[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Will A New Router Really Improve Performance?

Small point of clarification please -- it appears your charts reference two routers:

The RT-AC68U is referenced/tested in the first graphic.

The remainder of the article references the RT-AC66U.

Does that mean they are identical under the case/label? Do they respond to the adapters in the same manner.

[Assistant]
performance is constrained by your ISP speed of course. Then by your client device capabilities and bi-directional signal strength. Adding a WiFi Access Point can increase speed in weak signal areas. Note the clinet device's transmitted signal is often a limitation too.

Assuming you have an 11n client and WiFi router.

phillipnolan said:
Small point of clarification please -- it appears your charts reference two routers:

The RT-AC68U is referenced/tested in the first graphic.

The remainder of the article references the RT-AC66U.

Does that mean they are identical under the case/label? Do they respond to the adapters in the same manner.
Click to expand...
The first graphic (now titled "Three AC1900 Routers compared - 5 GHz downlink") compares the performance of three AC1900 routers, one of which is the ASUS RT-AC68U.

The tests in the article use the ASUS RT-AC66U as the reference router.

They are not the same router.

stevech said:
performance is constrained by your ISP speed of course. Then by your client device capabilities and bi-directional signal strength. Adding a WiFi Access Point can increase speed in weak signal areas. Note the clinet device's transmitted signal is often a limitation too.

Assuming you have an 11n client and WiFi router.
Is this comment directed to me or the OP?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: How Much Throughput Can You Really Get From An AC Router?

Happy New Year!

NETGEAR used to have a version of its firmware with an "Airtime Fairness" option. The general idea being for a mixed network of fast and slow wireless devices, the router would try to ensure all devices got the same amount of the router's time.

I wonder if airtime fairness would have any impact in this specific test case too? We will have to wait until NETGEAR adds the option back in to see of course.

Interesting results!

[Assistant]
I don't know how you can get any more fair than the sharing shown with capped transmit rates. Remember that there is virtually no application that can blast data at the rate that the IxChariot throughput script can. There is virtually no protocol overhead.

At any rate, I would think the "Airtime Fairness" would apply to mixed standard devices, not same standard, different streams.

hey, i never used the IxChariot program, but my former testing methodology usually involved DataRAM software RAMdisks. Appears they've seen been bought by AMD or something. Also used tmpfs, of course.

Originally, i had 12gb of ram so I would use 4gb ramdisks with good stability while using the ramdisks, however the machine's overall performance seemed to degrade over time whereas without the ramdisks running, not at all. When i lost 2 sticks of ram (wouldn't OC high enough with these particular sticks and with the particular mobo as populated as it was), I dropped down to 8gb total mem and continued to play with 1 and 2gb ramdisks, until i got annoyed with the instability. (this was all back on i7 920 6x2gb triple channel. very populated. anybody keeping track, i've decided to go haswell.)

In the beginning, I used the RAMdisks for basic file copies to see 'real world' read/write performance of lots of different kinds of drives. The results were always extremely interesting, having such a universal, yet simple methodology for testing all kinds of things like partition formats (reiserfs and xfs were interesting before ext4), single drive I/O, 4x single 500gb platter Raid0 I/O, encryption cipher I/O, file conversion, you name it. I've also seen interesting results running different benchmark suites directly off the RAMdisks.

Has there been any comparisons here between RAMdisks/tmpfs and the benchmark suite? I intend to play with ramdisks again, myself, soon.

Filecopy still has more overhead than IxChariot throughput.scr. I don't use filecopies for wireless testing.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: WD My Net N900 HD Dual-Band Router Reviewed

Interesting design...

Discrete radios for 2.4 and 5Ghz, Ubicom network processor for routing, and another CPU and what looks like bridge chips for LAN and WAN respectively - What is that chip under the HSF - my guess is for NAS services to the USB ports (x2)... perhaps a Marvell ARM5.

Lot of work went into this one - very vertical and proprietary. And spendy from an OEM perspective.

I'm thinking a BSD software baseline on this one... and probably not open for modification, not that anyone would want to code for this one...

[Assistant]
You mean the WD N900 right? With 7x Gig LAN ports and 1x WAN port. CPU speed info seems to been remove by the OEM. Odd move. The top of the line version sports a TB NAS drive system. Still looks good something different than the rest of the pack.

There is nothing under the fan. It's just there for exhaust and has never come on in the time I've used the product.

The design isn't that unusual. As noted in the review, similar to the D-Link DIR-857 and a few other high-end simultaneous dual-band routers.

Look at the FCC database:

https://apps.fcc.gov/oetcf/eas/repo...Frame=N&application_id=656927&fcc_id='RRK-F2F'

Made for WD by Alpha Networks Inc., No.8 Li-shing 7th Rd., Science-based Industrial Park, Hsinchu, Taiwan, R.O.C. - Model No.: F2F


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: 802.11ac Specification Is Final - so what's the future hold?

Hi Tim, on a practical level, does this mean anything for us as end users?

I've been holding off on an ac router for several reasons, including a lack of clients, and more importantly, the fact that vendors seem to be (very slowly) rolling out more and more streams. Does finalization make it more likely we're going to see vendors rolling out full MU-MIMO setups, which could conceivably give us the theoretical 6.7Gb/s that we were expecting to see?

Somewhat unrelated: I was expecting to see 802.11ac/ad products roll out this CES, so high speed in the same room with fall back to lower speeds as you move out of the 60GHz band's reach. In fact, I can't think of any ad devices at all - is it DOA in your opinion?

[Assistant]
11ad.. next try at wireless USB.
Cable replacement.
IMO: it's a long haul to get home theater/HDTV manufacturers to replace HDMI audio/video with wired/wireless something that actually interoperates/works well to meet users' expectations. On that same racetrack is 4K video (Sony) which likely exceeds what can be provided by any near future wireless.

Here's the 802.11 working group timeline...

http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/802/11/Reports/802.11_Timelines.htm

Lots of interesting stuff on the docket.

stevech said:
11ad.. next try at wireless USB.
Cable replacement.
IMO: it's a long haul to get home theater/HDTV manufacturers to replace HDMI audio/video with wired/wireless something that actually interoperates/works well to meet users' expectations. On that same racetrack is 4K video (Sony) which likely exceeds what can be provided by any near future wireless.
Click to expand...

I thought that's WISA and it's been standardized? Okay, so at least I now know not to expect ad to be part of a router, but a point-to-point communication replacement and not to expect routers with ad... I'm not sure how I ended up with that mistaken belief.

sfx2000 said:
Here's the 802.11 working group timeline...

http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/802/11/Reports/802.11_Timelines.htm

Lots of interesting stuff on the docket.

Yeah, it really is. I hadn't realized that it was now public.

At any rate, I guess the thing that I'm wondering most of all is: how come we're not seeing a over-the-top 8 antenna, 160MHz-wide, 6.7Gb/s-capable router with 10G-baseT yet? Surely someone wants to be first in this!


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: SmallNetBuilder's Wireless FAQ: The Essentials

SmallNetBuilder's Wireless FAQ: The Essentials

See an error? Want a different FAQ? Let me know.

[Assistant]
Hi Tim,

Nice FAQ - regarding the inability to lay cable for HD streaming when wireless is not up to scratch, perhaps it's worth mentioning PowerLine ethernet? I gather it's not so popular in the US but I recently picked up a couple of Devolo 200Mbps adapters which seem to do the job.

Keep up the good work

grant

Great FAQ!

I always believed N improved range - and in my case when I switched from G to N I did get better coverage in previously weak wares but perhaps my N router has better antennas.

Good work!

Here are a couple of other (industry related) questions:

1) Since 802.11n took so long to be ratified, why haven't multi-stream capable products released after the standard was ratified been available from a variety of vendors?

2) Why is it only this year that we will see full-featured 600mpbs products (ie all the 'options') being utilized, when they had all the time during the draft process to engineer these products?

3) Why are there so few dedicated Access Points available and the vast majority having routers tacked onto them as well? It's plainly clear that to boost wireless performance we need several AP's around the house, so why are so few vendors creating consumer Access Point gear?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: How Well Do AC Routers Handle Mixed Networks?

With regards to your second generation iPad ...

My third generation iPad (the first with the retina display) can only connect at a max of 65 Mbps on N 5 Ghz. I imagine your second generation would have been the same.

I think 4th generation iPad introduced true 150 Mbps connection rates. The iPad Air introduced true 300 Mbps connection rates. Of course we are talking N in both cases here.

Edit:

Oh ... considering you were using a NETGEAR router ... you could use the genie app's Network Map to determine link speed rates. At least to my laptop what I see via the genie has always been what Windows OS reports as the connection rate. (Why NETGEAR does not include this in the router GUI is beyond me.)

[Assistant]
Thanks for the tip on the Genie app. I'll try it.

I don't know why Apple would limit 5 GHz to 20 MHz link rate, as they do 2.4 GHz.
A 1x1 N radio should be able to support 150 Mbps link rate.

Just trying to understand N versus Mixed modes and how to get the most speed. Does iPad 2 lock into N when it connects or does it use some mixed mode? Am a beginner to the different transmission speeds and how to optimize it all.

offroad said:
Just trying to understand N versus Mixed modes and how to get the most speed. Does iPad 2 lock into N when it connects or does it use some mixed mode? Am a beginner to the different transmission speeds and how to optimize it all.
The iPad gives you no control over the mode it uses. When used with an N or AC router, it will connect at N rates. Only AC clients can connect at AC rates.

If an iPad is used with an older G router, it will connect at G rates. See How Fast Can Your Wi-Fi Go?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Why 802.11ac Will Kill The 5 GHz Wi-Fi Band

Reference:
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...4-why-80211ac-will-kill-the-5-ghz-wi-fi-band/

That was an interesting piece. Thanks Tim.

"The gist of all this is that 802.11ac, even in the first draft devices appearing this year, can reduce the effective number of available 5 GHz channels from nine to two!"

That's indeed a scary thought. I can already detect 30+ networks in the 2.4Ghz band in my townhouse complex neighborhood, with about 12 on Channel 1, 8 on Channel 6 and 7 on Channel 11, and a few using the in-between channels. The end result is my 2.4Ghz wireless N speeds aren't the best and there are times when the connection would drop.

I've since moved to the cleaner 5Ghz space and got more stability and speed for my laptops, but it looks like 802.11ac will make crowded neighborhoods a bigger nightmare for stable wireless connectivity.

Is there anything else in the works for wireless connectivity besides 802.11ac?

[Assistant]
kk22 said:
Reference:
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...4-why-80211ac-will-kill-the-5-ghz-wi-fi-band/

That was an interesting piece. Thanks Tim.

"The gist of all this is that 802.11ac, even in the first draft devices appearing this year, can reduce the effective number of available 5 GHz channels from nine to two!"

That's indeed a scary thought. I can already detect 30+ networks in the 2.4Ghz band in my townhouse complex neighborhood, with about 12 on Channel 1, 8 on Channel 6 and 7 on Channel 11, and a few using the in-between channels. The end result is my 2.4Ghz wireless N speeds aren't the best and there are times when the connection would drop.

I've since moved to the cleaner 5Ghz space and got more stability and speed for my laptops, but it looks like 802.11ac will make crowded neighborhoods a bigger nightmare for stable wireless connectivity.

Is there anything else in the works for wireless connectivity besides 802.11ac?
Click to expand...

Once all the vendors move to 802.11ac, the 2.4ghz will be back to less crowded!

One thing I don't like about this new standard or any wifi is that if you want higher bandwidth, you have to use 80mhz wide bandwidth and you know everyone is going to use it and it will start to overlap your neighbor's channels.

I forgot to mention that with new TVs that are going to be wifi enable from its base will be using 5ghz which means if your neighbors has that type of TV, you can bet that you will be able to pick up what they are watching.

darksamus said:
Once all the vendors move to 802.11ac, the 2.4ghz will be back to less crowded!
Not likely. 11ac products will all be dual band, implementing bgn in 2.4 GHz.

kk22 said:
Is there anything else in the works for wireless connectivity besides 802.11ac?
60 GHz technologies (WiGig and WirelessHD) are out there. But are short-range only.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Ubiquiti UAP-LR (Long Range) Reviewed

Just read the article http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-reviews/32189-ubiquiti-uap-lr-long-range-reviewed and was wondering about the pricing of the device.

(8MB RAM and Flash ??? )

The PCB components and designs look no different from mid range consumer level routers. What makes that router at $90 worth it over spending the same amount for a dual band n450 or AC based router which can also function as an access point and can be modded with 2 bodge wires and a soldering iron, to handle POE?

[Assistant]
The UAP-LR is not a router. It is an N300 access point.

First, it's not a router, it's purely an access point.

It's designed for businesses...to be used in offices where multiple access points are setup. Also note that it's designed to be installed in ceilings, nice 'n neat.

Another big feature is centralized management. Say you deploy 20 of these at a large office space, you can manage them from one interface. Things like this are desirable for business networks.

I haven't gone into depth with the new about to be released 3.0 manager yet, but seamless roaming is supposed to now be supported. Typical other business grade access points are often 200-300 dollars per AP. Ubiquiti is giving us most of those features, for substantially less in price.

We've sold a lot of those units over the past year, and had a very good experience with them.

That is what I mentioned before, many consumer level routers have a similar build quality, better specs, and generally have an AP mode, or support for 3rd party firmware that can make them into an access point.

From a hardware standpoint that accesspoint is not offering much for the money.

(it seems to work well, but it seems that a price of around $40-50 will be more fitting)


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Linksys EA6900 Wireless AC Router SMART Wi-Fi Dual Band AC1900 Reviewed

Like its AC1900 NETGEAR and ASUS competitors, Linksys' EA6900 doesn't provide a compelling reason to abandon your current AC router.

[Assistant]
Thank you for your in-depth review thiggins.

I have both the Netgear R7000 and the Linksys EA6900 and in my "real world" environment, the Linksys performs better in wired and 5GHz Wifi. Range is better on the Netgear but in my small condo that's somewhat irrelevant as I get plenty of range from the EA6900.

I purchased both routers to test it out in my set-up and it looks like I'm keeping the Linksys and sending back the Nighthawk.

Thanks for the report. How was 2.4 GHz performance?

Better range and slightly faster with the R7000 but I've switched all of my devices to 5GHz since I live in a crowded 2.4GHz envireonment.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: NETGEAR Joins the AC1900 Club

NETGEAR just announced their AC1900 router based on what appears to be identical hardware. It's a bit cheaper than the AC68, and includes their automated backup solution (BYOHDD).

[Assistant]
babgvant said:
NETGEAR just announced their AC1900 router based on what appears to be identical hardware. It's a bit cheaper than the AC68, and includes their automated backup solution (BYOHDD).

Time to start a new "these USB 3.0 txfr speeds aren't fast enough on my router" thread. Let's get the jump on this one.

Pretty sure that's the same netgear R7000 that already leaked out after some weird appearances then removals off various websites. But there is a thread and at least one forum participant (@lexist2112) purchased one at a Fry's retail last week.

PrivateJoker said:
Time to start a new "these USB 3.0 txfr speeds aren't fast enough on my router" thread. Let's get the jump on this one.

LOL

PrivateJoker said:
Pretty sure that's the same netgear R7000 that already leaked out after some weird appearances then removals off various websites. But there is a thread and at least one forum participant (@lexist2112) purchased one at a Fry's retail last week.

I didn't say the R7000 didn't exist before this morning, just that it was announced this morning . I would have liked to comment on its existence earlier (when the AC68U v. others discussion started), but unfortunately I agreed to an NDA until today .

R7000 Announced

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-news/32229-netgear-joins-the-ac1900-club

http://youtu.be/zsV38qqIB9Q


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: How We Test Wireless Products - Revison 7

This is my first posting here

First of all, i would like to thank you for this great Smallnetbuilder page, which already helped me several times to select "the good ones" out of the product Jungle.

The "kick" to register to this forum was this article:

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-howto/32082-how-we-test-wireless-products-revison-7

...because some years ago I experimented with a similar setup, using radiation inside a box in combination with artificial pathloss by variable attenuators.

First with 11a/g products, where the method worked "reasonable" and later with 11N products where i faced some pitfalls, which made it difficult to achieve really comparable "range performance" results between different MIMO products.

The major problem for MIMO products is to make the air loss between ALL Router antennas and their chamber counter part antennas "comparable" for all different sorts of router and their different antenna designs.
In small chambers at short distances, a few inches difference in the distance between 2 antennas can already result in several dB difference in attenuation.

Some routers have external rubber stick antennas, others have integral antennas glued inside the housing and others even have the antennas directly printed on the PCB.

Not all routers use vertical antenna polarization, but some use horizontal or even mixed horizontal + vertical polarization....
Often it's difficult to conclude from the optical antenna appearance to it's polarization and radiation pattern.

In a real domestic (reflective) environment and at a certain distance, the signal reflections and diffractions (which are necessaray to make MIMO working) will equalize the differences in antenna polarization and directivity.

But in an anechoic line of sight scenario, the range-vs-rate performance will depend on how well the chamber antenna setup "matches" the router antenna setup.

A wrong polarization can easily add 10dB to the air loss.
A router antenna "1" can have a "gain-null" in the direction where antenna "2" has the maximum gain and MIMO performance will suffer from this attenuation inbalance.

It could be, that specific Routers radiate with one antenna to the front, one antenna to the right and a third antenna to the left, which is not a problem in an reflective domestic environment, but of disadvantage in an anechoic line of sight scenario, where the chamber antennas have significant less air loss to one of the antennas, than to the remaining MIMO antennas.

Any inbalance in air loss between the router antennas and chamber antennas lets the MIMO throughput degrade earlier, than if the all antennas have a very "balanced" view, like if testing the RT-AC66U, which's antenna setup fits optimally to the chamber antenna setup => 3* vertical against 3 * vertical and all antennas have exactly same distance to the counter part.

To be honest, i found no universal "one fits all" solution for a suitable MIMO chamber antenna setup.

One point of improvement could be placing the chamber antennas not close together, but in a large circle around the router under test, while putting the router in the center.
Another to turn all chamber Antennas in diagonal 45° position,which better enables picking up horizontal and vertical fields. Better would be switching to circular polarized wideband antennas, like Archimedian spiral type, but unfortunately these are quite expensive.

Bonsai

[Assistant]
It is nice that you notice the flaws of the current way of testing wireless on most/all sites.
I think there is no 100% fair way to test wifi products.
Maybe manufacturers should mention the type and radiation pattern of the antennas that are used. Then customers could make a better decision about the wifi device that fits the job best.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and testing knowledge @Bonsai, and welcome to the forums!

One of the reasons I value the reviews on SNB as much as I do is because all of the complete router reviews analyze a physical dissection, bench testing, and real world LAN & WLAN performance

Like in car reviews - engine bench dyno tests of HP & torque are good to know, as is the diameter of the brake discs and how many pistons each caliper has... But repeatable 0-60, 60-0, and skid pad tests are what matters most.

And there was another good comment about routers potentially publishing their polarization pattern...on this PDF I linked to in another post earlier today they give you the plots on both axis of how this particular antenna radiates:

http://bit.ly/15DRGtS

Which is great when you're looking at single antennas, but probably far less useful when analyzing multiple stream radios that utilize beam reflection and some pretty complex concepts beyond traditional RF propagation.

I don't know how to measure the success or failure of the complex multi stream designs with anything other than actual file transfer speed, and not just connection strength in RSSI or link speed rate.

Edit: I'm aware that antenna radiation plot I linked to is actually depicting an array, but that still doesn't help us know exactly how the array will perform under 802.11n & AC.

Thanks for sharing your insights, Bonsai.

I'm the first to admit that SNB's wireless test process isn't perfect. I had many reservations when switching to it. But with the explosion of wireless modes to test and the steady march of new products, it was clear that the old walk-it-around process was unsustainable.

Yes, the process has the weaknesses that you point out and could be improved. But the data that goes into the posted results is much more extensive than the eight data points per band of the old process. The test process is consistently applied to provide as much of a controlled, relative comparison as reasonably possible.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Amped Announces AC1200 Router

Hi - I'm in the market for a new router and was about to pull the trigger in the RT-AC66U but I see that Amped Wireless is coming out with their AC router in a few weeks.

What's the consensus on the Amped routers? Think it's worth the wait or should I pull the trigger on the Asus? I can find almost nothing except some generic announcements regarding the RTA15, which seems quite late at this point.

[Assistant]
If you have no 11ac client devices, it's a good idea to not spend the premium on such

At $190, it's very expensive for an AC1200 class (2x2) router.

Our testing has not confirmed Amped's increased range claims for its past products.

Well Amped Wireless added even more power to the RTA15 and my review for the R20G was excellent and you can read the R20G review here:
http://remixedcat.blogspot.com/2013/03/amped-wireless-r20000g-wireless-router.html

So it having even more power will be even better!


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Who Says An AC Router Needs Gigabit Ports?

As I understand it, Gigabit Ethernet is mature enough that it simply "comes with the silicon" on modern chips. While an OEM can certainly still buy 10/100 (only) single- and perhaps dual-port chips, most of the chips with more ports (such as the switch-on-a-chip parts used in this class of router) support Gigabit already.

When a product uses a a Gigabit-capable chip but doesn't offer Gigabit to the end user, that's a marketing decision. Either to force the user to buy the "next model up" to use the Gigabit functionality that's present but disabled in the lower model, or to save a few pennies by not using a 10/100/1000 PHY (in the fewer and fewer cases where a separate PHY is needed at all), or a couple fraction-of-a-penny passive components.

As a prime example, I give you the Cisco 2811 (and lower) vs. the 2821 (and higher):

2811#sh controllers
Interface FastEthernet0/0
Hardware is MV96340

2821#sh controllers
Interface GigabitEthernet0/0
Hardware is MV96340

Notice anything fishy?

Also, jumbo frame support is often tied to Gigabit support. Jumbos can sometimes provide a huge performance benefit, though the amount of difference (if any) depends on the protocols being used, etc.

None of this diminishes the point the article raises about many wireless routers having a cable modem as their only wired device.

However, simply using Gigabit-capable hardware (or enabling it if it is present but off for marketing reasons) would make that same product more attractive to additional customers.

I had a very difficult time finding a wireless router which had 8 Gigabit ports (1 upstream, 7 attached devices) for a small business where I was replacing a cascaded stack of 4-port 10/100 switch/hub things. I found the WD My Net N900 (which I eventually ended up using), but it has a number of software defects which make it problematic. A wider choice of units would be greatly appreciated by me.

In N years time (no pun intended), will we be having this same discussion about 10 Gigabit ports? To turn that on its head, when was the last time you saw (or needed) an AUI port? Or a MII port?

[Assistant]
It's rare to find a WiFi router AND IT'S CLIENT DEVICE that can, in real use conditions, sustain over 100Mbps at the IP layer. Thus, a 10/100 switch port is fine for all but a few cases.

With 1000BT switch chips cheap now, it may be that using that in a WiFi router doesn't add as much cost as it used do. When prices were higher, we used separate gigE switches to interconnect wired PCs on the LAN.

Unfortunately, the typical consumer doesn't know that xxx Mbps at the WiFi air link signal level doesn't at all correspond to the IP layer bit rate, due to the nature of 802.11 with its overhead, lack of full duplex, etc.

I have to agree with the original poster.
Most of the time the only reason they put in FE switch instead of GE is product differentiation.
Companies which do this are usually those big brands with a big marketing department.
GE switches are dirt cheap nowadays, you can find them in many "value for money" brand at a price even lower than those 'premier' brands.
And the most important reason for GE nowadays is fibre.
With everyone going fibre, rates are going to exceed 100Mbps no point releasing FE products anymore.
Funny how a reviewer can get bought over by marketing bollocks...

stevech said:
It's rare to find a WiFi router AND IT'S CLIENT DEVICE that can, in real use conditions, sustain over 100Mbps at the IP layer. Thus, a 10/100 switch port is fine for all but a few cases.
Do you mean a wireless client? If so, I agree.

For connected (wired) devices, the "IP layer" part is mostly irrelevant - on-site traffic is going through the switch-on-a-chip and never being routed. With the site I installed the My Net N900 at, they have a modern Synology and Optiplex systems which can definitely share files at faster than the 100Mbit/second (12.5Mbyte/sec, give-or-take).

I've collected hardware from the scrap pile at a colo facility I'm in which does 9.89Gbit/sec (basically wire speed) over a single TCP connection using 10GbE.

With 1000BT switch chips cheap now, it may be that using that in a WiFi router doesn't add as much cost as it used do. When prices were higher, we used separate gigE switches to interconnect wired PCs on the LAN.
Now that many router / switch manufacturers have moved to RJ45 jacks with integrated magnetics for EMI compliance, there isn't a lot between the chip and the jack. A quick search for '10/100/1000 integrated phy' turns up things like the BCM53115, which is a 5-port switch chip which has advanced features such as VLANs, Q-in-Q, built-in TDR, etc. Pricing information isn't available, as they sell by quote only in large batches. They claim it is competitive, though, and position it for home / SOHO applications.

Unfortunately, the typical consumer doesn't know that xxx Mbps at the WiFi air link signal level doesn't at all correspond to the IP layer bit rate, due to the nature of 802.11 with its overhead, lack of full duplex, etc.
Agreed 100%.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: NETGEAR R6100 Reviewed

So no comments about the first QCA based AC router?

[Assistant]
Was really looking forward to this review so thanks for doing it! Was considering upgrading from my rt-n56u, but maybe I'll hold off and get something better down the line considering I haven't really had any issues with it. Hopefully someone else will chime in here with a little more knowledge than me.

thiggins said:
So no comments about the first QCA based AC router?

Thanks for the excellent and detailed review as usual Tim. Like you noted, it's really disappointing to see them use antiquated 10/100 ethernet ports, which sort of destroys the whole point of 802.11ac to some extent if you actually want to have some ethernet cabling on your local LAN. It's like ... uh ... what were they seriously thinking? Well it's a budget router I guess.

I'm really surprised at how behind in market share Qualcomm Atheros is about getting their chips into the latest gen products. Do you have any insight into this? IMO Atheros was the reigning king of wireless technology, at least until they were bought out by Qualcomm. Their chips and open source support was a cut above Broadcom even if Broadcom still dominated market share prior to the buyout. But for whatever reason Qualcomm hasn't kept up with maintaining the wireless perch on the market share they've had. I was looking forward to seeing some Atheros chips in some of these products before deciding what to upgrade to but if Atheros is being relegated to budget routers like this it really doesn't seem like there's much of a choice. Broadcom seems to have all but a clear monopoly now.

I have no real insight into QCA's inner workings. But here are a few observations:

- The good news is that Atheros appears to be intact as a business unit within Qualcomm. Coulda gone another way, with the company disbanded and technology absorbed into other product lines.

- I don't know why Qualcomm is so far behind in 11ac. I suspect it had to do with the Qualcomm buy.

- QCA devices are not going to be relegated to only budget routers. The chipset is coming in D-Link's new top-of-line DGL-5500 "gaming" router. This one will have the StreamBoost auto QoS, which looks quite interesting.

I assume all router manufacturers are trialing the QCA chipset. I'm sure they all would like to have a bargaining chip with Broadcom.

From the limited view, it looks like the QCA chipset could have superior range vs. Broadcom. But need to see it with a Gigabit connection to be sure.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Amped Wireless Trots Out AC1200 Adapter

Finally - a right proper USB ac adapter!

Big external antennas and USB 3.0.

I found it so funny that almost all USB ac adapters to this point are USB 2.0 yet they're touting 867 Mbps link rates. Of course not even this one will get 867 Mbps but it should be capable of those 300 Mbps+ numbers Tim has reached with ac and the ASUS PCIe ac adapter.

I guess it's two-stream though, so not quite as high as the nearly 450 Mbps Tim tested with the ASUS RT-AC66U:

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...reless-ac1750-gigabit-router-reviewed?start=2

[Assistant]
Has anyone tried this unit out? Is Amped any good? I know they're fairly new to the game but wondered if this and their other products are good performers.

Transfer rates (Mbytes/sec):
Wireless N I have around 12Mbytes/sec thru 32ft/2 walls/1 brick chimney/1 hardwood dresser
Wireless AC I have 22Mbytes/sec thru the same as above.

I did have it peak up as high as 35-40Mbytes/sec quite often as well!!


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: D-Link Wireless AC1200 Dual Band Gigabit Cloud Router Reviewed

Just read SNB's review of the D-Link DIR-850L or is it for the DIR-860L? Not sure which one is actually being reviewed here.

In the overview, you say you reviewed the DIR-850L back in may and in that in this review you're going to review the DIR-850L. Then further on in the "Inside" section, you start showing pictures of the 860L?

In the last sentence of the "Wireless" section you say:
Like the DIR-868L, the 850L does not support wireless bridging or repeating or have an access point mode.

That's not correct. The DIR-868L now has bridging mode in its latest firmware.

[Assistant]
The review is for the DIR-850L. I've corrected the first editing mistake and removed the inaccurate information about the 868L. The Inside section compares the designs of the 850L and 860L.

Thanks for the quick feedback.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: CERTIFIED ac Begins. 802.11n Fading Fast?

Missed one,
Broadcom BCM4706 5G WiFi Communications Processor [RT-AC66U ]

http://www.fiercebroadbandwireless....tified-ac-takes-wi-fi-performance-new-heights

[Assistant]
WiFi Alliance is just starting 801.11ac testing...

1) Interop is showing to be a challenge - no more different than it was with 802.11n when it first came out - second generation and following 802.11n chipsets were much better than the first silicon...

2) Just as it was with 802.11n in the early days - add, don't replace, with 802.11ac gear...

if you're not in a big need for 5Ghz super bandwidth, I would wait a bit, and watch the reviews here at SNB...

sfx

I'm skipping AC and upgrading when AD becomes the standard. My RT-N66U will have to suffice until then.

sm00thpapa said:
I'm skipping AC and upgrading when AD becomes the standard. My RT-N66U will have to suffice until then.
What do you think AD will do for you?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: PowerCloud Systems Skydog Beta Reviewed

In a recent article, the beta version of the Skydog router was reviewed.
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...32148-powercloud-systems-skydog-beta-reviewed

Is it just me or does the whole concept behind that router seems like a bad idea?

The router immediately shows some of it's issues, Many of it's monitoring tools are offered on free 3rd party firmware which do not require any 3rd party servers. (with the exception of a select few features that are more or less gimmicks)

Linking the function of a product to the cloud means that you are gambling on the servers staying up for as long as you will want to use the product.

The 3 year claim means nothing because there is no guarantee that they will be in business a year from now, or even a trillionth of a nanosecond from now.

It is just as bad as online DRM used by many games. if if the DRM server dies, then your games get dragged down to hell with the servers.

Furthermore unless the company is willing to give out all source code involved on both the router level and server side, there is no way to build any sort of trust with them. No security is perfect and imagine if they get hacked and everyone gets their router settings changed to use a malicious DRM server, then communications to the cloud crap gets blocked at the router level to prevent them from fixing it?

Giving a 3rd party full control over your network requires a lot of trust, and their current business model does not qualify any trust. Their policies only cover them self when things go bad.

Furthermore in looking at the images of the PCB, the router is clearly built to a low cost (similar to what you will find in a lesser brand (eg rosewill and other uncommon/ cheap brands)

The caps are cheap 85C ones

very few components to handle noise

design looks largely autorouted with very little human aftethought (as if a company provided them with a generic cheap router for them to slap a name tag on)

transmit power is very low for a modern router (closer to what was available with early 802.11n routers)

Overall the item seems to be targeted at having the highest profit margin possible, and then further increase profits by collecting fees for the cloud service.

It has some interesting features but none of them should require cloud crap, modern routers are more than enough powerful to do statistics and monitoring locally, and graphics can be done using ajax like with tomato.

FCCID page https://fcc.io/U2M/-WBR4200AGN

[Assistant]
I have added PowerCloud's responses regarding security to the article.

Hybrid local / cloud products are here to stay. All consumer network product manufacturers either have them now in some form or will in the future.

The majority of consumers have shown by their actions that convenience is valued over privacy when it comes to internet based services.

So, no, the product concept is not a bad idea, per se.

To my mind, the primary concern is the long-term viability of the company. Because, as you point out, without the cloud services, Skydog becomes a very basic N600 router.

I was going to write all sorts of things about this then I realized I'm really, really not the intended market. Nor are most of the people who read this site actually.

It's not my thing at all, just like Bose and Apple are not my thing at all either.

It appears I'm in the minority about all three.

Fraoch said:
I was going to write all sorts of things about this then I realized I'm really, really not the intended market. Nor are most of the people who read this site actually.
You would be surprised at the range of people who read SNB.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Apple's New AirPort Extreme Offers No Innovation

Apple posted the AirPort Extreme 802.11ac technical specifications today. It was pretty much what I expected but one thing I did notice. They listed the Radio output power: 32.5 dBm maximum (varies by country). Are they serious? 32.5 dBm is 1,778.279 mW! That seems really high. Link: http://support.apple.com/kb/SP680

[Assistant]
The beauty of choice...

I bought two.

My reasons:
1) My existing AirPort Extreme hardware don't need to be power-cycled as frequently as my WRT350Nv1 or WRT610Nv1 or RT-N66U did.

2) I like the AirPort Utility from a usability standpoint and the portability of settings from old->new. Putting DD-WRT on the Linksys routers above gave me some freedom of configuration, but crippled their wireless throughput

3) An additional ethernet port, USB 3.0 and wireless router level QoS are not important to me.

That must mean they designed it for a world wide market. Many wifi amplifiers used today can offer over 1000mw transmit power (especially when you have many of them).

Apple needs to make the US version do 1778mw transmit power, and once the high powered mode is enabled, it will send out a 1 time beacon that says FUUUUUUU FCC!!!. Then you can enjoy better wifi coverage.

Why does the FCC limit wifi to 1 watt?

AEBS 6th Gen.....

When SNB gets around to testing it I'd like to see how it stands up against the competition and the AEBS 5th gen. I know what QOS is and how it works, but for me at my house when my son is Facetiming with his grandmother, my daughter is streaming movies and the VoIP phone is in use....not once in the 2 year period has the AEBS 5th I have never once burped. The person on the other end sounds like they're in the same room with me and Netflix never stumbles. So under very heavy use I have never experienced any problems.

I guess if you're a person that likes to customize the settings it could be of value depending on what your running. I use to have a DIR-655 and the thing either dropped signals or had to be reset once a week. I finally dumped it. Anyway, I hope the 6th gen has great performance.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: MetaGeek inSSIDer For Office Reviewed

Hi Tim,

Did you test InSSIDer For Office while using a USB 3.0 drive (either on the router or on the laptop itself)? I wonder if it would allow you to measure the RF interference caused by USB 3.0.

[Assistant]
I gave the product only a cursory look before passing it to Doug for review. I found it a lot easier to run a check like I did for the ASUS RT-N65U to check for USB 3.0 / 2.4 GHz interference.

Tested with USB 2.0

I used a Thinkpad T410 for my tests, which has USB 2.0 ports.

RMerlin said:
Hi Tim,

Did you test InSSIDer For Office while using a USB 3.0 drive (either on the router or on the laptop itself)? I wonder if it would allow you to measure the RF interference caused by USB 3.0.

Quick question Merlin, when downloading the Firmware from Media Fire, for example 3.0.4.270.26b. Does the "B" mean beta? and the ones without the "B" mean not beta? Or is everything under Experimental mean Stable version?

Please let me know

Thank You
IPHANT0MI


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Asus RT-N66u retest correlation with previous results

It seems that the new test setup doesn't correlate too well to the previous test setup.

If I understand the test correctly, this is the change for the 4 current tests

Diff Test (3 Stream )
52% Downlink 2.4GHz, 20 MHz
54% Uplink 2.4GHz, 20 MHz
128% Downlink 5 GHz, 40 MHz
31% Uplink 5 GHz, 40 MHz

I am guessing that the client change is a big driver of these diffs, and if that is the case, it will be difficult to compare previous test results.

[Assistant] Both the client and test method make comparison difficult. That is why I am retesting some of the more popular routers with the new method.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: NETGEAR R6300 WiFi Router-802.11ac Dual Band Gigabit Reviewed

Thank you Tim for your review and mentioning that your test results don't reflect my experience. I am on day 5 with R6300 and it's still delivering the range and speeds (in 5Ghz band) that N56 was never able to achieve using the same client card Intel 6200. Btw, my primary test location is similar to your location E and at average 8 MB/sec (64 Mbps) download. I'll keep using R6300 for now in hopes that next firmware release will improve things even further.

EDIT: Since Amazon reviews show split in terms of good & bad results, I wonder if there is a chance that there is a defective batch of routers. I find it it surprising that N56U outperforms R6300 in long range using 5Ghz band because that's clearly not the case for me, unless I have a defective N56U.

[Assistant]
Thanks for the early look Tim.

On my last biz trip to the US, I stood in Fry's looking at both the Buffalo and the Netgear. I couldn't decide which one to grab, so after trying the dice roll app on my phone to no avail, and tossing my tea on the floor to read the leaves (just kidding) I shut my eyes and randomly picked the Buffalo.

Seems it wasn't such a bad way to go, so far...

klas said:
EDIT: Since Amazon reviews show split in terms of good & bad results, I wonder if there is a chance that there is a defective batch of routers. I find it it surprising that N56U outperforms R6300 in long range using 5Ghz band because that's clearly not the case for me, unless I have a defective N56U.
That is certainly possible for any router.

corndog said:
On my last biz trip to the US, I stood in Fry's looking at both the Buffalo and the Netgear. I couldn't decide which one to grab, so after trying the dice roll app on my phone to no avail, and tossing my tea on the floor to read the leaves (just kidding) I shut my eyes and randomly picked the Buffalo.
The downside with Buffalo products is that they are rarely updated.

NETGEAR has a few updates in the pipeline since it seems their release was a bit premature due to marketing pressures.

Update: Netgear confirmed that it plans to release the first firmware fix to support guest networks and some bug fixes by June 8th Friday, followed by another firmware release by mid-next week to enhance 802.11ac 5GHz performance.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: NETGEAR R6250 reviewed

In the review, it's stated:

Since the R6250's 5 GHz radio is the same AC1300 class radio in AC1750 class routers, I pulled the top-ranking ASUS RT-AC66U into the 5 GHz comparisons. The downlink profile below shows the R6250 besting the other two routers with 361 Mbps at 0 dB attenuation, our "Location A" equivalent point. As signal levels drop, the NETGEAR generally tracks above the Linksys.

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wire...gear-r6250-smart-wifi-router-reviewed?start=3

(the "5 GHz Downlink Throughput vs. Attenuation" chart)

Yet the chart below that text does not show the RT-AC66U results, only the NETGEAR and the Linksys EA6300.

Just an error? It would be interesting to see if the RT-AC66U is better over longer distances...I expect it would be.

[Assistant]
Caching problem. Fixed now. Clicking on the image would have given you a slightly larger correct version. Thanks for pointing out the error.

Consolidated Benchmark Summary

Hey Tim, nice review...the R6250 looks promising...one question:
Why does the consolidated benchmark summary for 5GHz downlink show 184.8Mbps yet the Throughput vs Attenuation for 5GHz downlink shows a max of 361Mbps at 0dB. I thought the summary result was the "highest throughput benchmark" as stated in the consolidated charts explanation...did I miss something?

Also, another metric that may be useful for your tests is max usable wireless clients supported by the AP. Although most small net users will probably use just a dozen or two clients, I've seen in my testing that the number of clients an AP can reliably handle varies significantly by manufacturer, frequency, attenuation, security and traffic mix among other factors.

I know this is a bit confusing. From the paragraph above the graphic.
The retest Benchmark Summary below from the new Consolidated benchmark process shows the average of throughput measurements made in all test locations.
To see the maximum throughput, choose the benchmark chart, then use the view selector next to the benchmark. Here's 5 GHz downlink Maximum. There you see the 360.6 that is rounded to 361 Mbps in the plot

I agree it would be nice to test the maximum clients routers support. But I have no practical way to do this. There is also a difference between what a product physically supports and what is reasonable for good user experience. As you note, this depends on a lot of factors.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: D-Link DIR-825 B1 Quick Review

I just posted the test data for the DIR-821 B1 using the standard SNB Intel 5300 WiFi Link client in the Router and Wireless Charts.

Bottom line: It ain't no WNDR3700...

I'll have an article posted tomorrow.

[Assistant]
Looks like its got an issue with downlink throughput. Uplink isn't bad at all as far as I can tell.

When looking at the throughput versus location chart the 825 B1 doesn't look that bad. Not as solid as the 3700, but not bad.

Hopefully this will inspire Dlink to fix the issue in firmware. I know they are working on new firmware since they are releasing fix specific versions for beta test.

Those are surprising results; I'd like to hear speculation about the performance disparity.

jdabbs said:
Those are surprising results; I'd like to hear speculation about the performance disparity.
Antennas, firmware, attention to detail and component selection in the radios.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Extremely Disappointing: Apple Airport Extreme Reviewed

Apple released today the new revision of the AirPort Extreme.

Do you guys think you will be able to test it this time?

"Even faster performance.
Based on the IEEE 802.11n specification, AirPort Extreme uses a technology called multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) to transmit multiple data streams simultaneously. The result? AirPort Extreme delivers data transfer speeds up to five times those of 802.11g wireless networks — while achieving up to twice the range. And improvements in antenna design give you up to 50 percent better Wi-Fi performance and up to 25 percent better range than with the previous-generation AirPort Extreme Base Station."

That would be nice, I've been planning about buying a new router, but I just won't buy it until someone does a nice review, and I don't find any review even comparable to the ones you make here at SmallNetBuilder.

I've just registered the forums to gently ask for that

Thanks
Nuno

[Assistant]
Come on Apple!

I would also like to see a review here.

Dear Apple, please send the review unit to Smallnetbuilder! I and lots of readers have no valid reference point for how the newer airport extremes stack up against the other networking products. This site does a great job of not only testing products under the same test conditions, but also touching on other important features, such a setup software, etc. All of the other major manufacturers' networking products are reviewed here; not being reviewed here is a big red flag for me.

I have one and I think you desperately need to buy/borrow one to test because it is the fastest thing I have ever seen by quite some margin.

Using an Intel 4965AGN I am getting at least an average of 16-18MB/s (megabytes) with many peaks of 20MB/s, which is way faster than anything else on the market. This is a Win 2k8 > Win 7 transfer, monitored with at least three different utilities and no matter what I do, my speed is always above 15MB/s.

Thanks for the thought. But it would be more effective to post here:
http://store.apple.com/us/questions/product/MC340LL/A?mco=MTMzNzk0MDA


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Yes, Routers do die

This is a thread discussing the topics Tim brought up here:

Strangely enough, I have exactly the same problems with the same router. I bought it when it was first released (3 years ago?) tho I got a replacement a few months later when it died. I'm currently considering what to replace it with (but that's an entirely different question).

My question is, how long to people expect such devices to last? In the UK we have an EU law which means that devices are covered by a 2yr warranty, regardless of what the supplier says (I wish I'd known that when my Draytek modem died 2 days over 1 year and when I spoke to them, I was told that it was out of warranty, a year was acceptable for the money I paid etc), but if I pay £150 for a router, I think it should be expected to last more than 3 years.
What's your opinion? I'd also be interested to hear if you're someone who upgrades when new tech comes out just because you want to, whether you replace when a device dies, or somewhere in the middle.

[Assistant]
When solid-state products have no moving parts and are used in a benign temperature controlled indoor environment, they should last until you don't want or need them anymore.

All my previous routers including an original SMC "Barricade", Linksys WRT54G and D-Link DGL-4500 lasted until I retired them (multiple years each). I switched to the NETGEAR because it was so popular and so that I could easily answer questions about it.

The problem with many of today's routers is that high speeds on wireless and wired = high heat = shorter life. That plus cheap, crappy power bricks. Routers can be designed with better heat removal, but that costs money, which few consumers are willing to pay.

I'm not really a "latest-and-greatest" product kinda guy. I'm frugal so frequently buy factory refurbs and last-generation products. The only exception to this is notebooks, where I'm a sucker for light travel notebooks.

I've had a couple "die" on me but mostly I've had them become flaky too. For instance, I had a Linksys WRT610N wireless router that I bought off of E-Bay as a refurb that worked perfectly and then suddenly the 2.4ghz wireless AP section just quit working. Everything else works fine, 5.8Ghz wireless, wired switch etc. That was after just about 2 years of use in my home.

Someone in the office suggested just reflashing the firmware - he said it's given life to flakey devices that he's had. Not sure I believe that but may be worth a go.
If there was an obvious choice for a replacement I'd go and get one now but the 2 best looking options to me are the Asus models but the firmware seems to be work in progress on those.

I'm also looking to get fibre in the next month or so; I will get a router provided with that but I'm not sure how functional it'll be - almost certainly they won't be aimed at home techies like myself.
Maybe I need to get in the current world but to me, a £150 router should last longer than 2 years. Maybe £150 is becoming throwaway money to most.

As Tim has said a number of times in his reviews, an expensive router does not necessarily make a good router.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Securifi Almond Reviewed

Is anyone else intrigued by these? Apparently the Almond router is one of the best reviewed routers on Amazon. Link here.

I'm actually most intrigued by the upcoming Almond+ router. This is going to sell for only $99 via Kickstarter, and it will be 802.11ac, include zigbee + z-wave for home automation, and have an integrated touchscreen. Given how highly reviewed the Almond is, I'm really excited about this one. Here is a link to the Almond+ page.

Anyone have thoughts?

[Assistant]
couple of random thoughts...

at the price point - it's not sustainable - been there, done that, have the t-shirts to prove it - it's being sold at a loss, and volume will just make it worse, burning up investors money until they either get bought or roll it up.

D-Link showed a touch screen router at CES2010 - never shipped... margins are too thin as it is in the CE router business, any additional development costs need to be carried over in volume to make it up - it's a falling knife from there....

http://www.cnet.com/8301-31045_1-10429277-269.html

Well, it's being done right now. There are currently 400 Amazon reviews w/ an average score of 4.5 stars.

As for the Almond+, it went on Kickstarter this morning. Here is the link. I snatched it up quickly. $95 is a great deal, and I'm encouraged by their previous success.

The bad news is that it isn't going to ship until September 2013. Oh well. It's not like I have any 802.11N devices yet anyways.

Hello there, I am with Securifi. This post caught our attention due to the incoming traffic.

I cant claim I am a frequent reader of this forum but I do check it out from time to time.

We would be happy to send you a free review unit of the original Almond. I suppose Mr. Higgins would be the reviewer. Whoever it is, please send a message to sales@securifi.com with your address and let us know you are from SmallNetBuilder and we will ship you the review unit. Thanks.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Apple AirPort Express [2012] Reviewed

Forgive me for this post. I'm not an avid Apple fanboy or supporter, but in this instance I believe you might have missed the point of the new Apple Airport Express.

I saw it come out and I knew immediately that I was going to get one. I have never purchased one before, but now that it's been redesigned and is less intrusive, I believe it fits in exactly where I want it to - as a wireless roaming AP that will also serve up my music to my home theater system.

To use this as a router - yes, I agree with you, it's really not for that and lacks lots of features. I am surprised they didn't have gigabit ports for one. That would have been a really nice feature.

But to use this as a supplemental wireless AP to also to do what it was intended to do - extend airplay to any 3.5" minijack device - is where this product really shines.

Another thing I have noticed with Apple wireless APs - they are stable and fast. Maybe not the fastest in the most ideal conditions, but they get the job done very painlessly. No fumbling with open source firmwares, no relying on the companies' firmware updates. They work out of the box (one of the few things Apple makes that truly does). For wireless, they should be what every manufacturer strives to provide. For features, well, like I said, they lack.

To reiterate, Apple is not my favorite company. I deplore most of what they do with their products - making it extremely simple for the user instead of letting the user decide how to use a product.

But in this case, simple is definitely better. You plug it in, you plug in an audio cable, and it's sending music to your device in minutes.

I can't even configure a USB drive in another vendor's router in that amount of time.

Thank you.

[Assistant]
thetoad30 said:
Forgive me for this post. I'm not an avid Apple fanboy or supporter, but in this instance I believe you might have missed the point of the new Apple Airport Express.
Thanks for your report. No offense taken.

How did I miss the point of the Express? Given that Apple gave it the ability to act as a full-fledged wireless router, I just reviewed it that way. The wireless performance results are interesting whether the product is used as a router or extension AP.

thiggins said:
Thanks for your report. No offense taken.

How did I miss the point of the Express? Given that Apple gave it the ability to act as a full-fledged wireless router, I just reviewed it that way. The wireless performance results are interesting whether the product is used as a router or extension AP.

While I certainly see your point, I would have to say that the fact that Apple gave it those capabilities would be an addition, not the main point of the product.

So I guess, since I'm more familiar/a power user with wireless routers (thanks to this site and my techiness), I see it from a different perspective. I see it as an AP/bridge first, and a router only as a last resort. In fact, I even see the Extreme that way, to be honest. I feel that Apple has left the power routing up to the rest of the market (or they just don't know how to tackle it) and have developed a no-nonsense way of wireless networking.

But, yes, as you reported, the routing features are very limited. I'm not saying that you shouldn't have reported this - in fact, I appreciate the thoroughness of the report. I'm merely saying that while reporting the negative aspect of the routing features it seems to overshadow how fantastic of a bridge/roaming AP/music server this product is.

Again, makes me sick to come to Apple's defense, but this is one product I think does more than it's predecessor and does what it's predecessor did even better.

I'm not sure what you mean about it's routing functions being limited?

They're competitive with other gear... name a couple of features that mainstream users would need from a router... it's not a NAS, and most AP's that have NAS functionality are fairly limited in what they can do...

The big thing is that the AP Express has always been more of a travel type of router, and there it has a bit more limitations, but still decent...


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Router UI Emulators

I thought I should post emulators for various brands and their router models, as it may help prospective buyers and also allow people to help others with settings/troubleshooting.

ASUS
RT-AX88U, RT-AC5300, RT-AC66U, RT-N56U, RT-N16, RT-N12, RT-N10E
Belkin
Multiple Models
Cisco (Small Business)
Multiple Models
D-Link
DIR-890L, DIR-880L, DIR-866L, DIR-825, DIR 818LW, DIR 817LW,
DIR-815, DIR 685, DIR 665, DIR 660, DIR 657, DIR-655,
DIR 635, DIR 628, DIR-625, DIR-615, DIR-605L, DIR-600
DrayTek
Multiple Models
Linksys
Multiple Models
Mikrotik
Web Config
Netgear
Newer Genie interface based router emulators don't seem to be available.
Multiple Models
Peplink
Balance Series (username - admin/password - admin)
TP-Link
Multiple Models
TRENDnet
Multiple Models
B & G D-Link, Linksys, Netgear
Multiple Models
Ubiquiti UniFi
https://demo.ubnt.com/manage/site/default/dashboard
NetComm
https://support.netcommwireless.com/emulators
SonicWall
https://livedemo.sonicwall.com/

Custom Firmware UI
DD-WRT
Gargoyle
OpenWRT Luci
Tomato
-Shibby (Only images no emulator)
-Advanced
-RAF

If anyone has more links please feel free to contribute.

Credits:
kvic for finding the ASUS RT-AC5300 link.
Trip for Microtik RouterOS UI, and Peplink Balance Series UI.
umarmung for Ubiquiti UniFi UI, NetComm and SonicWall demos.

[Assistant]
Mikrotik
RouterOS Webfig (CLI and WinBox also available there)

Peplink
Balance Series

(more to come later)

Thanks Trip, original post updated to reflect your additions. For Peplink I don't see any actual emulators, did I miss something?

The Peplink URL is just the jump page, showing login credentials, with the "Go" button about 4/5 the way down the page. The actual UI is here: http://balancedemo.peplink.com . If you link directly, you should probably put "admin/admin" next to the link so users know the credentials.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: looking for cheap router with openwrt support

* Wifi N is a must
* USB is always nice (to install extra ipkg's) or at least a large flash instead (well, not that large.. i install only a few packages..)
* gigabit could be optional

* I'm low on budget, so nothing expensive or facny.

I prefer a more powerful router then the most speediest since It'll be in a basement (no need for dualband because I don't think it'll work well here)

and last, but most important, is openwrt support (or dd-wrt)

[Assistant]
There are not many 802.11n routers that support openwrt. There are a few that are supported (some unofficially) by DD-WRT.
http://wiki.openwrt.org/oldwiki/tableofhardware

For DD-WRT
If you live in a Metro Area, I'd look on Craigslist for a Linksys WRT150N, WRT160N (v1.0, 1.1) WRT300N (v1.0, 1.1) or WRT350N. Be sure to get the proper hardware revision as v2.0 do not work with the firmware.
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices#Linksys
I bought a 150N and 350N for $30 and $25 respectively off craigslist and they performed very well.

For Store bought DD-WRT Devices, the Linksys WRT310N should work out of the box, unless they move to a v2.0 PCB. The Netgear WNR834B (v2.0) and WNDR3300 should also flash with DD-WRT out of the box. The WNDR3300 has poor 5Ghz performance though. Also the Asus WL500W supports DD-WRT and Oleg (and should support OpenWRT with Kamikaze 8.09 or greater) and has 2 USB ports. Buffalo WHR G300N supports DD-WRT.

The Netgear WNR834B is the cheapest at only $45 but only supports DD-WRT - it is also gets 42Mbps average in 20Hz mode, but I don't know how well its range is
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833122266
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/30152/96/

The Asus is $65 after MIR and supports OpenWRT and DD-WRT and has 2 USB ports for optware. It also has 8MB flash and 32MB RAM.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833320011&Tpk=wl-500w
http://wiki.openwrt.org/oldwiki/openwrtdocs/hardware/asus/wl500w

Buffalo WHR-G300N supports DD-WRT and is on sale for $42
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833162026R
You need to TFTP flash this router (only once though)
http://dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/WHR-G300N

I'm not from the US. I'll be ordering it off ebay (although its kinda hard to check revisions, as some people don't know what that is..)

the asus is a bit more then I'm interested in spending (although it does look nice)

will probably go on one of the others you mentioned and will learn to live with dd-wrt until openwrt support appears

You can always buy it from a US online store using
http://www.myus.com

It costs a bit more for shipping (because you ship it twice), but you can get what you want so long as the router will work in your area and support your modem requirements such as PPoA. You can also 'pay' for a personal shopper if they need special information for shipping. Works great if shipping to your country from USA is cheap and import custom duties is not an issue.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Looking for a Secure and Long-Term Supported Router (Home Use)

Hello everyone,

I'm currently using an old modem from my ISP, with my PC connected via Ethernet. Occasionally, I also connect my smartphone via Wi-Fi.
I'm now looking to buy a dedicated router, with the main goal of improving the security of my home network.
My main priorities are security, stability, and long-term reliability, rather than raw performance or advanced features.

What I'm looking for:
A router with a long lifecycle, offering regular firmware updates (especially security patches and bug fixes).
Wi-Fi range is not a priority, as the router will be placed very close to my devices.
Ideally compatible with firmwares such as Asuswrt-Merlin, OpenWRT, or others focused on control and security.
Strong technical support and an active user community are appreciated.

Any model suggestions, brand recommendations, or personal experiences would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance for your help!

[Assistant]
NoShine said:
A router with a long lifecycle, offering regular firmware updates (especially security patches and bug fixes).
This is very much at the whim of the manufacturer. Asus does well with regular updates, but for the life cycle, that all depends on various market factors.

RT-AX86U Pro should be supported for quite a while. Now on sale @Amazon for $149.99. One of the most recommended routers here.

NoShine said:
My main priorities are security, stability, and long-term reliability

Keep using your ISP provided gateway. They are all locked down tight with minimum features and attack surface. More secure than most over the counter home routers. Save your money if you have a few clients only. The clients have own firewalls and protection against malware.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Upgrade recommendation

Hi all, I am looking to upgrade from AXE-11000.Its worked ok for what I needed but I think its time to upgrade .I use it as my main router with the Rt-Ac68u connected as a wired Aimesh node.

[Assistant]
Lmputer said:
Its worked ok for what I needed but I think its time to upgrade.
What's changed that requires a change of router? Without knowing what it is that you need that this router doesn't provide it's not possible to recommend anything.

Looking retire my Rt-Ac68u.Take Master/Main Router (axe-11000).Turn it to wired mesh node to witch ever new main router I pickup.

You’ll still have firmware mismatch limitations in AiMesh. Your new router will be perhaps running 3006 firmware, your old router is locked on 3004. Not all the new main router features will propagate the older node. Something to keep in mind and set realistic expectations.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Upgrade Advice

Currently have a Ubiquit UDM-US that I bought in 2019 from a review that was published here (but that is no longer available).

The latest model is the UDR7, but there are two major problems with it:

2x2 MU-MIMO on 5ghz vs 4x4 on the UDM
Weaker processor
The problem is that (just like in 2019) the selection of quality routers is a cesspool.

Aside from OpenWRT routers, what are my options?

[Assistant]
UDR7 is much newer hardware device with more features and higher performance.

This is the only UniFi AIO device. Your other UniFi options are better specs component system. Otherwise you have to look for something else from the consumer market. AIO home routers - plenty from different vendors. Pick the one you believe fits best your needs.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Little WiFi System

Hi,
we bought an older house and i want to install some WiFi. Not really much WiFi in the air now.
I worked with WiFi-networks with TP-Link Omada and Ubiquiti, booth are working well.
My requirements are:
- Controller and gateway in one device with VPN-Server, some switch-ports (PoE if possible)
- AP as extra device (no all-in-one)
- solid and future-proof (speed ist not that important)
Options:
1: ASUS EBG19P + EBA63 (don't know this, but EBG19P has PoE)
2: Omada ER7212PC + EAP772 (the ER7212PC has no good start, is the firmware stable now?)
3: Ubiquiti Cloud Gateway Ultra + U7 Pro

I don't need WiFi 7 imho, may better buy AX-devices?
What is your opinion or do you have other suggestions?

Cheers!
Markus

[Assistant]
The physical environment - walls, floors (1 or 2 or ?) would be helpful.
What are the ISP down/up available ? ISP protocol / physical (coax, fiber, dsl, etc)
What country ?
AX seems to be the sweet spot performance/price. Wifi 7 is still in beta and for most residential little if any help.
IOTs ?
Use case - how many devices, type, usage, etc ?
POE switches are readily available and reasonable cost. Level 2.5 or 3 if you need VLANS.

#3, #2, CISCO SMB, #1 would be my order today.

degrub said:
The physical environment - walls, floors (1 or 2 or ?) would be helpful.
What are the ISP down/up available ? ISP protocol / physical (coax, fiber, dsl, etc)
What country ?
AX seems to be the sweet spot performance/price. Wifi 7 is still in beta and for most residential little if any help.
IOTs ?
Use case - how many devices, type, usage, etc ?
POE switches are readily available and reasonable cost. Level 2.5 or 3 if you need VLANS.

#3, #2, CISCO SMB, #1 would be my order today.
Click to expand...
Okay
2 floors, each ~80m².
WAN comes from coax modem as cooper with max. 250/50 for now. Maybe we get fiber (1000/250) next few years, but no reason for SFP(+) for now.
Germany
Thought so about wifi 7 too, thx.
Some plugs, bulbs, radiator valves and a camera (mostly Tapo/Kasa/TP-Link so far) for now. But there will be more probably
Well 15 IoTs, 3 Smartphones and 4 Laptops/PCs + 1 Printer, 1 NAS, some HiFi-Streamer,...
I don't thing to need vlans or managed switches. I have a TP-Link TL-SG1005P (5Port/4PoE/unmanaged), works fine for me. But the ASUS with PoE right on board sounds nice for me.
Cisco SMB sounds expensive . I worked with Meraki already, don't like it ^^
Are there experiences with the ExpertWifi series?
Want to have as few single devices as possible.
Thank you!

Does the residence have ethernet wall terminations in each/most rooms with common termination in a wiring closet or panel ?
Can you have cable run if needed ?

The construction of the floor/ceiling will affect the ability to use just one AP, particularly for 5 GHz bands. Most SMB APs are intended for lower TX power and spaced closer together to ensure good coverage. The area you quote is relatively small and if the floor plan is open and you can mount the AP on the ceiling then 1 AP per floor can work. If the floor is light construction, possibly only one AP in total if the floor area is close to square. If there are 2 or more walls, particularly if plaster or concrete block, then you may have to get creative with placement on walls and ceiling. If the area is elongated, then perhaps 2 APs each on opposite walls and separate floors would provide enough coverage.

Any idea about the floor plan for each level ?

ASUS has been working on breaking into the SMB market. i have no idea how their gear compares with Ubiquity, Omada, or CISCO SMB gear which are well established. i would hope they have a better firmware QA program in place than what they have for consumer gear. Having a controller, either in the router, a separate device, or the APs is very useful to manage roaming clients to provide more seamless roaming for time sensitive clients/applications. The CISCO SMB APs ( old AC 371s i have) - current 150 series AP, has the AP controller built in and is redundant if one AP fails ie another picks up acting as master controller, which is nice.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Too many options, tell me what to buy :D

Hello all,

I've been looking for a while and doing research but honestly think ive fried my brain go back and forth.

Router is in corner of the house with wired connection to server, desktop & Xbox.
I have 500 Down and 100 up.
Lots of IoT devices

Looking for a decent WiFi router to upgrade my Free ISP one, I need the ability to have seperate wifi SSID's as i would like to put all the smart home stuff on one 2.4ghz to keep it seperate. I'd like the capability to add a 2nd to mesh it the otherside of the house in the future, 2.5gb to the desktop would be nice but as i dont see me upgrading my 500mb speed not essential.

Been looking at:
1. ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AX11000
2. ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AXE11000
3. ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AX6000
4. ASUS RT-AXE7800
But im sure there are some I've missed.

Any opinions/help muich appricated.

[Assistant]
GT-AX6000 or RT-AX88U Pro. Both about the same hardware, both popular around.

Rough size of your living area? Dont forget the fact that 10Gbps are coming (would be a cool art meme with Ed Stark), and most of the 10Gbit ethernet cards cant work on 2,5Gbps (Only on 1Gbps and 10Gbps, but not on 2,5 and 5. At least the ones i put my hands on). The 2,5 are still an awesome choice if you are connecting stars with it. As Tech9 mentioned it before on this forum, AiMesh is the best if you have the same chip manufacturer and fw version -just to think for the future node. If this gives just more reasons to fry your brain, just ignore my comment and listen to the one above

Thanks for the info, its a standard 3 bed semi-detached furthest point is probably 15m through walls/ceilings but wouldnt mind being able to put a node at that point to cover the garden a further 20m.

Side question, i have the option to get a TP-Link BE550 for the same price as a GT-AX6000? is it worth it?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: ASUS router recommendation Wifi 6/6E?

All Asus
AX86U Pro
TUF Gaming AX6000
ROG AX6000
AXE7800

I don't plan to use Wifi 7 anytime soon and the issues with it deter me for now.
Plan to learn basic networking (House is wired so I'll run a port to a switch, also want to play with Vlan, other features) Seems like they all have enough to help/learn.
I want the best signal coverage for 3000+ sqft 3 floor. (I'm aware I'll eventually get an AP to help). But also I'm in a congested area with neighbors plus my 40+ IOT devices.

My thought is the 86U Pro due to it's stability for several years, however the other devices seem newer which potentially would be better? Price is not an issue as they are all between $170-220.

[Assistant]
Ubiquiti wifi6 or TP-Link Omada wifi6 if you want reliability and good coverage. 1 AP per floor at low power to avoid overlap and noise from too much RF power. Wired router at ISP entry point, either double NATed (behind ISP router) or behind ISP router/modem in bridge mode. Learning curve is not too steep and the Ubiquiti gear has a very good user interface.
see many posts by @Tech9

I was interested in Ubiquiti but the cost became an issue. I didn't see how I could get the router plus AP's from them and still be in the $170-220ish range. I could add more AP's later but even a router and 2 AP's would be a lot more unless I'm wrong. Do they have routers that would equal similar features/abilities as what I mentioned in the same price range?

Edit: Staying away from TP-Link

The AX86U Pro and AX88U Pro are still the most recommended Asus routers.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Wi-Fi 7 worth upgrade?

I have a Asus rt-ax86u(not pro) and looking at the Flint 3 router and I am wondering if it is worth the upgrade. I was feeling the need with all the recent exploits and security concerns to upgrade to third-party firmware and I know gl-inet uses a flavor of dd-wrt. Is that the best hardware to both use and learn dd-wrt? My usage is low. Only two people with about nine devices total and maybe four devices online any given time with the priority being my wired desktop. I only pay for 500/500Mbps fiber and that is more than enough speed for me. The house is also small and the router I have now provides more than enough coverage so I don't need a mesh or wired AP solution. The area is also not very congested physically, so congestion of the Wi-Fi band is also really not an issue. I guess I am only tempted because I hear so many great things about the Flint routers and want to try them. Are there any benefits to Wi-Fi 7 I haven't thought of? Like improve latency to Wi-Fi cameras if I ever choose to install them outside? Or is that not a big issue? Thanks for the input.

[Assistant]
Sounds like a mild case of G.A.S. Get one if you want to play, but based on your description, it is a solution in search of a problem for the use case. And wifi 7 is a work in progress.

Nope not worth it for most. It's a lot of market hype with very little difference over all.

Optimus2357 said:
I know gl-inet uses a flavor of dd-wrt

OpenWrt.

Optimus2357 said:
Are there any benefits to Wi-Fi 7

For your use case - No.


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: RT-BE86U vs RT-BE92U

My 6 year old AC86U is finally dying on me, forcing me to reboot it multiple times a day. Originally I was looking at the 92U last year for 6ghz but I’ve since realized I don’t need 6ghz right now. I looked at getting a AX86U PRO but it’s out of stock locally and Amazon says it’ll take a week to get here which is too long. Locally I can get either a BE86U or a BE92U.

I’d like a router that will get software updates for the next 3 years if possible. Which of these two routers would be a better option?

[Assistant]
Both will most likely get updates for next 3 years or longer.

I almost bought the BE86U to upgrade from an AX86U PRO but then realized that it has crippled WiFi 7 since it's missing the 6 GHz band. I ended up buying two BE92Us and they've been perfect! I connected them as an AiMesh system with MLO and getting the same internet speeds that I would normally get while connected via LAN on my laptops/phones.

Tech9 said:
Both will most likely get updates for next 3 years or longer.
What about the AX86U Pro? Will that also get updates for the next 3 years?


[System] You are a professional Wi-Fi router support assistant; I will provide forum posts as background material, and you should learn from them while remaining aware that forum content may be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect — when uncertain, explicitly note that you are uncertain and refer the user to official documentation or other authoritative sources for verification.

[User]
Title: Solved Should I ditch Asus or go deeper into the rabit hole?

I am moving into a 4 story house soon and I currently have a Asus RT-AX55. The AX55 is fine as of now but I am afraid that I'm going to lock myself into Asus exclusive eco system but I also don't want to throw away a perfectly good router. Should I cut my lost and go with something more open nature like easymesh (Tp link, Tenda and ZTE devices) or should I stick to Asus and go full Aimesh?

[Assistant]
In the end it is your money. Many have a good experience with Asus Aimesh as long as the routers and nodes are of the same technology (AX to AX). Others have not had a good experience and complain a lot. I have been with Asus routers since my RT-N66U and have had only one failure that was replaced by Asus at the very end of the warranty period. Amazon usually has some good deals on "refurbished" routers.

bbunge said:
In the end it is your money. Many have a good experience with Asus Aimesh as long as the routers and nodes are of the same technology (AX to AX). Others have not had a good experience and complain a lot. I have been with Asus routers since my RT-N66U and have had only one failure that was replaced by Asus at the very end of the warranty period. Amazon usually has some good deals on "refurbished" routers.
I own an RT-N12+ since 2015 so I understand it. I just wish Asus supported easymesh along with their aimesh. Most of my country's ISPs used easymesh compatible devices from ZTE and Dasan which are available for cheap on the used market. On the other hand, I do live close to China and have access to Chinese exclusive routers both used and new(ish) imported for cheap. This include Asus, ZTE and Xiaomi, the only caviat here is that the UI will likely be Chinese only (Asus is confirmed to still use the Asus app to setup as normal). Tp link is a whole different can of worms since they did setup a factory here but still have some models imported from China. I could go for a cheap aimesh system or build a cheap easymesh system from scratch for slightly more.

spend your money on ethernet cabling (CAT6) to each floor or use existing dedicated coax (moca) to each floor. Wired backhaul will always work more reliably and at higher throughput than wifi backhaul in this environment.

If you go with wifi backhaul as the only option, use gear that has a dedicated radio for backhaul. 2.4 GHz radios can usually penetrate a wooden floor reasonably, however, this is the most congested band and you may see enough interference and signal reduction to drop bandwidth significantly. 5GHz radio backhaul may penetrate one floor or wall and may be a little less crowded. 6GHz band radios have a hard time getting through 1 wall or floor. They are best with open air line of sight situations.

Don't bother with ISP speed offerings > 1Gbit/s unless free. It is mostly for bragging rights and supporting G.A.S. . You will have to use more expensive gear to take advantage of higher ISP marketing with no effective gain in user experience. You can likely easily get away with 300-500 Mb/s ISP download service and not notice issues. particularly if you are planning to use less expensive consumer gear like what you have. WIFI6 gear is the sweet spot for price/performance/least issues as it is a mature technology. Fiber to the house ISP service should have the least issues over time.