Should I keep my RT-N66U ASUS Router?

Hello all,

Background - I’ve had the RT-N66U for around a year now and have used a few different flavours - Merlin, Tomato etc., used the smart features like QOS. I had 80mb Fibre (BT using Homehub 5) installed in the last few weeks so as expected I'm noticing a dramatic improvement, i.e. from 12mb to 70mb.

Anyway, the ASUS router was purchased originally to extend my wireless network and basically I was just intrigued to checkout the features, overall this unit has served me very well, but as I’m more of a trial/error DIY techie type, I recently found from a expert that I was ‘double nat-ing’ and so I decided to have a mess around with the configuration - albeit in a limited way with my knowledge....

So, in the past I had linked the ASUS router (in) via the WAN port from the (out) ethernet port of the HH5, basically connecting all my UK needs (iPlayer etc.) directly into the BT HH5 and everything else via the ASUS (streaming etc.) and the VPN, which I had configured within the ASUS router gui and it worked relatively well.

Since I got the fibre upgrade (previously ADSL 17mb broadband) I decided to test the ethernet & wireless methods with the ASUS turned off completely and use only the BT HH5 with the VPN individually/separately configured on all my devices, and, after speedtest checks, found my BT speeds remained consistent (70mb/18mb) using both methods actually, however, all the devices using the VPN on wireless have now more or less tripled from an ave. of 12mb to 35mb.

Naively, I thought that, as I was achieving 12mb on ethernet via the ASUS/VPN before (i.e. when I was double nat-ing) I upgraded to Fibre that I would get around the same pro-rata improvement after the upgrade, i.e. around 50mb.

So with this in mind I wondered what you guys thought - should I sell the ASUS or am I missing something obvious (very possible!) which I could test and re-try a third method before I sell it.

Equipment/Service/Software - BT Infinity2 (80mb), BT Modem/Router HH5, ASUS RT-N66U, PureVPN, TP-Link Adapters, Android Tablet, Macbook Pro, Android Media Player/Streamer

Any help/advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
E.

....as a final option, I've decided to try openvpn

….I found that my Android Media Player/Streamer is a limitation in this set-up, and in particular its Ethernet capabilities, however what I don’t fully understand is the stated spec. of the Media Player i.e. "10/100 Ethernet”, and my full results shown below, give me speed readings way above (i.e. beyond the 12mb max as I understand) the units spec? : -

Media Player - D/L mb ; U/L mb ; Ping ms
1.NAT>Ethernet (straight from UK ISP/BT Modem, no vpn) = 27.89; 17.39; 33
2.Double NAT>Ethernet (using Dutch vpn configured in router) = 9.25; 8.05; 41
3.Nat>Ethernet (using Dutch vpn configured in media player app) = 5.75; 3.94; 77

4.Double NAT>Wireless Asus 5G (using Dutch vpn configured in router) = 26.75; 28.76; 42
5.Double NAT>Wireless Asus 2.4G (using Dutch vpn configured in router) = 23.00; 31.91; 43
6.NAT>BT Modem 5G (using Dutch vpn configured in media player app) = 27.89; 9.65; 70
7.NAT>BT Modem 2.4G (using Dutch vpn configured media player app) = 25.75; 13.26; 35

….subsequently, I have purchased a relatively cheap 480mbps Ethernet adapter for the android streamer from eBay via Hong Kong, just to see if this makes any difference, if not, I can’t see (again, I stand corrected if anyone has any suggestions) any justification for keeping the ASUS router.

Thanks,
E.