Question What fibre modem/router do I need with mesh wi-fi?

[mrdaveyboy]

Hi there

I need to replace the modem/router that comes from my ISP (UK). I use it with BT Whole Home Mesh wi fi discs. It is fast fibre via BT Open Reach network.

Can someone help me understand what I need? I assume it is a modem/router, and that most of these come with wifi. However I am struggling to choose one as all reviews refer to wi fi capability which I don't need. As an average user (not a gamer, who doesn't need to tweak settings, apart from DNS to use open DNS) can I just get a basic one?

Any recommendations for a reliable budget modem/router, remembering that I am not at all interested in the wifi capability.

Since I don't know what I'm looking for in the modem/router side of things (as opposed to wifi) I don't know what to search for on Google. 'Best budget modem router for someone that doesn't care about wifi' isn't helping me!

Happy to go second hand.

Thanks

 

[aigomorla]

how much exactly is your budget? What is your Bandwidth WAN Speed also?

You need a fairly powerful router if your going to handle traffic greater then or equal to 1gb WAN.
You will even need a 2.5gbe Router if your bandwith is greater then 1gbe.

Reason is you need it to be sync 1gb up and down concurrent.
That means a 39.99 Chinese router shouldn't be the thing you are a looking for.

I would personally isolate the wifi and the router into 2 units.
The Wifi should be on an access point, and the router itself, possibly put a middleman PoE switch in between to handle any additional cross traffic that doesn't need to be sent from Wan to Lan.

So basically 3 pieces of equipment is my initial recommendation.

Fiber ONT -> Modem (however sometimes you can connect to ONT directly depending on ISP) -> Router -> PoE Switch -> Access Point.

 

[mrdaveyboy]

Budget = cheap! Hoping for £30 second hand. It seems to be that used good but budget consumer wifi router might be the cheapest option.
Fibre speed is 73Mbps.
I only need something to equal the capability of my current ISP provided Technicolour DGA0122.
Not a professional job, I've never been good on networking.

Thanks for helping me focus my question.

 

[aigomorla]

i would see if you can get any of these routers, and flash it to DD-WRT.

Supported Devices - DD-WRT Wiki

wiki.dd-wrt.com

Its not very difficult to do, and DD-WRT is a very stable build.
It would probably fit your bill perfectly.

Another is a Tomato compatabile router.... here is a list of tomato supported devices:

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Tomato_Firmware/Supported_Devices

But either DD-WRT or Tomato is probably your ideal solution.


Watch Youtube videos if your lost on how to flash.
There should be enough resource for you on Youtube to successfully flash one of those routers.

 

[mrdaveyboy]

i would see if you can get any of these routers, and flash it to DD-WRT.

Supported Devices - DD-WRT Wiki

wiki.dd-wrt.com

Its not very difficult to do, and DD-WRT is a very stable build.
It would probably fit your bill perfectly.

Another is a Tomato compatabile router.... here is a list of tomato supported devices:

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Tomato_Firmware/Supported_Devices

But either DD-WRT or Tomato is probably your ideal solution.


Watch Youtube videos if your lost on how to flash.
There should be enough resource for you on Youtube to successfully flash one of those routers.

Yes I did that once many years ago.

I was hoping for something less complicated.

Perhaps my question is really just:
'What is the cheapest (happy to go second hand) reasonable like for like 'plug in' replacement for the Technicolour DGA0122 that allows use of OpenDNS? Can I use supplied modem/routers from other ISPs (there are a lot on Ebay)'?

 

[mrdaveyboy]

Actually I have been able to enter OpenDNS DNS into the router, so all good.

This is despite it saying on Open DNS site that 'In general, Technicolor devices are distributed as a part of Internet provider packages and cannot be configured for OpenDNS'.