Budget router?

[Cream Soda]

In the market for a new router. I currently have a Linksys WRT54g that I bought along with my first laptop, so that'd be like 2004-2005. It's been 9-10 years, so I figured even budget routers at this point would be an upgrade.

Any recommendations?

[Sonomaa]

Ive bought this one for my sister, my friend, and to replace my range extender.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

it works great, very solid

[Cream Soda]

Great price, something to definitely look into, thanks. Now that you've said range extender; I'm kinda curious. If I were to get this, would I be able to put the old one downstairs? When winter hits, I'll probably sit in the lawn chair and play smash 3ds in the front yard, so that would be cool to be able to do

[Outlaw]

I've heard good things about D-Link. They are inexpensive too.

[chiyio]

Your wrt54g can probably route up to about 30mb, so unless your internet is faster than that it probably won't make much difference.

[Cream Soda]

It's just old/becoming unreliable (dropping me and shit lol)

[orinthia]

Depending on your model number, you can install some custom firmware on the wrt54g. I've been using Tomato Shibby, 1.28.0005 121 ND VPN, on my old wrt54g. As with any custom firmware, be aware of how to rescue the router from a bad flash, since it won't be terrible simple. There are other firmwares (original tomato, ddwrt, etc) but I've found that one good enough and has a crap load of features (vpn server, ddns logins, etc) that are not on the default firmware. Tomato though doesn't give you much info on its settings while logged into the router, so it can be a little intimidating seeing the hundreds of settings you can mess with heh.

But outside the firmware upgrade, I use my old one (from 2003) like an extender. I hooked it up through a 100' cable so the speeds are maximum and don't suffer from the same crappy reception at length that my other stuff does. I gave it a different ssid so I knew which one I connected to. Took a few tries to get the settings right so I could log into either router while both are hooked up (have to change one of their login ips from the default), but it's been excellent this way for the past few months. Great alternative to buying a repeater.

[Cream Soda]

Mind walking me through a setup on that shibby? I'll see if it works w/ my router

[rold]

i will be upgrading my internet speed to 100mb in a month, which router should i be looking at in the mean time to get the maximum speeds.

[orinthia]

You'll want any router that has high speeds, so not anything that's stuck with old wireless G, or the older wireless N standard. Look for wireless AC or 5ghz wireless N, but you'll then need to have compliant hardware or else you won't be capping your speeds. You'll also get less speeds at distance from the router (and lesser still if there's dense obstructions), so consider running some cable if you need a lot of distance.

Mind walking me through a setup on that shibby? I'll see if it works w/ my router

Tomato is pretty advanced, so hopefully you like playing with new stuff heh. Check here: http://tomato.groov.pl/?page_id=69 to make sure your wrt54g is actually compatible. There should be a sticker on the bottom of the router with the version and type. Also, this site is mostly in Polish but has some spots of English and English firmware versions. I went with the k2.4 version even though it says the k2.6 is compatible (this references the linux kernel version). I might try the k2.6 sometime, or you can if you want to. I think this was the firmware I personally tried: http://tomato.groov.pl/download/K24/...5x-121-VPN.trx And some screenshots are posted on that site, http://tomato.groov.pl/?page_id=31 .

Bad flash recovery: http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php...om_a_Bad_Flash You will shit a brick if it happens, but be calm and try out stuff from there.

[chiyio]

I like this router to use with Shibby tomato if you're trying to get a low priced router that will work well. http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

That should route over 100mb, and with tomato it'll be rock solid. Flashing is dead easy, just get the current image for the router (currently 1.22, flash, reboot, flush the nvram, reboot once more and you're done)

Cheap powerful router. Once you get used to tomato you'll love it, can't stand to use a router that doesn't support it.

*it says WNR3500L, but you'll actually get the V2 of it, so make sure you get that image to flash.

For the wrt54g, if it's one of the early supported models I'd definitely flash it. I've setup a TON of them for people. Haven't ever bricked one and they are rock solid, some have years of uptime. Stick with the 2.4 kernel though, the 2.6 is too slow if your connection is over 20-25-ish mb. The 2.4 will get you closer to 30.

[Kalmado]

I just snagged a Trendnet AC750 for $24. Haven't set it up, but I too will be upgrading from a WRT54G and was advised it will be a huge improvement. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833156469

[Eticket]

I love the Asus routers. I've had one for a couple years now and it's more reliable than my d-link or netgear ever was.