I have been asking questions on this subreddit already, on this point. So those who have already offered me their advice I say “Thanks!” and please don’t be offended that I continue to ask more questions. I’m still trying to understand the nuances of home networking sufficiently to make what I would believe to then be a well informed decision.

I have AT&T Fiber 1G to my home, the Gateway (BGW320) is located in central location of ranch style home. I have wired ethernet ports at the West and East ends of the home. I get low signal strength at the West and East ends of my home resulting in dropping of Wifi connections to devices when at those ends of home.

Initially, working from ‘old’ knowledge/experience, I was thinking I could just buy two wireless routers/switches and plug them into the wired Ethernet ports at the East and West end of home. No configuration needed. Just plug them into the wall, run ethernet cable from the router to the wall. Good to go. I could connect devices via ethernet, to the router/switch, or connect via wireless signal for roaming devices or devices with no ethernet ports. I would be extending the Gateway AT&T network. Roaming devices would connect to whatever signal they desired (hopefully the best signal) and would switch between them all as they roamed. Single network SSID among all of them

RouterWest ----> BGW320 Gateway <---- RouterEast

IF THEY ARE CONNECTED VIA HARDWIRE:

But these days things seem to have gotten complicated and I’ve become lost amongst buzzwords. Now I find discussions of “wireless routers” as opposed to “Mesh systems” as opposed to “Access Points”. But it seems to me that all three are doing the same thing. All four are providing wireless wifi access to a single network. I can’t figure out what “Mesh” would accomplish that simply hardwiring (ethernet) a switch up to the wall would not do. It seems the Mesh systems out there can be configured as “Access Points”…so then what is the difference between that and just getting something called an “Access Point”…then what is the difference between that an an “Extender”…and, finally, what is the difference then if simply buying wireless switches (for $50)?

What is the difference between:

WirelessRouterSwitchWest ----ethernet----> BGW320 Gateway <—ethernet---- WirelessRouterSwitchEast

WirelessAccessPointWest ----ethernet----> BGW320 Gateway <—ethernet---- WirelessAccessPointEast

MeshinAPModeWest ----ethernet----> BGW320 Gateway <—ethernet---- MeshinAPModeEast

Is there some simple, basic, something that I’m just not clued in on?