Are AC Routers worth the cost?

[Melena]

I'm leaning towards replacing my comcast modem and router with my own stuff, in part to save the 12 dollars a month in the equipment rental. Was thinking an AC Router, though the only devices we have that support AC is our PS4, XBone, and IPad Air 2. I know future phones will be supporting AC, but with comcast, I'm only paying for 75 down and I think it's 25 up, so just wondering if I'm better off getting a solid N router and save myself 50-100 dollars.

[enzan]

These things seem to always be on sale on amazon. http://www.amazon.com/D-Link-Wireles...=d-link+router
I don't really know how good they are though. Maybe someone else can comment on that.

[Melena]

Ooof, yeah when I worked at Fry's, we shuddered whenever someone bought a D Link as they were typically the bargain basement ones we put on ad to get them in the store. Dunno if they have improved at all.

[Arkanna]

http://www.amazon.com/D-Link-Wireles...ZW5JD2RSSA7K97

I have one of those and it's boss so far (though the admin GUI is really dumbed down a lot).

[Darus Grey]

I'm leaning towards replacing my comcast modem and router with my own stuff, in part to save the 12 dollars a month in the equipment rental. Was thinking an AC Router, though the only devices we have that support AC is our PS4, XBone, and IPad Air 2. I know future phones will be supporting AC, but with comcast, I'm only paying for 75 down and I think it's 25 up, so just wondering if I'm better off getting a solid N router and save myself 50-100 dollars.

If you don't do any in-home streaming over WiFi(like steam streaming or a plex server or something), stay with N. AC only has downsides unless you actually need the extra bandwidth(such as you have a 500+ internet connection like I do, and thus N is too slow for devices to use your bandwidth), otherwise AC has shitter drivers, shitter support, shitter range, shitter battery life, etc.

[Auspice]

I thought the current gen consoles only supported up to N; am I missing something? I had been looking at replacing my aging D-Link DIR 655 since it's recently starting randomly rebooting itself(likely from the 20+ devices hogging up bandwidth) but I'm not sold on AC.

[Isiolia]

I thought the current gen consoles only supported up to N; am I missing something? I had been looking at replacing my aging D-Link DIR 655 since it's recently starting randomly rebooting itself(likely from the 20+ devices hogging up bandwidth) but I'm not sold on AC.

Could get a dual band one like this (what I have currently), which will let you run both.

[Hellfury]

The ASUS RT-ACxxxx routers are pretty nice, I use one for the wifi at home, with a couple of cisco switches for all the assorted wired stuff.

[Melena]

I thought the current gen consoles only supported up to N; am I missing something? I had been looking at replacing my aging D-Link DIR 655 since it's recently starting randomly rebooting itself(likely from the 20+ devices hogging up bandwidth) but I'm not sold on AC.

Your right, I must have misread something a while ago.

[Takiwaki]

Your right, I must have misread something a while ago.

PS4 wifi is slow as shit, so i bought an ac wifi bridge for my consoles so they can connect and get wired like speeds.

[Auspice]

PS4 wifi is slow as shit, so i bought an ac wifi bridge for my consoles so they can connect and get wired like speeds.

I noticed that; even on N that shit was CRAWLING. I'm glad I had the foresight to run a LAN cable to my entertainment center. Do you recommend any specific bridges? That would probably be the only way I'd jump to AC at this point. lol

[Oreth]

Yea id welcome a solid AC Wireless Bridge reccomendation. Have a good Wireless AC but for our Smart TV it can hang some times despite it only being 2 rooms over. I currently have an ASUS RT-AC66U

[Melena]

Wound up getting the Asus N900. If the Modem/Router that comcast gave me wasn't such a big piece of shit that would lose connection almost every 3 nights, i probably would have stuck with that.

[Takiwaki]

This is what I use atm, have not had any hiccups at all. Im using an ac netgear router.

http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-Wirele...ireless+bridge

[orinthia]

I've got this one: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...ilpage_o03_s00 , a refurb Linksys EA6300 AC1200.

I have another router, an asus RT-N65U, as my main router for my home network but it really only serves half the house due to things like the ac, water heater, and fridge being relatively close to each other blocking the other half. I set that linksys as a bridged connection via 100ft cable. The asus has a bunch of features builtin that the linksys didn't, so we kept the asus one as the main. Works awesomely.

Add: I couldn't decently use wireless bridge because of those obstructions, it would be a relatively weak signal since neither router's 5ghz signal is very strong. But bridging over their 5ghz signals was an option since I don't have any devices that use 5ghz yet, leaving the 2.4ghz connections unaffected by the wireless bridge. Would have been cool, but wired is much faster if you have that option and can string some cable in the attic/etc.

[cosworthrs]

https://on.google.com/hub/

just picked one up today, so far so good.

[Kalmado]

Gonna bump this instead of a new thread. I decided to dig out and try again this TrendNet AC750 router since I'm working from home. Two days in and I've had some websites (BG) act up when others aren't having issues. Today I had my online training crap out and no one else had the issue. Pretty much same issues I had when I originally got it (spotty performance). I have an ancient Linksys WRT54G that still works. My internet is Comcast Blast. With the TrendNet I pull about 88mbps down. With the Linksys around 45-55 as it varies greatly.

We use internet for browsing, some online gaming, and of course my work. I have the ps4, x1, and htpc hardwired to a router/repeater. Do I really need to get something such as a N600 or higher? Or should I just stick with the old Linksys?

[orinthia]

Read reviews and pick your poison. I've still got both routers I posted about earlier with a bridged connection (over wired) and it's been awesome so far. Of course, you could take a gamble with something refurbed to save a little cash, though that particular one I linked should still have a listing on ebay by linksys as well (similar price) if you want to buy it there instead.

That TrendNet AC750 was one I considered getting since it was cheap, until I read reviews, researched it and others a bit more, and eventually found the refurbed linsys instead. Took a chance buying it and was at least pleasantly surprised. I didn't really mess with its options or extra stuff before putting it on bridge mode though, it has almost no features enabled like this (just access point, no dns or anything; it's all handled by the other router). Take a look at asus routers as well, some are pricey but it might have some useful features to you out of the box.

Or, see if you can put the ac750 as a bridge to your wrt54g. Sure, it'll be stuck with 100mb max over the cable (wireless bridge will be very slow with the wrt), but since it'll be doing nothing but being an access point, maybe something could change. Just be sure to set that router's ip different than the wrt54g's (say 192.168.1.1 for the wrt, 192.168.1.100 for the ac750), so you can access both routers.

[Kalmado]

Well, I hooked up the wrt54g after my htpc couldn't find my main's network. Still can't find it. So I set up a homegroup on the htpc and when I try to join it on my main, it says the password is wrong when it's clearly right. I double checked and even though I've changed the password to my choice, homegroup keeps changing it back to a dummy lkjgqoihjg password. Now I get an error saying "cannot setup homegroup on this pc". I'd much rather just have the network so I can access the drives. I should mention I'm not savvy when it comes to this.

[Kalmado]

After almost 2 hours trying to access my F: on my HTPC and failing due to lord knows what I give up. I'm considering just doing a darn fresh install on the HTPC and getting this router because it's only $27 on Jet.com right now with promo code. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16833704150