Best wireless router out there?

[grandnexus]

I'm looking to buy a new router. I'm looking for one with at least 4 ports, is 10/100/1000, supports wireless N, and has 2.4 and 5 ghz channels.

What is the best one out there? I was thinking the linksys E4200, but I'm interested in your opinion.

 

[jwcooper]

The Airport Extreme is widely considered the best. If you own an iOS device, you can manage it using an app.

 

[smitbret]

The Airport Extreme is widely considered the best by almost all Mac fanbois. If you own an iOS device, you can manage it using an app.

I fixed that for you.

 

[smitbret]

Routers are like cars. You can't just walk up to someone and ask them what the best car is. It's tough to find a router that does both 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz well. A lot of times you'll find one that's great with 2.4GHz but has terrible range with 5Ghz or it kills the 2.4Ghz when you turn on the 5Ghz, etc.

Do a search on the E4200 and you'll turn up a significant amount of these types of issues with it. Although you'll probably find a lot of people that really enjoy it as well.

I have a D-Link DIR-825 and it has performed flawlessly for the last three years. My 5Ghz is only used for a stretch of about 12 feet as the crow flies and many people would complain about its range.

If I were spending my money, right now for the purposes you listed, I would go with:

Asus RT-N56U
or
Netgear WNDR4500 N900
or
Netgear WNDR3700
or
Apple Airport Extreme

.... in that order.

Also, when checking review sites and things like that, it's healthy to disregard any collective consumer ratings (3 stars out of 5, etc.) Almost any other product, I thoroughly weight customer happiness more than the reviewers/editor ratings, but not for networking devices. Most network problems are the fault of the consumer and they just end up blaming the router. I check the comments, but ignore the customer scores.

 

[grandnexus]

Asus RT-N56U
or
Netgear WNDR4500 N900
or
Netgear WNDR3700
or
Apple Airport Extreme

.... in that order.

I was looking at the WNDR4500 and WNDR3700 on newegg, there is a $80 difference, but I don't see many spec differences except that the 4500 has more memory and can do a theoretical throughput of 450Mbps on wireless where as the 3700 does the standard 300Mbps.

Is $80 really worth that? Is the WNDR4500 better in some way I'm missing?

 

[smitbret]

I was looking at the WNDR4500 and WNDR3700 on newegg, there is a $80 difference, but I don't see many spec differences except that the 4500 has more memory and can do a theoretical throughput of 450Mbps on wireless where as the 3700 does the standard 300Mbps.

Is $80 really worth that? Is the WNDR4500 better in some way I'm missing?

Unless you can find a specific need for either feature, no. Unless you are streaming multiple Blu-Ray streams or doing many large file transfers, you won't even notice. Even then, the difference probably won't be that huge.

 

[JackMDS]

When One starts with the ""Best"" (None Functional quest), money is out of the equation.

Otherwise, One should state clearly his/her specific needs and the amount of money that is available for purchasing.

For many humble users this with DD_WRT might be the ""Best"".

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833320039

For more demanding users this is the ""Best"" sub $100 choice.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833162047

 

[looper]

We want the best router for gaming and video streaming.

We currently have the D-Link DIR-655 router. Using wired for online PC 'FPS' gaming here upstairs where both computers are.

We have a Roku on order for the downstairs Pioneer TV (40' away) to stream Netflix. What would be the best router for this setup? And do you think we'll need an extender to get a better signal down to the Roku?

At the moment, I'm leaning to the LinkSys E4200 or the Asus RT- N56U...

Thank you for any input.

 

[bupkus]

I picked up the ASUS RT-N16 this BF for 50 usd after mir. For me it's also about the price.
Anyone endorse the Rosewill RNX-N150RT?

 

[MtnMan]

At the moment, I'm leaning to the LinkSys E4200 or the Asus RT- N56U...

Thank you for any input.

I tried the Asus and while all the specifications look great (especially for the price) I found it to be a piece of crap. It never ran longer than a day without needing to be reset because I lost connectivity to the internet. I wish it has been reliable because I like it, especially the dual USB ports.

I got a deal on a returned E4200, and I'm happy. DD-WRT is coming (a per-release is available (no USB port support yet )) so I'm still running Cisco/Linksys firmware and while I miss some DD-WRT features, I'm content as it has been running about 3 months now without needing to be reset.

 

[evident]

I did alot of research and am taking my chances with the Linksys E4200 for $99 refurb on cisco.com. I was torn between that, the Asus N56U and the buffalo one. I figured the one that will have the most DDWRT support i nthe future will be this linksys, as it uses a broadcom chipset. the buffalo while it has ddwrt out of the box, doesn't seem to have much support from the community from what i gather. and since the asus uses a ralink chipset i doubt if it will ever get ddwrt support.

 

[bleomycin]

I've been through many horrible, consumer grade garbage wifi routers over the years (10+ probably of them) running openwrt, tomato, dd-wrt, stock firmwares and most recently a ubiquiti. Eventually they all begin to display some sort of instability or poor performance just due to the terrible hardware they ship with (the days of a cheapo wrt54g running dd-wrt with perfect stability are over it seems).

The only consumer grade wireless AP i've found that stands the test of time is the apple airport extreme. I have 3 of them spanning 3 generations of the product and they've been rock stable for years. I can't speak for how well they work for routing, i use them strictly as an AP. From there i run in alix board with pfsense to handle all of my routing needs and 2x 24 port dell managed switches for all of the devices throughout the house. This is the cheapest, fastest and most reliable system i have been able to come up with and i hugely regret throwing away so much money on d-link, netgear, linksys, buffalo, ubiquiti, and asus garbage. Long story short, save yourself the hassle and pay a little more up front, it's not worth the gamble.

 

[snuuggles]

I've been through many horrible, consumer grade garbage wifi routers over the years (10+ probably of them) running openwrt, tomato, dd-wrt, stock firmwares and most recently a ubiquiti. Eventually they all begin to display some sort of instability or poor performance just due to the terrible hardware they ship with (the days of a cheapo wrt54g running dd-wrt with perfect stability are over it seems).

The only consumer grade wireless AP i've found that stands the test of time is the apple airport extreme. I have 3 of them spanning 3 generations of the product and they've been rock stable for years. I can't speak for how well they work for routing, i use them strictly as an AP. From there i run in alix board with pfsense to handle all of my routing needs and 2x 24 port dell managed switches for all of the devices throughout the house. This is the cheapest, fastest and most reliable system i have been able to come up with and i hugely regret throwing away so much money on d-link, netgear, linksys, buffalo, ubiquiti, and asus garbage. Long story short, save yourself the hassle and pay a little more up front, it's not worth the gamble.

I second (third?) the Airport Extreme. I can't say that it's more reliable/faster, I've only had it for 2 weeks. What I can say is that the UI for it is eons ahead of the garbage that linksys and all the rest have been getting away with. I'm an almost exclusively PC user, but I have to admit that networking stuff confuses and annoys me. The accessibility of the airport is amazing, even better if you have an iphone or itouch since you can control most of the basics right from those devices instead of having to go to [some random IP port].

 

[JackMDS]

While the name Airport Extreme stays the same, under the hood there are different chipsets and the choices are the same as the one used in other Wireless cards.

There is only 5 OEMs that make Wireless core components and Apple is Not one of them.

I.e., "Nice fairy tales" are Not necessarily technological facts.

 

[bupkus]

I must confess that yet another endorsement for Apple as The savior of the consumer technical world gets on my nerves. But bypassing that to express my personal experiences with consumer class routers is more helpful.

Yes, I have had a couple router failures in my life but not for a while. My Linksys WRT54GL is still going strong having purchased it on 5/22/2008 and using Tomato for the firmware.

I have a Rosewill RNX-N150RT I bought for $19.99 (free shipping) which has yet to show failure--purchased on 10/11/2011. I bought my first one for a friend two months earlier which is serving them well still.

I've purchased several ASUS WL-520gU for friends using 3rd party firmware and have yet to hear of one failure. Maybe there was one... don't recall. Could have been some loss of configuration, too.
UPDATE: I recall now... I had a WL-520gU that was unstable with the firmware that came from ASUS. I didn't want to install Tomato until I had proven to myself the hardware was good. Still, I upgraded to DDWRT and the stability was fixed.
Now I must say if they started to run slow I haven't noticed. I don't stress throughput with extreme traffic.

EDIT: I guess I should add the obvious; my purchases have been sooo much cheaper.

 

[NXIL]

Hi Grandnex, I have been researching this too.

Since you are apparently looking in the E4200 price range (180 or so), it seems to me it comes down to the E4200 (or the new E4200V2, which adds IPV6, and another antenna from what I can tell) or the Airport Extreme.

SmallNetBuilder.com does great reviews on both of them.

Seems to me that the Airport Extreme has better cooling (lots of remarks about the e4200 getting very hot, which is not good for longevity), and has great firmware (can put Tomato on e4200 which I have used and is excellent; DD WRT, not so much.....).

I have decided on the Airport Extreme because of many reviews stating how completely stable it is under load for long periods of time--people with 50/50Mpbs connections who say the Airport Extreme handles that without any problems.

Set and Forget and "just works", even under high load and long range wireless: that works for me.




PS: Hi Bleomycin--you an MD?

 

[NXIL]

Jack said:

There is only 5 OEMs that make Wireless core components and Apple is Not one of them.

True--but Apple writes the firmware, and it seems to work really well. Software sells hardware.....seems that a lot of people feel the need to swap stock Linksys and Asus firmware for Tomato (love it!) or DD WRT (sort of a pain.....)

Jack, if Apple is just a fairy tale.....well they are certainly doing pretty well serving up the Kool Aid!

 

[NXIL]

Hi Bupkus--

I had an excellent Linksys WRT54G version 1.1 flashed with Tomato that worked great for almost a decade. For a lot of people, the current version of that router, the WRT54GL is still a great option. But, no N, and, now many people have broadband connections it can't keep up with.

As I said, Airport Extreme advantages include: very good hardware, well cooled, and very good firmware that is stable under demanding conditions.

Apple's PCs use Intel chips and Foxconn motherboards--as Jack notes above, there are not that many OEM manufacturers--and they command a premium because of the software (OS X), design (a matter of taste of course), reputation for reliability and good service.

See this month's Consumer Reports--Apple does really well.

 

[MtnMan]

I just replace a Dell Truemobile wireless router for my daughter that had been running since 2003. It still works, it is just a little lacking on the wireless side as it won't auto channel to eliminate interference from her neighbors, now that it seems everyone near her has wireless.

 

[bupkus]

True, NXIL, the Linksys WRT54GL is limited by 802.11b/g. That is why I ordered the ASUS RT-N16 on Black Friday. It has both the IEEE 802.11b/g, IEEE 802.11n Draft for wireless and the 1 x 10/100/1000M WAN; 4 x 10/100/1000M LAN for Gigabit ports.

The Rosewill RNX-N150RT I mentioned for $20 has IEEE 802.3/3u, IEEE 802.11b/g, IEEE802.11n Draft 2 for wireless but has only 1 x 10/100M WAN; 4 x 10/100M LAN for its ports.

Still, I feel no need to pay a premium for Apple products in spite of Consumer Reports. If I had to struggle with poor software interfaces or unreliable hardware I would consider the higher cost of the Apple line of routers. Instead, I usually purchase routers where I can install 3rd party firmware.

 

[snuuggles]

Feels like rooting for pro ball teams: worthless and and a waste of everyone's time. I use what works and makes my life easiest. In most cases that is windows/linux. In some cases, it's apple. In *my opinion*, the UI for the airport extreme is a major selling point, and worth the extra money. If I save even one single hour of hassle using the apple product, it's more than paid for itself.

Your milage may vary, but blanket statements should be examined with great skepticism, even on Anand, even from moderators

 

[NXIL]

...blanket statements should be examined with great skepticism, even on Anand, even from moderators

Nice blanket statement!

In *my opinion*, the UI for the airport extreme is a major selling point, and worth the extra money. If I save even one single hour of hassle using the apple product, it's more than paid for itself.

Agree completely snuu!

 

[gsaldivar]

the UI for the airport extreme is a major selling point, and worth the extra money.

I found Apple's interface to be overly simplistic, to the point of being cumbersome. It would be nice if it were possible to configure via app in addition to a standard web interface. However, that's not possible because there is no web interface on an Airport extreme.

Rather than having different status lights so you can quickly see what is going on with the device, the Airport extreme relies on a single multipurpose "aesthetically pleasing" light. If you don't have the app installed near the router, expect lots of fun referring repeatedly to the manual to decipher different blink patterns and color codes, which the router uses to symbolize different statuses...

 

[JackMDS]

Jack, if Apple is just a fairy tale.....well they are certainly doing pretty well serving up the Kool Aid!

Very true, and those who drink the Cool Aid are the ones that will also buy the Gucci/Pucci, and sneakers for $500.

I worked many years in a Medical facility that was few minute way from the Americana Mall.

It is based on stores like the above (it has an Apple store too). I can tell a lot of amusing stories about my employees buying habits in this Mall, and the many useless a expensive Cool Aid glasses that they end up with.

Example (most pics are thousands of $$ value items) - http://www.americanamanhasset.com/

 

[stevech]

non-consumer; semi-pro. Works.
Cradlepoint.