I own 2 WRT54GLs, and 2 older WRT54G's. all running DD-WRT

I have gigabit copper run around my house, using a SD2008 switch to tie it all together.

I am swapping back to TWC, took a year off to try and save $$ with DSL, but could not deal with the slow speed anymore.

I purchased a Motorola SB6141 instead of getting another one of the refurbed rental modems from TWC.

I am looking for a router, wired or wireless, that will handle a large number of connections without puking.

We have:
2 gaming pcs, a smart tv, 2 blu-ray players, 2 laptops, a Wii, a 360, and ~9 small devices including phones and kindles.

The WRT54GL works great... until it doesn't. When the total number of connections gets high, it tends to misbehave. With the kids using amazon to watch stuff on the tablet and the tv, and the wife and I gaming and using voice services on the desktops, it runs the connection count up fast.

I am fine with a all wired router, and using the currents ones solely as access points, I also have an older Cisco business class AP that I normally only power up when I am mowing in order to extend the wireless to cover the entire yard. However, it has no routing capability, and is just set up as a range booster.

3/15/2014 10:48:04 AM

http://brentroad.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=629575

3/15/2014 12:29:07 PM

I run an asus AC66, but the AC68 is looking to be a little more feature ridden.

I have a high gain antenna on mine as well, so I can be across literally an open field streaming content when I'm out for a walk. I bought refurbished, flashed custom...and the High gain was just a perk of the buy.

3/16/2014 8:16:07 AM

ASUS RT-N66U and love it.

3/16/2014 5:34:13 PM

^me too.

3/16/2014 8:50:22 PM

I dug the AIR-AP1242AG-A-K9 out of the barn, still need to get it back configured.

I care about having 100% uptime, and nice configuration options or DD WRT compatibility is a plus.

I don't really need wireless N capability, as the TV and desktops are wired connections. The most intensive thing the wireless does is stream video to a tablet or phone.

It seems like every nice/decent router I find these days is a 100-200 price range with 3-5 antennas

3/16/2014 8:58:06 PM

you have a lot of devices IMO...you need something with a little more oomph

Get an N router at least...spend around $130 max and get something pretty kick ass.

Asus is what's kicking some serious ass lately.

3/17/2014 10:20:50 AM

for reliability, the things to look for are the chipset (there's not too many out there, look at the dd-wrt compatibility list), the cooling, and the process for connecting the antennae. asus has a few decent ~$5 antennae on the box that are laser cut to the actual wavelength (or some harmonic multiple) of the wavelength they are producing. you can get a cheap router with the same chipset and add a couple heat sinks to the board and drill the case and attach good antennae that are appropriate for your application

3/17/2014 12:02:18 PM

I have the RT-AC66U and love it.

Quote :

"I have a high gain antenna on mine as well, so I can be across literally an open field streaming content when I'm out for a walk. I bought refurbished, flashed custom...and the High gain was just a perk of the buy."

[Edited on March 17, 2014 at 12:58 PM. Reason : Can you provide a link to what you bought? I'd love to extend the range a lil more.]

[Edited on March 17, 2014 at 1:24 PM. Reason : /]

3/17/2014 12:56:46 PM

http://slickdeals.net/share/android_app/fp/116140

Asus n66r refurbished for $80 from newegg

3/17/2014 1:32:44 PM

I'm only looking for the high gain antennas to add to the AC66U.

3/17/2014 1:37:20 PM

OK? My link wasn't in reply to you... Just a general post since people are looking for routers.

3/17/2014 3:45:03 PM

anything change in the last two weeks ?

my apartment in the carribean is only 900 Sq ft and internet there doesn't go above 30 mpbs ... so I don't need a gigantaur router... trying to stay under $100, but not get something that's going to die on me half way through my 2 years there.

3/30/2014 4:56:48 PM

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2143623/linksys-wrt1900ac-wi-fi-router-review-faster-than-anything-we-ve-tested.html

Anyone got this yet?

Quote :

"The WRT1900AC proved to be 4- to 30-percent faster than Asus’s RT-AC68U, depending on the test location."

I'm running the RT-AC66U and it's been pretty good.

6/12/2014 2:13:54 PM

$280? lol

6/12/2014 3:35:31 PM

$250 now

6/13/2014 12:53:38 PM

I have the 30mbps plan from TWC, and they gave me this awful 2-in-1 UBEE modem/router dealio, so I need to get a router and try to bridge it (I know I saw a tutorial somewhere on this forum before). Any recommendations on what I need for a router in that setup? Pretty standard fare?

6/15/2014 6:59:59 PM

http://www.netgear.com/home/products/networking/wifi-routers/R8000.aspx

Up to 3.2Gbps
Tri-Band Wi-Fi
6 high performance antennas & amplifiers
Smart Connect designates slower and faster devices to separate Wi-Fi bands
1GHz dual core processor with 3 offload processors


$300

Comes out July 11

[Edited on June 26, 2014 at 3:06 PM. Reason : .]

6/26/2014 3:05:54 PM

Anyone else find it strange that Netgear, ASUS and Linksys are releasing the same damn products in different plastic cases?

ASUS RT-AC3200 == Netgear R8000 (AC3200), and I'm sure the Linksys model will come sometime later this year.

I personally wait on the ASUS version(s), as their firmware tends to be more mature and frankly I like their visual design of the product better.

6/26/2014 7:39:03 PM

it's not strange, they all use the same broadcom chipsets stamped out by foxconn.

6/27/2014 7:22:10 AM

I have this: NETGEAR Wireless Router - N600 Dual Band Gigabit (WNDR3700 http://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-Wireless-Router-Gigabit-WNDR3700/dp/B002HWRJY4

It is on a 3rd floor and we simply don't get good download speed with it on devices that are not hard-wired. I have the xbox hard wired and when it is on, most wireless connection fail. I've tried moving the router to the center of the house (without anything hardwired) and the wireless connections are still weak. They connect for a bit, struggle, and fail almost daily when we are supposed to have 50/5. I have an SB6121 modem.
Even being in the same room as the wifi device being used, we do not get full speed. It seems to be getting worse each day.

I would like a router with high signal strength and the ability to not allow a hard wired device to eat up all the available bandwidth. Hit me

[Edited on September 9, 2015 at 4:10 PM. Reason : ttt]

9/9/2015 3:59:35 PM

if you have ports around the house, add access points off the main router. a couple $20 tp-link units will do it

9/10/2015 10:49:55 PM

I do not have any ports around the house.


So the Xbone (harwdired) gets 50/5 but a laptop in the same room gets 3/1 to 10/1.

9/26/2015 9:07:09 PM

Are the wifi channels set to minimize interference from neighboring wifi?

9/28/2015 11:53:45 AM

I used an analyzer to select best channels, did some other optimization steps after some googling, it's just weak sauce. It can be just as weak in the same room as it is 2 floors away from the router.

[Edited on September 28, 2015 at 1:42 PM. Reason : when I say weak, I mean bandwidth/speed signal strength seems fine]

9/28/2015 1:36:38 PM

You tried 5ghz? 2.4ghz doesn't work great in my apartment but I still get 300-350mbps a room over. Mainly due to all the 2.4ghz channels in my apartment complex. Over 5ghz I easily max it out at ~700-800mbps I believe.

Using something like speedtest.net is not a good measure of your network speed. It'll simply tell you if your network can go up to the throughput you're paying for from your ISP. Do an intranet test or just look at the status of the adapter.

If you're in windows go into adapter settings and right click on the wireless adapter and click status. That should tell you a ballpark signal mbps throughput. Usually that's in line with network transfer speeds.

9/28/2015 5:40:49 PM

I use 2.4ghz as I understand it has greater range. Plus we do a lot of tv apps that can't do 5ghz.
EDIT: 2.4ghz goes down to about 50-80Mbps when I am 2 floors way, it was a delayed drop

I guess I can go back to blaming TWC? Just ran a bunch of speed tests and they all are ~2mbps for most of the test, then spike wildly for moment, which affects the end number. I've gotten a huge range of 4-140mbps down as my final result in about 10 tests now. Most are ~20-30mpbs, we pay for 50/5. upload is always at 5.

[Edited on September 28, 2015 at 6:08 PM. Reason : edit]

9/28/2015 5:57:08 PM

Quote :

"2.4ghz goes down to about 50-80Mbps when I am 2 floors way"

That's pretty good actually.

9/28/2015 6:14:28 PM

Quote :

"That's pretty good actually."

It depends. Wireless N should have theoretical speeds up to 300mbps. Lower in practice but 50-80 is a decent drop for 2.4ghz. I guess 2 floors could be a decent amount of distance but if you're close to a window...

9/28/2015 8:25:30 PM

300 is only with dual band. 150 is the max for 2.4 only

9/30/2015 8:42:24 AM

I'm seeing old wireless N routers that say 300mbps over 2.4 and 450mbps over 5. I'm not sure though. I think there's other factors as well.

--nvm maybe that's 150 for 2.4 plus 300 for 5ghz is 450 total.

Get an AC router. N is quite old.

[Edited on September 30, 2015 at 10:32 AM. Reason : s]

9/30/2015 10:22:43 AM

Is AC mostly for newish devices? I was under the assumption that "old" tech (smart tvs, 3-4 year old laptops, kids 8 year old pc, kindle, leap pad, and chromecast) can't utilize it

10/13/2015 12:11:20 PM

Correct although the new Chromecast has AC and 5ghz the 1st gen one only has N@2.4ghz. Any decent laptop or device released in the last 2-3 years will have AC but not always 5ghz.

10/13/2015 12:23:40 PM

you have that backwards. all mimo wifi cards (standard in the last few years) have 5ghz but few are AC, most are N.


[Edited on October 13, 2015 at 12:38 PM. Reason : .]

10/13/2015 12:36:09 PM

Not in my experience. Every single one of our Dell e7440's have AC single channel (2.4gz) cards. Most cheaper laptops I've run into only have 2.4ghz but do have AC. I've had to order quite a few dual band AC cards to swap out in laptops that only have 2.4 AC so they can get on the less busy 5ghz channels.

10/13/2015 12:40:27 PM

I've got an ASUS RT-AC68U, because I'm DINK and just don't give a fuck with two middle fingers in the air.

10/13/2015 3:51:31 PM

Quote :

"IEEE 802.11ac is a wireless networking standard in the 802.11 family (which is marketed under the brand name Wi-Fi), developed in the IEEE Standards Association process,[1] providing high-throughput wireless local area networks (WLANs) on the 5 GHz band.[1] The standard was developed from 2011 through 2013 and approved in January 2014.[1][2]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_802.11ac

ac requires 5ghz. n150 is 2.4ghz, n300 is possible with 2.4ghz, but most gear won't do 40mhz channels and will only do 20, so to get 300mbps and above reliably, you need 5ghz (the baseline for ac)

10/13/2015 8:30:18 PM

I guess I overlooked that. All our Dell must have single band N and we replaced them with dual band AC.

10/14/2015 10:00:40 AM

Quote :

"I'm running the RT-AC66U and it's been pretty good."

I can attest to this.

10/14/2015 12:11:56 PM

Is that Asus RT-AC68 still what is recommended? I have had some spotty internet speeds and after doing some local wifi testing it appears that my router is the issue.

I'm also DINK so on't give a shit about cost

12/6/2015 11:00:06 AM

are you hoping to run a custom firmware like dd-wrt or just plan on a drop in replacement?

12/6/2015 1:58:05 PM

i don't plan to run custom firmware, i do like the ability to for the potential in the future but it is not a feature that I have a strong need for and not having the ability is not a dealbreaker at all.

The reason I am having issues is that the 5 GHz range on my router is not enough and the 2.4GHz channels around me are very crowded (in fact the strongest 2.4Ghz channel isn't even my router, it's my neighbors). 5Ghz is wide open, but my current router is really only usable for 5Ghz inside the room with the router.

That Asus looks good, and I like that it's available in white, but I'm not sure if there is something newer that is an improvement

12/6/2015 2:14:47 PM

do I need MU-MIMO? i don't know shit about routers

Edit: sounds like not yet

[Edited on December 6, 2015 at 8:57 PM. Reason : .]

12/6/2015 8:30:02 PM

Quote :

"my current router is really only usable for 5Ghz inside the room with the router"

That's how all the 5 GHz stuff works. It doesn't go through walls worth a damn.

Asus routers are awesome. If you can run some network cable, think about adding an access point or 2 to improve your 5 GHz coverage.

12/7/2015 12:18:49 PM

I can easily go two rooms over with my 5ghz. I don't get the 600-700+ mbps I get right next to the router but it still easily exceeds the 125 mbps download I have with Comcast. It may drop to 200-300 mbps a couple rooms over but still fine for internet. If I'm transferring a file to a wireless device I just bring it to the same room to fully utilize AC speeds.

12/7/2015 12:41:39 PM

the feature you're looking for is "beam forming" antennas

12/7/2015 3:08:28 PM

I'm going with the ASUS, the Netgear R7000 appears to have slightly better technical reviews but a lot of consumer reviews talk about firmware issues and Netgear removing features with firmware updates. ASUSWRT seems pretty good.

(and I understand the limitations of 5Ghz, what I'm saying is that my router has below average performance. Even for 2.4Ghz my neighbors router is a stronger signal than my own router. the attenuation was killing my throughput)

[Edited on December 8, 2015 at 10:23 AM. Reason : .]

12/8/2015 10:04:18 AM

I think you'll like it. It's supported by the new ASUS Router app for Android, which is neat:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.asus.aihome

12/8/2015 10:40:55 AM

i got the netgear r6400 because some website told me to. haven't hooked it up yet though

12/8/2015 11:19:20 AM

This ASUS is sweet, thanks for the recommendation

12/9/2015 6:10:15 PM