Router Suggestions for a Church

[N2Wind]

I am the volunteer IT guy at the church. The current router (Cisco RV180) has been in place for a year now is being very problematic. During the week there are 5-6 users and 10-15 devices on the network. On Sunday there is currently 50-100 (bandwidth limited to 512k). There are 9 APs covering the building. The budget is limited as being a church. We have a 20M internet connection. I need a new router that is reliable, easy to configure, DHCP server (10.10.X.X) and has a basic firewall. In other words, I need a heavy duty consumer grade router.

 

[kanewolf]

What brand APs? There might be benefits of getting a router of the same brand.

 

[DeadlyDays]

you could try a dual or tri band gaming router setup centrally, or get another small business cisco router. the cisco router will provide a lot more options for controlling each individual connection to it, but the gaming router will likely provide better connections just because they are putting faster components in the gaming router. But the firmware for gaming routers leave a lot to be desired for controlling a network.

The dual band would allow for some people with newer devices to go onto the 5.0Ghz spectrum which is faster/less noisy, and older to go onto the 2.4Ghz network. Tri band would allow attempting to split the traffic on the 5.0ghz spectrum to 2 separate networks along with the 2.4 for older devices. Set it up in the main area.

Any router is going to provide DHCP service on the subnet of your choice, the gaming router is only going to do a single subnet at a time though, you'll want like a 12 hour lease time max though so you don't run out of addresses. Only a cisco small business router or maybe one flashed with ddwrt or the like would do multiple subnet DHCP service. And almost any router will have a basic firewall.

 

[N2Wind]

What brand APs? There might be benefits of getting a router of the same brand.

They are Unifi. I have tried the edge router and I don't have a clue when it comes to working through the terminal. I have also tried the newer unifi router and for some reason I started having speed issues.

 

[N2Wind]

I don't see a consumer router holding up.

 

[N2Wind]

After calling around to a few of the major IT retailers, all suggested to go with the Cisco RV130. It is the replacement for the RV180. Well, it came in today and it is a no go. It will not even take my Static IP from my ISP. (192.230.X.X) It also will not support more that 253/254 IP addresses... Back to the drawing board.