Upgrading my router. Which one is best?

[FreePenguin]

I have a Linksys WRT3200ACM that ive been using like 5 years now, its been killer. there's 4 people in my house, everyone has tv's, laptops, game consoles, desktops, phones, etc. there's like 35-40 active devices on on my wifi, and really havnt had a lot of issues. I only have 200mbps but speed wise it handles it pretty boss. The problem is I think we are exceeding the poor things mind with the device amount, sometimes random devices are getting kicked off for no reason.

I was given a Netgear nighthawk X6S awhile back and modem, but it didn't really yield any extra oomph so just put it aside. My house is almost 3000 feet. but my WRT3200acm reaches everywhere perfectly fine. I did buy a Eero Pro 6 this week, and it was causing lag interruptions on my playstation 5 and ps4, my gf and me would both have random spikes like every 20 minutes saying connection interrupted. Plugged the WRT3200acm back in, and no issues. so the Eero is going back

I am leaning towards the Costco models, as Costco guarantee, if the routers ever break, I will return it if ever was needed.

So help me pick guys!!!

(current WRT3200ACM) vs Linksys MR9610 vs Netgear RAXE450 vs Linksys Hydra Pro 6e tri band

(I have 2 room mates who pay rent) so its important to get the bossest router I can to help today, and also future proofing a bit. I listed all my routers for sale.

Sams club- this router is going on sale for 149 on may 8th.
Linksys MR9610.
https://www.samsclub.com/p/linksys-...UiUM2HFO3QzagLH82Lpw1w&pubNAME=Slickdeals+LLC

Costco has 2 routers im interested in.

Netgear RAXE450 (its a RAXE500) but like a hair difference in top bandwidth, but 150 bucks less than RAXE500.
449 bucks
https://www.netgear.com/home/wifi/routers/raxe450/

Linksys Hydra Pro 6E Tri-Band router. Now there is a caveat to this one. It says it has 2x2 2.5ghz chip 2x2 5ghz chip and 4x4 6ghz chip, but the previous model MR9600 /9610 has 4x4 2.5ghz chip
https://www.linksys.com/us/wireless...ain_Site-en_US/reviews/product/2/P-MR7500.htm



This is what ive been using. I just listed on craigslist for 100, see if anyone buys it to put $ towards my upgrade.
https://www.linksys.com/fi/wireless...0-mu-mimo-gigabit-wifi-router/p/p-wrt3200acm/

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[shogun32]

(current WRT3200ACM) vs Linksys MR9610 vs Netgear RAXE450 vs Linksys Hydra Pro 6e tri band

1. kick devices off - white list the important ones and default deny everything else
2. buy a device that has a supported opensource ROM (tomato or openwrt)
3. tell your renters(?) to get their own damn router and put it on a non-interfering channel.

If you want a truly good device, go commercial grade not this consumer crap.

 

[FreePenguin]

cant do that, everything in my house gets equal priority, need a bigger badder router. one room mate could be playing on phone, and another could be video conferencing for work. printer is just as important as anything else.

out of those 3, prices does not matter. what is the best? I have had great luck with my linksys, but I saw that the new hydra has 2x2 2x2 and 4x4 bands. and the linksys ax6000 has 4x4 2.4ghz and 4x4 5ghz.

but the netgear has 4x4 4x4 4x4 for all 3 categories.

 

[FreePenguin]

1. kick devices off - white list the important ones and default deny everything else
2. buy a device that has a supported opensource ROM (tomato or openwrt)
3. tell your renters(?) to get their own damn router and put it on a non-interfering channel.

If you want a truly good device, go commercial grade not this consumer crap.

I mean I only have 200mbps speeds, but I am capable of upgrading to 500 and 1gb internet, but the promos make it so its better to upgrade every year to next tier to stay cheapest price, then I switch internet company and start over back and fourth. lol. its dumb, but even 200mbps works fine for us, no one lags (well didn't) til I got the new router.

so this year is 200, next year will be 500 and next year 1gb, then il switch over to other company, at 200mb, and start over again. you keep the same rates this way, its dumb but ive been doing it for like 6 years, I keep 2 companies wires on my house and just bounce back fourth.

what is a commercial grade router? I figure gaming routers would be boss for even dispersion of internet to devices

 

[FreePenguin]

Set them up their own network(or two). I have 2 routers at all my houses. First one is TVs and WiFi devices(ring,switches, thermostats) 2nd(lower) is personal devices phones, PCs and what not. Adds another layer of protection. Both are gigabit so speed isn’t affected.


I have had good luck out of this one. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07N1L5HX1/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I mean, I have multiple devices, I wasn't aware I could hook up 2 routers like that. lol I listed all these items for like 300 together. have people messaging but no ones snagged them yet

 

[shogun32]

buy another of what you already have. Kick your renters down into the 2.4Ghz band, and you use the 5Ghz. Flash it to OpenWRT. If you're happy with the vastly better firmware, then you can throw the current one into the closet for the future or you+GF use one device and your renters use the other device. This isn't hard. Make sure they are not on the same channel and are placed reasonably far apart such that the center of radiation covers the intended zones of the house. Run some Cat5/6 across the ceiling to connect the 2 devices.

It's fairly rare to get a reliable 'home' Wifi device. If you've got a good one, you hold onto it - don't chase the ever newer crap.

If you want to go hard-core then look at
https://www.commscope.com/product-type/enterprise-networking/wireless-access-points/indoor/

^^^ is my employer.

 

[FreePenguin]

main 192.168.0.1
Sub first 192.168.1.1
Sub second 192.168.2.1

It works great. You can use your old stuff for this configuration. You can’t see down router line though so you need to put printer on top router.

you know, thanks for the info guys. ive always just bought a new router when time came, I wasn't aware that you could use routers like this. I know flashing stuff, the WRT3200acm a lot of people flash, but they've always been great to me.

going to run them in some different set ups as suggested.

 

[The Demon]

I just use the router that I got from AT&T U-verse. I have 1000 MB speed, up and down. If you’re using Wi-Fi for everything that’s a mistake. For things like the TVs in any room you should use wired using a desktop switch that can handle at least a gigabit. That way the things using Wi-Fi won’t be slow down. It works great for me. No need to buy an outside router if you can get a free one that can handle that type of speed from the provider you have.

 

[FreePenguin]

I just use the router that I got from AT&T U-verse. I have 1000 MB speed, up and down. If you’re using Wi-Fi for everything that’s a mistake. For things like the TVs in any room you should use wired using a desktop switch that can handle at least a gigabit. That way the things using Wi-Fi won’t be slow down. It works great for me. No need to buy an outside router if you can get a free one that can handle that type of speed from the provider you have.

what do you mean switch? you mean something you physcically plug a wire into? not possible, we have 5 smart tv's in different bedrooms, every one of them have Apple TV's hooked up as well, thats 10 connections already.

I ripped out all the outside wiring in all the walls/outside of house too. it looked cleaner and going wireless meant we could have doors closed and such, all my tv's are floating, with no wires hanging from them. even the power wires are ran through the walls.

I didn't really plan it out when I did all this, I chose looks first over functionality, but thats because I didn't realize you could actually exceed limits on amounts of devices, hell even my scales are wifi, and watches, and clocks, its crazy. one room mate, I swear he has 7 phones by himself.

the crazy part is, even at the 100-200mbps speeds, we've never had lag, and no lag currently. its just the new Eero 6 pro it couldn't handle devices going on and off, and causing a lag spike and ruining the ps5 CoD zombie rounds! cant be having that.

 

[Vert]

I run my router and then I have 2 unifi's hardwired that are mounted in two rooms at each end of my house and it keeps up well.

 

[shogun32]

cant do that, everything in my house gets equal priority,

no, learn how to use QoS. give priority to video-conference protocol and gaming. streaming (eg. TV) can be middle, phones and computers (data, HTTP) get lowest.

 

[15GTPPinCO]

I would be sure to get something that will do a mesh network and comes with multiple (at least 3) wifi6 capable access points. Google's is excellent, but there are alternatives if you are not particularly fond of Google.

 

[shogun32]

I mean I only have 200mbps speeds

sheeet, we have 25/25 FiOS for $50/mo. Massive Verizon trunk line runs right by the house with a termination point 100m away. 20 years ago it was a OC256 circuit, it's probably 400Gb WDM these days or bigger.

 

[FreePenguin]

sheeet, we have 25/5 FiOS last I checked. Or maybe it's 50/10. Massive Verizon trunk line runs right by the house with a termination point 100m away. 20 years ago it was a OC256 circuit, it's probably 400Gb WDM these days or bigger.

we have speeds to 1gb to my house, we have fiberoptic internet in my area, but its 55 for 200mb, 65 for 500mb, and 79 for 1gb.

but we've never had issues on 100mbps, so when they bumped it to 200mbps for no cost change, I was fine with that, but every year we go through an upgrade where they raise internet, and my price by 5-10 bucks but I argue it and get another year promo, once I hit the 1gb, after that year I switch to spectrum, and pay for the 200mbps for 60 bucks all over again, and repeat.

after 90 days, you are considered a new customer again. its so stupid they won't just let me keep the lowest price for the lowest tier, but nope. every year they want to raise it 10 bucks. my neighbor doesnt complain, and hes like at 90 bucks a month now. its screwy / messed up how they are charging

 

[FreePenguin]

That works well but my guess is his current router is overheating and throttling the processor. That would just exacerbate the problem if that’s the case. Qos is processor intensive.

The poor WRT3200ACM doesnt have much for QoS settings, it only lets you put 3 devices as priority, thats it. I was reading, the new hydra and the ax6000 both are same way from what I read, only get to put 3 devices in a priority, everything else is just running as leftovers

this is all we linksys users get. the Netgear though has an entire QoS where everything is categorized on its own. not linksys.

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