Netgear X4s vs Asus 86u/5300

[Hussein Zreik]

Hey Guys,

So I posted before and ended up going with the Asus AC5300 router... Well... I've been having ALOT of issues with it (MULTIPLE Dropped connections, lagging out of games, etc). It's been a horrible experience for me so far. I was wondering should I just go for the X4s instead and return this thing or go for the 86u/88u? Will the 86u/88u give me the same issues? Also, if I upgrade to the asuswrt-merlin firmware, will that solve all my issues? If that's an option i can just keep this router too. Thanks in advance for all your help!

 

[avtella]

The 88U uses the same chipset as the AC5300 just with one less 5 Ghz band. The R7800 has the greatest 5 Ghz performance of any consumer unit I've seen, the 86U is pretty close. The 86U has the best VPN performance of any these though and is using a newer gen WiFi chip than the 88U/AC5300. VPN: 86U>R7800>88U/AC5300.

R7800 or 86U either is fine.

Now before doing any of that, what devices do you have connected and what other issues are you experiencing. If you really don't want to deal with all the trouble shooting you could just get a R7800/86U and test it for a few days and if issues don't abate you can return them.

 

[Hussein Zreik]

The 88U uses the same chipset as the AC5300 just with one less 5 Ghz band. The R7800 has the greatest 5 Ghz performance of any consumer unit I've seen, the 86U is pretty close. The 86U has the best VPN performance of any these though and is using a newer gen WiFi chip than the 88U/AC5300. VPN: 86U>R7800>88U/AC5300.

R7800 or 86U either is fine.

Now before doing any of that, what devices do you have connected and what other issues are you experiencing. If you really don't want to deal with all the trouble shooting you could just get a R7800/86U and test it for a few days and if issues don't abate you can return them.

So my main issues have been what I stated in my original post. Frequent (atleast once a day) dropping connections while gaming, lagging, rubber banding, and had to actually restart the router once because WiFi wasn’t working. For $300, I shouldn’t be experiencing issues like that at all. Now I don’t know if it was a firmware issue and I’ve been reading around that the factory firmware for the Asus routers is horrendous compared to the asuswrt-Merlin firmware. I upgraded to that last night but I’m not sure if that will solve my issues. That’s why I was considering the Netgear X4S as a replacement but wasn’t sure how good that is for gaming and streaming when 3 people in the house are doing that at once. And if the Merlin firmware will solve my issues I can just keep the 5300, but I’m not sure if this is a fix and if others have experienced this as well.

Now for connected devices, wired, I have 2 xboxes, 3 PC’s, two Smart TV’s, hue bridge, another router for the security system. Wireless is 5 phones, 3 laptops, another smart tv, and printer, off the top of my head.

All of which are running off of a gigabit connection 980/930.

 

[avtella]

The R7800 can handle that stuff fine and so can the 86U. I have 20+ devices on my network including 3 Arlo cams that record on motion. The QoS does a pretty good job of balancing the upload on my 40/5 connection but since you have a gigabit connection you don't even need to worry about any of that. Games use barely any bandwidth usually at most around a 100 kbps or so and even with simultaneous streaming you should have no issues as we do it all the time at home.

 

[Hussein Zreik]

The R7800 can handle that stuff fine and so can the 86U. I have 20+ devices on my network including 3 Arlo cams that record on motion. The QoS does a pretty good job of balancing the upload on my 40/5 connection but since you have a gigabit connection you don't even need to worry about any of that. Games use barely any bandwidth usually at most around a 100 kbps or so and even with simultaneous streaming you should have no issues as we do it all the time at home.

I just picked up the R7800, so far so good, I'm liking it! Fingers crossed on this bad boy, but if you haven't had any issues or dropped connections then I think I should be a-ok. I appreciate all the help man! I have literally the same setup as you haha, that's pretty funny. I forgot about my Arlo cams. Does the firmware on the x4s support Arlo cams, I know the old AC1900 nighthawk supported it. Not sure about this one though, should I break out the bridge that came with the cams? Thanks again!

 

[avtella]

The R7000 had support but they took it out due to issues. You have to use the base station.

 

[imdandman]

The R7800 can handle that stuff fine and so can the 86U. I have 20+ devices on my network including 3 Arlo cams that record on motion. The QoS does a pretty good job of balancing the upload on my 40/5 connection but since you have a gigabit connection you don't even need to worry about any of that. Games use barely any bandwidth usually at most around a 100 kbps or so and even with simultaneous streaming you should have no issues as we do it all the time at home.

I wonder if you could offer some insight here - you seem pretty knowledgeable about these two routers.

I currently have the ASUS RT-N66U, but in the last month or so, it's started giving me trouble. Random reboots for no discernible reason. I tried old firmware, the newest firmware, DD-WRT, and the latest Merlin firmware.

I thought DD-WRT would fix my problems, but my IP cameras had trouble connecting to it for some reason. I had them assigned specific IP numbers via DHCP in the router, but 75% of the time, they wouldn't even respond to ping. This no matter which device (router or camera) was booted first. The other ASUS firmwares didn't have this specific problem, but still had the rebooting issue.

Now I'm contemplating upgrading and stuck between these two routers. The Netgear Nighthawk X4S R7800 or the ASUS AC2900 (RT-AC86U).

My needs are pretty simple...

• Want ability to assign specific IP addresses to specific MAC addresses.
• Want ability to utilize some kind of DDNS so I can access my IP cameras from outside the home. I had been using the built in one offered by ASUS, but am open to changing to something else (as long as it's free).
  
• Because of the above, obviously I will need some kind of port forwarding.
• I do a little bit of gaming on Xbox One, and typically we have the baby monitor going, or my wife will be watching something on Netflix simultaneously. I don't usually have much lag, but I obviously want the router to be beefy enough to handle everything. Some QoS might be nice as well as long as it's decent. I tried the ASUS QoS once and it killed everything else on my network.
• Connection is cable: 150 mbps down/ 12 mbps up.
• Xbox, PC, and a few other things are wired via CAT 6. Everything else is wireless.
• Typically about 15-20 clients with DHCP leases on the network at any given time, but usually only 3-4 actively using bandwidth simultaneously.

Any thoughts are greatly appreciated!

 

[avtella]

R7800 can handle your stuff fine and so can the 86U. R7800 has better 5Ghz WiFi, and the 86U has better VPN performance. R7800 uses a Qualcomm CPU/WiFi chipset so it’s a bit more open source friendly at least from an OpenWRT perspective where newer gen Broadcom units don’t have proper WIFi functionality. 86U does have RMerlin support. You could honestly go with either.

 

[imdandman]

Go with R7800 if you're not planning on using the router as a VPN client. Better looking router with good wifi range. Go with 86U if you're planning on getting a VPN service. Not as fast but close to the R7800 in wifi range but still the king of VPN speed R7800 can't match.

I occasionally use PIA on my PC, but you're referring to a router based VPN, yes?

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

 

[imdandman]

Using the router as a VPN client. Actually used an R7800 before switching to 86u. VPN is the deciding factor for me going with the Asus router.

Having used both of them, how do you feel about the functionality and reliability of both? With my needs in mind if you remember.

Sent from my Pixel 2 XL using Tapatalk

 

[avtella]

I used the R7800 but not the 86U, I have seen reviews of the 86U and also from others experience not my own, it seems like a capable device.

 

[imdandman]

I used the R7800 but not the 86U, I have seen reviews of the 86U and also from others experience not my own, it seems like a capable device.

They both seem like high quality products... I'm probably just splitting hairs. I just want to maximize what I can get. They're both within about $5 of each other too.

Can anyone recommend a decent free DDNS service if I go with netgear and abandon the free ASUS service?

Also - what are the advantages if a device being "Wi-Fi certified"? I've read that Netgear doesn't get their devices certified until after releasing.

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