-Fi 5), the 5GHz radio in the more expensive Nest Wi-Fi is 4x4, offering double the backhaul (connection to the next node closer to the Internet) throughput.

Enlarge / A trio of Wi-Fi 6 Eero Pro devices like these should provide excellent Wi-Fi coverage and performance for nearly any home. (credit: Eero )

This Tuesday, Eero—one of the first and most popular Wi-Fi-mesh providers—announced a new hardware and software program which targets ISPs rather than retail customers. Ars spoke about the new program at length with Nick Weaver, Eero founder and CEO, and Mark Sieglock, Eero's GM of Software Services.

The short version of Eero for Service Providers is simple: deploy new Eero 6 series hardware, let your customers self-install using a co-branded app with the ISP's own name on it, and provide the ISP with Eero Insight, a dashboard allowing them to view metrics from the entire fleet-level down to individual households. The telemetry exposed to the ISP includes outages, speed-test data, client network topology, RF diagnostics, and more.

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  ISPs using Eero Insight can check for network outages using Eero telemetry, with configurable alert levels. [credit: Eero ]

Weaver told us that the vanilla Eero Insight dashboard itself wasn't the whole story, though. The metrics, charts, and graphs the dashboard exposes can also be accessed via API, allowing larger providers to seamlessly integrate the data into their own, existing dashboards.

Enlarge / One of many devices introduced today, the 4th-generation Echo devices is a cloth-covered sphere with a halo at the base, contrasting with the squat plastic cylinders of earlier generation Echoes. (credit: Amazon)

Today at Amazon's hardware launch event, the company announced new Ring, Echo, Eero, and Fire devices. Amazon also announced a new gaming service called Luna , which we're covering in its own article .

Ring Always Home Cam

The Ring Always Home cam is a tiny, self-docking drone that flies around inside your house. (credit: Amazon)

The Ring Always Home Cam is the newest device in the Ring family, which is better known for doorbells with cameras in them. The Always Home Cam is a tiny, self-docking drone designed to fly around inside your home, streaming video off to the cloud for review in smartphone apps. Ring founder Jamie Siminoff says the Always Home Cam is intended to provide multiple interior viewpoints without the need for multiple interior cameras and that it's an "obvious product that's very hard to build."

The drone operates fully autonomously, but the setup procedure involves mapping areas of the house in which it's allowed to fly and what paths it's allowed to take. After setup, the drone can be asked to fly directly, or it can fly on its own to visit disturbances detected by Ring alarm systems. Its 1080p camera is blocked by the dock itself, so if the drone is not in flight, it's not streaming or recording. Like most small drones, it integrates automatic obstacle avoidance and uses propeller shrouds to protect both the blades themselves and any objects, persons, or pets that might otherwise encounter them.

Enlarge / Seventy low-income and special needs units in this apartment complex will offer Plume-managed Wi-Fi. (credit: Michael Bennett Kress Photography)

Montgomery County, Maryland offers its low-income and special needs citizens Internet access via a 600-linear-mile fiber route as part of its Digital Equity program. In a new pilot project, the county will add onsite Wi-Fi—by way of Plume superpods —to its existing basic Internet access.

Digital Equity is defined as a condition in which all individuals in a society can access the technology needed to fully participate in our society, democracy, and economy. The Office of Broadband Programs (OBP) is taking steps towards achieving digital equity in Montgomery County, through programs such as expanding broadband services, educating seniors, and aiding individuals in connecting to the internet.

—Montgomery County Office of Broadband Programs

Ars spoke to Montgomery County's Chief Broadband Officer, Joe Webster, about the upcoming project. Webster told us that although the county has been providing free or low-cost Internet service to residents in need for some time, significant challenges remain beyond the demarc. If you're unfamiliar with the term, "demarc" is ISP shorthand for "point of demarcation"—the point beyond which your IT problems are your own, not the service provider's.

Wi-Fi is a particular pain point, and the low-income and special needs citizens served by Joe's office face particular challenges trying to set up and administer in-home Wi-Fi, due to both the expense and complexity. Ongoing support of in-home Wi-Fi is also a challenging and expensive proposition—network equipment vendor Actiontec claims 60 percent of all ISP support calls are really for Wi-Fi, not the Internet service itself.

Enlarge / We expect the new Eero Pro to look largely like the existing Eero Pro or the Amazon Eero units shown here. (credit: Jim Salter)

Tech blog Zatz Not Funny broke the news this weekend that Wi-Fi 6-enabled Eero hardware is at the FCC for testing and validation . Details on the new hardware are sketchy for the moment—Eero has requested confidentiality for most of the interesting data through March 10, 2021.

What we do know is that three devices under test are listed—an Eero Pro, Eero Gateway, and Eero Extender. All three are Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax)-enabled parts. The Eero Pro is a tri-band design (one 2.4GHz radio and two 5GHz radios), similar to the current Eero Pro; the Gateway and Extender are dual-band designs differentiated by wired Ethernet ports—the Gateway has two, and the Extender has none.

Ars has reached out to Eero, with no response as of press time. All we know for sure is what limited nonconfidential data is available from RF testing at the FCC—Eero's site itself still simply says "there is no timeline set for 802.11ax (also known as Wi-Fi 6) support."