Best brand for (wireless) router?

donline · Feb 19, 2018

Hi folks,

What brand (and any specific product) would you recommend for a wireless router for home use?

I'd like a router that is stable (good, reliable signal), secure (not easily hacked) and easy to maintain (good software to setup and monitor the network)...

Budget around £100 or less.

Thanks!

D

Scottray · Feb 19, 2018

Out of the routers brands that I have had over the years, I personally like Netgear, over TP-Link or D-Link equipment. Here's a good site for router reviews: https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/

kanewolf · Feb 19, 2018

Read the article from smallnetbuilder on "how to buy a wireless router 2018" -- https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/basics/wireless-basics/33177-how-to-buy-a-wireless-router-2018-edition

Asus has always been a favorite brand on that website. But the "router ranker" pages can provide side-by-side comparisons

donline · Feb 19, 2018

Scottray :

Thanks Scottray

What do you think of Asus routers?

Any specific router models you can recommend?

donline · Feb 19, 2018

kanewolf :

Thanks Kanewolf

I've now read the article and looked at the router ranker page. The routers are quite expensive (I'm for something around $100-$150).

Do you have any specific product recommendations (and/or overall brand preferences)?

kanewolf · Feb 19, 2018

The 2017 recommendations were for AC1900 routers. That would be a Netgear R7000 or Asus RT-AC68U.

donline · Feb 19, 2018

kanewolf :

Thanks Kanewolf.

The Asus router looks quite nice. Have you had any experience with Asus routers?

kanewolf · Feb 19, 2018

Yes. I have had several Asus routers (mostly setup as access points). I have RT-N56U, RT-N65U, RT-AC68U. I always run second source firmware.
I buy all mine used on E-Bay. You can get a used AC68U for about $60

donline · Feb 20, 2018

kanewolf :

Thanks Kanewolf.

I was wondering how useful is the AiProtection on the Asus RT-AC68U? Is this a useful feature or more of a marketing gimmick?

And can the Asus RT-AC68U actually run with IPv6 connectivity? (The product description says it 'supports' it but I wanted to make sure it actually fully runs it).

When you mention second source firmware, is that something like the 'Merlin' firmware for the Asus router? It sounds good but how do you know if it's legitimate (i.e. no malicious) if it's not directly from the vendor (i.e. Asus)?

Also, can you recommend any good way/software for monitoring your network and seeing if any 'outsiders' (hackers) are accessing the network?

Thanks again! D

bill001g · Feb 20, 2018

The key to third party firmware is where you download it from you always want to get it from the official sites. If you are really worried download the source files and run the build command yourself.

Pretty much the cheapest router on the market protects a home user purely because it is stupid. When someone attacks you from the outside the traffic coming into the router hits the NAT. Since the router does not know which of your internal machines to send the traffic to it just drops it.

So as long as you have no port forwarding and do not use the DMZ option no attacks can get past any router. The router itself can be attack but most routers do no expose thing like remote configuration on the wan port.

The other so called protection attempts to prevent your internal machines from accessing stuff on the internet. Even the best commercial IPS devices can do little now days. Almost all traffic is encrypted via https so any so called "deep packet inspection" can not be done. All they can do is block certain IP addresses and those change constantly.

IPv6 is still not used much....even though they have been saying its the future for the last 20 years. What is much more important is that your ISP supports IPv6. It tends to be messy because you run a mix of ipv4 and ipv6 since there are not a huge number of web sites that support ipv6 either. Even if it worked great I would avoid ipv6, your internal mac address is in the IP address. It lets the people who want to misuse tracking information know which internal device in your house you are using.

donline · Feb 21, 2018

bill001g :

The key to third party firmware is where you download it from you always want to get it from the official sites. If you are really worried download the source files and run the build command yourself.

Pretty much the cheapest router on the market protects a home user purely because it is stupid. When someone attacks you from the outside the traffic coming into the router hits the NAT. Since the router does not know which of your internal machines to send the traffic to it just drops it.

So as long as you have no port forwarding and do not use the DMZ option no attacks can get past any router. The router itself can be attack but most routers do no expose thing like remote configuration on the wan port.

The other so called protection attempts to prevent your internal machines from accessing stuff on the internet. Even the best commercial IPS devices can do little now days. Almost all traffic is encrypted via https so any so called "deep packet inspection" can not be done. All they can do is block certain IP addresses and those change constantly.

IPv6 is still not used much....even though they have been saying its the future for the last 20 years. What is much more important is that your ISP supports IPv6. It tends to be messy because you run a mix of ipv4 and ipv6 since there are not a huge number of web sites that support ipv6 either. Even if it worked great I would avoid ipv6, your internal mac address is in the IP address. It lets the people who want to misuse tracking information know which internal device in your house you are using.

Thanks for your advice bill001g. Appreciate you explaining some of the technical details behind routers

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