Suggest a new Wifi Router

hellokitty[hk]

Posts: 3,413   +146
Hi everyone, I'm looking for a new wifi router.

I'm looking for simultaneous 5ghz/2.4ghz.
My house is decently sized, so good range is necessary but nothing exceptionally big (larger than average American house).
At most about 8 concurrent sessions.
Don't really care for custom firmware.
Don't really care for features, just need to be able to port forward, which I'm confident any router can do.
Won't be doing anything outside of regular home use.
It needs to have at least one ethernet port.
Want it to be fast of course?

So I don't know if this matters or not but it will be placed in the middle floor, corner of the house, so if it'd be possible to direct the signal both up and down, that's good since usually the radiation pattern is mostly upward/outward. I don't think any exist that let you point the signal directionally 180 degrees but that's ideal.

Modem is Motorola SURFboard SB6141.
I'm not looking to spend a whole bunch, and as you can see I don't think there are a lot of specific features that I need so don't throw me the most expensive ones possible. I'm guessing I can get everything I asked for for $100 or less.

Thanks for reading, willing to order online in the US or drive to the nearest best buy if the price is the same as online.
 
I have the Netgear N600 and I love it! It is a great all round router. It goes for $75 on Amazon and the Gigabit version goes for $5 more. I would avoid Belkin routers since I have heard bad things about them. The Linksys N900 router also seems to be a possibility.

I would highly recommend the Netgear router (N600) because it is a good value for the performance. Keep in mind, when looking for a router, you should probably ignore the mbps ratings since your connection is probably not realistically close to that level. Look at warranties, reviews, and reliability. We have a ton of devices connected to the router at once (at least 10) and it works fine. It makes me lag a bit when gaming from time to time but that isn't usually the case.
 
So I was looking at the Netgear AC750 which is pretty similar except that it supports AC instead of N and I heard good things about it too...
 
You probably just searched netgear AC750, its much more useful nickname, whereas the product name is actual the R6050, just like the netgear N600 is rather the WNDR3400.
 
I have TPlink WR1043ND. It is pretty much rock solid. Dual band is not too important for now, just get a 300 or 450 N based one and be happy
 
That's too bad I need dual band.
I'm looking at the DLink AC1750 it looks a trash but it's supposed to be pretty good.
 
That's too bad I need dual band.
I'm looking at the DLink AC1750 it looks a trash but it's supposed to be pretty good.
I wouldn't bother with AC for now man unless you really want it. Routers and ISPs are improving each year and it may be best to let the AC standard bake and wait till it is the true standard (probably like 1-3 years). Plus, most devices actually don't support the standard yet. I understand you want to future-proof, but it may be better to get a good N router now and upgrade in like a year or two. Just my take on it though :D.

Also, funny story: a few days after telling you about my N600 (been using it for like a year), it actually started to go wack! It DCed a ton and was just being odd. So I went to the local Optimum store (I was renting that particular N600 from them) and picked up the latest router they have. Funny how right after I tell you about it, it basically dies xD.

If you are curious, they gave me a "Sagemcom F@st 3965CV". It is actually pretty good. I think it is an OEM router though, so you can't purchase it from say, Amazon. Tell me what you decide on!

Finally, I think you should take a look at the Netgear N900 (one of their highest end dual-band N routers) and Apple's Airport Extreme (AC router and has 6 antennas, similar to Netgear's $300 Nighthawk, but for $120 less). The Airport Extreme works on any device, it doesn't have to be Apple. But it is optimized for Apple devices I bet. But the reason I am recommending these 2 routers is because after my router died, I was searching for some and I read a ton of reviews. A lot of the reviewers were networking professionals and stated how they only use N900s (Netgear) and Apple's AirPort Extreme for their work (setting up large networks) since they are so consistent.
 
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