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D-Link DIR-868L Wireless AC1750 Dual Band Gigabit Cloud Router Reviewed

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Synomenon

Regular Contributor
Read the review of the DIR-868L and saw a mention of the signal being directional.

Which "side" of the router does the signal tend to be directional towards? Out the front (side with LEDs), out the back (side with the ports) or one of the other sides?
 
Read the review of the DIR-868L and saw a mention of the signal being directional.

Which "side" of the router does the signal tend to be directional towards? Out the front (side with LEDs), out the back (side with the ports) or one of the other sides?
What I said was:
The upshot of this is that D-Link's unusual antenna arrangement is perhaps more directional than the cylindrical format might suggest—at least when the router and client are very close together.
The italicized part is important. I did not run tests in open air at normal operating distance to determine whether there is any directional effect in normal use.
 
Looking to replace my R6300 which has a bad ethernet port. How is the wireless range on this unit? Now that it supports bridge mode I may be interested.
 
Looking further at the 868L seems it does not support samba on the USB port. Sad as I require that feature for rsync backup from my NAS. Oh well, gotta move on.
 
It does support SMB. You connect to it using UNC (\\IP address-of-router).

You are correct that it doesn't support rsync, however.
 
It does support SMB. You connect to it using UNC (\\IP address-of-router).

You are correct that it doesn't support rsync, however.

Thanks Tim. Not worried about supporting rsync as my NAS MybookLive will still backup to external device. Problem is w/o that being discoverable on the LAN it won't connect. Hate to buy this and then return it b/c it won't work.
 
Won't connect to what? For a Windows machine you can map the UNC as a drive.
 
Won't connect to what? For a Windows machine you can map the UNC as a drive.

Let me better explain my situation.... I have a MybookLive NAS connected on the local network. It has a feature that does backups (called Safepoint) to an external device. Currently my R6300 has a 750GB USB drive connected which when setting up this Safepoint backup finds the READYSHARE USB. In the 6300 UI there is a setting in the USB section for Workgroup. If that is not set to the same setting as in the NAS (Workgroup) the Safepoint will not see it on the LAN, hence no backup can be done.

I need this functionality on the 868L.
 
Let me better explain my situation.... I have a MybookLive NAS connected on the local network. It has a feature that does backups (called Safepoint) to an external device. Currently my R6300 has a 750GB USB drive connected which when setting up this Safepoint backup finds the READYSHARE USB. In the 6300 UI there is a setting in the USB section for Workgroup. If that is not set to the same setting as in the NAS (Workgroup) the Safepoint will not see it on the LAN, hence no backup can be done.

I need this functionality on the 868L.
I understand perfectly. Yes, the MyBookLive is a little too cute. It displays little NAS icons for each share it finds. But it doesn't let you enter a server address directly. So, I agree, you need a router that supports Windows network browsing, which the D-Links don't.
 
I understand perfectly. Yes, the MyBookLive is a little too cute. It displays little NAS icons for each share it finds. But it doesn't let you enter a server address directly. So, I agree, you need a router that supports Windows network browsing, which the D-Links don't.

Thanks Tim. That's what I feared.

Any suggestion for replacing the R6300???
 
What are you looking for? Are you really using the AC1750 capability of the R6300?
 
What are you looking for? Are you really using the AC1750 capability of the R6300?

No, still 802.11n but the R6300 had great 5ghz range and throughput. Had to back off to an earlier firmware b/c of bad ping times. I didn't see any review of the Amped new router.
 
No, still 802.11n but the R6300 had great 5ghz range and throughput. Had to back off to an earlier firmware b/c of bad ping times. I didn't see any review of the Amped new router.
Review sample requested. Amped says they are all out being reviewed. I'll give 'em another week or so, then order one.

The R6250 actually does pretty well and is less $.
http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanw...-knight/1128-netgear-r6300/1183-netgear-r6250

Of course if you want to mess with ASUS, it's hard to beat the Dark Knight for throughput.
 
Thanks Tim.

ASUS is great and can't be beat, when its working. Had the 56U a while back and it required reboots a few times per week. Not sure I want Netgear again.... this R6300 only lasted about 2 years. Now a few ports are going intermittent.
 
Thanks Tim.

ASUS is great and can't be beat, when its working. Had the 56U a while back and it required reboots a few times per week. Not sure I want Netgear again.... this R6300 only lasted about 2 years. Now a few ports are going intermittent.
Well, use the same tool and select other products to compare. Keep in mind that when looking at AC routers the throughput levels you are seeing in the charts are with an AC client. That means the flat part of the curve will be higher than you'll get with an N client. But the falloff should occur with the same slope.
 
Well, use the same tool and select other products to compare. Keep in mind that when looking at AC routers the throughput levels you are seeing in the charts are with an AC client. That means the flat part of the curve will be higher than you'll get with an N client. But the falloff should occur with the same slope.

Well I managed to write my own rsync script for cron to call to do backups of the MBL. So there is no need to use the Safepoint UI. In fact its so much faster than using their perl script (11+ hrs vs. 4 hrs).

So I can use the D-link 868L. Now my question is what's your opinion on the 868L vs. the R6250 ?? Looking for throughput and range as the most important.
 
Bridge Mode does not seem to work the way I want

I want to bridge the WAN port to the LAN Ports, like you can do in WRT and disable the DHCP, DNS, etc. locally. i.e. use the unit as an access point.

It seems to bridge the wireless, then only allow you to selected 2.4 or 5 and use one outbound route.

Gone back to plugging everything into the LAN side of the unit ...

Also got an issue with airplay: unit can't see each other if they are using different access points ... LAN - wireless ok, but wireless - LAN - wireless no go. Any ideas?
 
The ipv6 support on this thing is a joke. DHCPD is not working properly, I have to restart it about 5 times to get it working.
 

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