Best home wireless AC router 2014?

[PliotronX]

QoS on a SOHO level has always been crap for me, even with open source firmware implementations. In order for it to "theoretically" work, you have to drop your overall bandwidth by 15%, making the router the bottleneck purposefully. I don't know about your situation, but I'm not paying for 15% less bandwidth LOL. Even with careful consideration about the prioritization, it has always resulted in higher latencies and slower overall speeds IME. I would instead look into constricting bandwidth intelligently by application. For example BitTorrent will download quite well without interrupting service (at least IME) when the bandwidth is capped at a lower overall speed. Note this is not like QoS where capping takes place of the overall line speed. Some routers may have the ability to limit bandwidth by MAC address which would be an interesting feature so that those who are incapable of balancing bandwidth in a network can still be managed. Overall, I have just always been disappointed by QoS unless we are talking VLAN tagging and enterprise class hardware which the Asus clearly is not nor is it trying to be.

 

[Nate_007]

So should I just disable the QOS altogether? Yeah usually when I'm downloading something, I limit my bandwidth using a download manager. So my guest-pc will have enough bandwidth for browsing. Still trying figure out exactly how Asus designed the QOS functionality on this router.

I read somewhere that only the RT-AC87 version, which is a $300 router, has the engine capable of throttling BW for each client. Now Im thinking maybe I should have gotten that...but it's way out of my budget lol. The AC68U was already out of my budget.

 

[Makaveli]

Some routers may have the ability to limit bandwidth by MAC address which would be an interesting feature so that those who are incapable of balancing bandwidth in a network can still be managed.

I've been looking for a consumer grade router than can do this kinda traffic management either by MAC or IP address and i've not found anything in well over 10 years.

I'm still in the market to upgrade my DGL 4500 and that asus model looks great just would still like this option available... Seems I may have to build a linux router to get this functionality, or go with an used but expensive cisco router.

I read somewhere that only the RT-AC87 version, which is a $300 router, has the engine capable of throttling BW for each client.

Will have to do some research on this.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Bandwidth isn't critical for your gaming PC, first off - what matters is latency. Very few online games are bandwidth-limited.

Secondly, the focus of QoS out of the box is making sure everything works. (Everybody has service.) So it limits traffic based on content type, not just per-client.

I leave QoS on so Crashplan and Youtube uploads don't clog my upstream connection, and break the interwebs. MMOs work fine and I still usually have the lowest ping of anybody in a given MechWarrior PUG, even if the housemate is watching Netflix.

(My contention is that ASUS QoS works fine, even if it doesn't work how you think you want it to work.)

If you want to do per-client bandwidth limitation, that's a different ball of wax. (And afaik requires flashed firmware or CLI tinkering to execute on the router.) There are reasons to look into it, but for gaming and web surfing in a multi-human household I wouldn't worry about it. (And really, when you're not using the connection, why should client PC #2 be limited to 10% of the available BW?)

(And if it's a machine you own, it's easy enough - possibly easier - to add a bandwidth throttle directly on the client anyway.)

 

[azazel1024]

I've been looking for a consumer grade router than can do this kinda traffic management either by MAC or IP address and i've not found anything in well over 10 years.

I'm still in the market to upgrade my DGL 4500 and that asus model looks great just would still like this option available... Seems I may have to build a linux router to get this functionality, or go with an used but expensive cisco router.



Will have to do some research on this.

You have? Because I've seen a lot of routers that can do effective bandwidth management. What is hard is QoS. They are two different things. Bandwidth management allows a certain maximum and can also target a certain minimum, depending on the router, for an IP or MAC address. QoS generally works on an L7 level looking at the actual applications involved to prioritize services.

So bandwidth management is going to attempt to balance (BALANCE) per IP or MAC. QoS (on a router, not switch QoS) is going to attempt to balance on an application level, like balancing VOIP against video streaming against online gaming against bit torrent, etc.

I've seen pretty decent bandwidth management from several routers (example, TP-Link Archer C7) that seems to work pretty well. Now granted, you aren't necessarily going to be able to do something like set 10% for one PC and 90% for the other (well, you can do that, but then you also have your max pipe for any one user capped artificially), but you can set appropriate max targets.

 

[Makaveli]

You have? Because I've seen a lot of routers that can do effective bandwidth management. What is hard is QoS. They are two different things. Bandwidth management allows a certain maximum and can also target a certain minimum, depending on the router, for an IP or MAC address. QoS generally works on an L7 level looking at the actual applications involved to prioritize services.

So bandwidth management is going to attempt to balance (BALANCE) per IP or MAC. QoS (on a router, not switch QoS) is going to attempt to balance on an application level, like balancing VOIP against video streaming against online gaming against bit torrent, etc.

I've seen pretty decent bandwidth management from several routers (example, TP-Link Archer C7) that seems to work pretty well. Now granted, you aren't necessarily going to be able to do something like set 10% for one PC and 90% for the other (well, you can do that, but then you also have your max pipe for any one user capped artificially), but you can set appropriate max targets.

Good explanation.

But yes looking for more than just basic management which had been on most routers for years now.

Want something alittle more advanced without going into enterprise grade equipment.

 

[alkemyst]

QoS is not a solution for bandwidth issues, but commonly thought of as one.

It's a method of prioritizing traffic.

If you have bandwidth issues and apply QoS, you will still drop unintended traffic.

 

[Nate_007]

Yeah so I guess QOS works but just had the wrong idea of it. I don't really have any BW issues, I'm just trying to prevent a way so none of my devices will hog all my BW. So I thought that putting a BW limit on my devices should is the best option.

I have 60mbps plan and I only watch Netflix on HD which recommends a 5mbps connection for that quality, so I want to allocate 10% of my BW to my HTPC. But I guess I'm fine with equal distribution of my BW for now. Is it even possible for this router's QOS at all to prevent one device from hogging all my BW?

 

[JackMDS]

The real problem is "Wishful thinking" a lot of the above can be done, but not with Entry Level Devices.

"One would never be able to use a Fiat 500 as the main vehicle for construction company".

Many people like nice shiny Marble/Granite Counter Tops in their kitchens.

The average cost is about $5000.

For whatever reason the Brain stop processing Reality with the price of a Real solution to a modern Wireless Internet/Networking.

Networking solution must be solved with one or two sub $100 devices. - - :| - - .

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Is it even possible for this router's QOS at all to prevent one device from hogging all my BW?

Yes. That's what it does. But it does it by prioritizing certain types of traffic over other types, not by limiting bandwidth absolutely.

If you adjust the QoS rules to prioritize your gaming traffic, or just to limit streaming traffic in general to 25%, you should be fine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2rsUDIsx_w