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I can spend $30 or $250 on a router, what do I really need?

pete6032

pete6032

Diamond Member
I live by myself in about a 1,000 sf 1 level apartment. I have a 75 meg internet connection. I don't have a console and I have a wired connection to my PC, but I don't play game. Everything else is wifi - cell phone, laptop, tablet. I don't have any special needs for internet use, and do not do any home networking stuff. I just stream music, surf the internet, and watch netflix or streaming sports. What is the best router for me?
 
I assume you already have one. Just optimize it's placement. Treat it like a light. So often simply elevating it helps greatly. Most people stuff their routers down behind the TV or on the floor next to power bricks and AC cables. All those things produce alot of noise and the backs of TVs is often metallic and blocks/reflects away WiFi. I think you get the idea . Try to maximize what you have and if the router is ugly to look at, put a picture with a non-matallic frame right in front of it.
 
razel said:
I assume you already have one. Just optimize it's placement. Treat it like a light. So often simply elevating it helps greatly. Most people stuff their routers down behind the TV or on the floor next to power bricks and AC cables. All those things produce alot of noise and the backs of TVs is often metallic and blocks/reflects away WiFi. I think you get the idea . Try to maximize what you have and if the router is ugly to look at, put a picture with a non-matallic frame right in front of it.
Click to expand...
I currently have a Linksys EA4200 if I recall correctly. I've had it for about 5 years. It's mounted on the wall, away from the TV, but I still have problems with it. My Blu ray player sits about 10 feet away from the router on wifi and it will stream video fine and then all of a sudden it totally drops the signal and I have to restart the blu ray player. I've also noticed my phone switching from wifi to mobile data more frequently over the past few months even though I'm only a few feet from the router. I've had to power cycle everything more often as well, so I think the router is crapping out.
 
Is it really router that you need or an access point?
Does the wired PC's connection die, or are all problems (due to) wireless?
 
EA4200 is an N router. It's time to upgrade to an AC. You don't need to spend much. Linksys has the EA6400 an AC for $30(https://www.linksys.com/us/p/P-EA6400-RM/) Depending on which revision they send you, you can install DD-WRT on it. They have other killer routers on sale there as well.

I believe the TP-Link Archer C8 was $30 a few days ago from newegg. I'm partial to onHub/GWiFi and ASUS routers that support AiMesh but those are closer to $100. As for streaming off a BluRay player wire it up. If that is a basic BluRay with smart features, it's not fast in the 1st place. Additionally it can also be your ISP that gets bogged down. Even when I had 200mb/s at home wired, during the busiest times when everyone else is streaming, I don't get stutters, but 4k/1080p content can drop down to SD resolutions.
 
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if you're looking to spend upwards of $100.00 consider assembling your own firewall w/ routing capabilities.

$50 mini embedded itx board w/ wifi + $50 cheapo ITX case + pfSense/Untangle OS x86 will get you something better than any store bought router. the latest versions are super easy to configure; just pick which interfaces for WAN/LAN, designate your DHCP range and you're pretty much set.
 
IIRC, pfsense has very poor WiFi support, unless it's been upgraded substantially for most recent version.

You still need to add memory, SSD.

v2.5 demands CPU with AES-NI feature too, saw the requirement in the forum.

It's also not for the faint of heart of generic end users.
 
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razel said:
EA4200 is an N router. It's time to upgrade to an AC. You don't need to spend much. Linksys has the EA6400 an AC for $30(https://www.linksys.com/us/p/P-EA6400-RM/) Depending on which revision they send you, you can install DD-WRT on it. They have other killer routers on sale there as well.
Click to expand...

Though this price is decent for a Refurbished Router, One has to be careful.

If a user does not have a demanding AC Wireless Device, the N part of the Router is only N300.


😎
 
mxnerd said:
IIRC, pfsense has very poor WiFi support, unless it's been upgraded substantially for most recent version.

You still need to add memory, SSD.

v2.5 demands CPU with AES-NI feature too, saw the requirement in the forum.

It's also not for the faint of heart of generic end users.
Click to expand...

DDR2 and small Sata II SSD are short money, though; we're talking 1GB memory and 20GB storage being plenty adequate. If the user doesn't really want to learn and troubleshoot pfSense, there's always Untangle--which has decent wireless support AFAIK.
 
Last time I tried pfsense Wi-Fi, it only supports 802.11g up to 54Mbps. Even though my adapter is 802.11n.

Now 802.11ac is everywhere, and it's not supported by pfsense (feebsd based) at all at this moment.

https://wiki.freebsd.org/WiFi/80211ac

Unless OP wants to filter a lot of websites/contents, doing VPN for all his devices, create firewall rules/VLANs , realtime scanning of virus, etc. for his network, what's the point learning pfsense?
 
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What I am trying to say (a little sarcasm), pfsense is a Router replacement.

Wireless Routers are a combo Router and Access Point that share the same Box.

Most of the issue raised on this forum by innocent posters are concerning Wireless.

So it is not "nice" to use pfsense as a solution to Wireless issues without elaborating on the Wireless issue.
-------------------------------------------
First rule of Wireless is: "Do not get a main unit that the Antennae are inside the box".

Most times the internal Antenna are of very low quality and do not provide flexible capacity to control their position. Being inside practically on the circuit board, most also suffer from lower SNR (Signal to noise ratio).

At this time this Wireless Router is one of decent compromise on performance/price).

https://www.amazon.com/TP-Link-Archer-AC1900-Smart-Router/dp/B00BUSDVBQ?th=1


😎
 
Go to smallnetbuilder.com.

Go to the router rankings.

Sort them by rankings.

Buy the best ranked ~$100 802.11ac router/WAP.

Replace your Linksys with it.

The problems you have going forward will not be your router.
 
JackMDS said:
First rule of Wireless is: "Do not get a main unit that the Antennae are inside the box".

Most times the internal Antenna are of very low quality and do not provide flexible capacity to control their position. Being inside practically on the circuit board, most also suffer from lower SNR (Signal to noise ratio).
Click to expand...
Is that rule for cheap consumer crap?

The "enterprise solutions" on shops and campus almost never have external Antenna:
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_pg_..._89:HP|Ubiquiti+Networks|Aruba+Networks|Cisco
 
"Business" class wifi gear doesn't have to be expensive.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01LLAK1UG/

I have v2 of the product and have been very happy with it. (The tablet-shaped one, not the wavy-surface one.) It seems to work a little better than the old 802.11n router I was using as a WAP, PoE is a nice bonus. If I had a bunch of them, centralized management would be helpful, but that's not a common home application.
 
Router/AP with external antennas probably works better, but I hate them!

It's unsightly and so easy to break.
 
mv2devnull said:
Is it really router that you need or an access point?
Does the wired PC's connection die, or are all problems (due to) wireless?
Click to expand...
It's only the blu ray player. My wired connection never drops. I stream music from my tablet and use wifi on my phone and those seem to be OK, don't usually have problems with them, so maybe it is the blu ray player? I occasionally do get drops on my laptop but I generally stream sports from "alternative" websites so I chock up those delays to poor streams.

BTRY B 529th FA BN said:
Are you on Cable, DSL, other ? If cable, what modem do you have?
Click to expand...

I am on cable and have this: Zoom 8x4 Docsis 3.0 modem
https://www.amazon.com/Zoom-5345-Certified-Spectrum-Providers/dp/B013C4L6OE
 
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