[SOLVED] AC1900 vs AX1800

[scubaslim]

I currently have two (router and media bridge) Asus RT-AC68u which is AC1900. I'm thinking of getting two (router and access point) TP-Link Archer X21 which is AX1800...

Is the AX1800 an upgrade?

 

[bill001g]

This is where comparing some magic number gets you in trouble.
The largest issue is the tplink is using the newer 802.11ax (wifi6) stuff.

It depends on what your end devices can do. If they do not support wifi6 then they drop back to 802.11ac but the tplink router only supports 1x1 mimo where your asus support 3x3. So if your end devices also support 3x3 the tplink will be a lot slower.

Even if your devices support wifi6 it is hard to say if it really will be faster. There are all kinds of issues with radar avoidance and how some devices support it. This tends to be a issue with the end device support more than the router.

I strongly suspect unless you "need" a new router today you are best off waiting at least 6 months. Wifi6e is starting to come onto the market and will solve some of the issues with the over crowded 5g radio band. You still need end device support as well as the router. Until then I suspect your current router will be just as fast as anything else you can buy. It is your end device not your router that tends to be the limiting factor.

 

[scubaslim]

This is where comparing some magic number gets you in trouble.
The largest issue is the tplink is using the newer 802.11ax (wifi6) stuff.

It depends on what your end devices can do. If they do not support wifi6 then they drop back to 802.11ac but the tplink router only supports 1x1 mimo where your asus support 3x3. So if your end devices also support 3x3 the tplink will be a lot slower.

Even if your devices support wifi6 it is hard to say if it really will be faster. There are all kinds of issues with radar avoidance and how some devices support it. This tends to be a issue with the end device support more than the router.

I strongly suspect unless you "need" a new router today you are best off waiting at least 6 months. Wifi6e is starting to come onto the market and will solve some of the issues with the over crowded 5g radio band. You still need end device support as well as the router. Until then I suspect your current router will be just as fast as anything else you can buy. It is your end device not your router that tends to be the limiting factor.

Thanks, but like I said. I'd be buying 2. One as my main router and the second to plug a few devices into. Would it be an upgrade for the devices plugged into the access point?

Also, what if I bought a TP-Link AX3000 for the router and the AX1800 for the access point?

Currently, sometimes when I use Steam Link on my Nvidia Shield, I get some connection issues.

 

[bill001g]

I think you have your terminology way off.

A AP is attached to the main router via a cable. It sounds like you want to use one of these as a repeater to connect to the main router via wifi.

I don't know what you are comparing. If you currently use 2 802.11ac units to do this then the wifi6 units "might" be faster. It all depends on how good the signal is and how much interference you get. It is actually very hard to get the QAM1024 encoding to work, many times it only works well if you are in the same room. The other big diffeernce is can you get 160mhz radio channel with no interference. With 160mhz you have the normal problem of your nieghbors and the addition problem of weather radar avoidance rules. Most 802.11ac routers do not use the channels that radar does but to use 160mhz channels wifi6 must use those channels. You are going to have to try it. The 802.11ac device running the 1900 encoding can get 300-400 for many people and wifi 6 will be a bit faster but not a huge amount in most cases

Your best option for getting remote network when you don't have ethernet cables is to use MoCA. You need coax cable tv wire in both locaitons but you can easily get full gigiabit speeds. I would also consider powerline network equipment like av2-1000 units. They might be faster or slower than wifi but they will be much more stable if you are using any form of online game on the remote location.

 

[scubaslim]

I think you have your terminology way off.

A AP is attached to the main router via a cable. It sounds like you want to use one of these as a repeater to connect to the main router via wifi.

I don't know what you are comparing. If you currently use 2 802.11ac units to do this then the wifi6 units "might" be faster. It all depends on how good the signal is and how much interference you get. It is actually very hard to get the QAM1024 encoding to work, many times it only works well if you are in the same room. The other big diffeernce is can you get 160mhz radio channel with no interference. With 160mhz you have the normal problem of your nieghbors and the addition problem of weather radar avoidance rules. Most 802.11ac routers do not use the channels that radar does but to use 160mhz channels wifi6 must use those channels. You are going to have to try it. The 802.11ac device running the 1900 encoding can get 300-400 for many people and wifi 6 will be a bit faster but not a huge amount in most cases

Your best option for getting remote network when you don't have ethernet cables is to use MoCA. You need coax cable tv wire in both locaitons but you can easily get full gigiabit speeds. I would also consider powerline network equipment like av2-1000 units. They might be faster or slower than wifi but they will be much more stable if you are using any form of online game on the remote location.

I'll look into those. thanks