Planning to buy a new router. What would you recommend?

[ameyer75]

Hey guys. I just moved and purchased fiber optic internet through Metronet (500/100). They installed the service and provided a modem and router (I'm not at home at time of posting, so I don't have model numbers). The house is relatively small but I'm not getting service outside. Like, my front door is only... 10ft? from the door and I don't get service standing outside in front of it. Conversely, I get pretty good reception inside except for the back of the house.

Generally speaking, I use the router for computer gaming/video streaming (wired). I have 2x4k Apple TVs that run on it as well (wireless but haven't had issues with them). I do plan to build a media server that will use the network as well.

I've been looking at Netgear and Asus routers in the $100-$200 range. I have experience with Netgear, but not so much with any other brands. So my questions are as follows:

Aside from physical specs on the machines, are there any bells/whistles you've noticed one brand has over the other that was a nice to have (software)?
Do you have any preference between Asus/Netgear/another brand and why?

I've seen some articles "about" the various routers between the brands, but they all seem to only talk about the physical specs, not about real world use, which is what I'm looking for.

Sorry for the long post! Let me know what you guys think!

 

[ikaz]

Well I can see Asus routers have feature called Airmesh which should help with coverage

https://www.asus.com/AiMesh/

You may want to look into dd-wrt compatible router (https://dd-wrt.com/) that you can flash if you want for more features.

 

[Solandri]

If you're already are familiar with Netgear routers, you can play around with a simulated Asus router online and check out the UI.

http://demoui.asus.com/

I found the Asus UI to be more intuitive, giving me more control (especially the VPN options). But the Asus AC router I bought had a bug - some devices have problems connecting to the 2.4 GHz network, and would experience slow transfer speeds and dropped connections. The weird thing was the devices could connect to the 2.4 GHz guest network and 5 GHz networks just fine. The problem was only with the 2.4 GHz private network. I ended up re-purposing it for a use which didn't involve WiFi, and buying a Netgear router (R7000). I ran across another Asus few years later (different model but also from the RT-AC line). A client bought it just before they called me so I couldn't warn them of this problem. It still had the same bug. And I've helped at least one owner here with the same problem (they ended up using the 2.4 GHz guest network since the device only needed Internet access)..

I've seen one report online a couple months ago that they've finally fixed this bug, but haven't been able to confirm it myself. Other than this bug, I had no problems with the Asus router. It's still busy acting as a VPN server for my office security camera system. But my home router is a Netgear.

For real-world router performance tests, read Small Net Builder.

https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/