Newbie here, need some help.

[TBillings]

So my name is ty, and i am new to this website but it seems like a cool place for advice. So i picked up the ASUS RT-AC66U and I need help optimizing this bad boy. I mainly play alot of xbox live, stream netflix and hulu on the regular and I also use a USB Hard Drive through this router to play my movies. So to get to the point, I use to use QOS on my d-link router cus the old time warner tech told me it was like golden honey for the routers soul. I liked that it helped when everyone was online at once, but even then, i experienced some serious lag. I have read that the QOS in the router is kinda junk, So i'm wondering what i can do to get this bad boy running like a champion. I got it for 70$ even after tax thanks to my bby discount. But i want it to feel like 200$ bucks worth. Here is my ISP Info.

 

[CaptainSTX]

Speed Direct Connect

What is your speed if you connect directly to your cable modem using an Ethernet cable?

 

[Pericynthion]

The QOS is ok if you have an idea of the traffic types and also your true bandwidth (see previous question from CaptainSTX).
However QOS does disable hardware acceleration and adds some complexity depending on what type of traffic you are using to test your speed (beyond speedtest.net etc it will vary on connection and application type - hence the point of QOS).

-My recommendation would be connect your computer directly to the cable modem and see what you get from speedtest.net.
-Then plug the router back in mix
-Disable QOS and any 'fancy' features - in fact if you want to be doubly sure, even reset it to factory defaults.
- Plug the computer directly into one of the LAN ports and retry your speed tests.

The key thing is to prove that you are getting close to no lag in the LAN->WAN connection , when you are using physical Ethernet cables.

When you add in wireless or streaming from USB, there is a different set of things to consider, but if you can prove that a hard wired connection doesnt cause you any delay then at least you know that you are getting some overhead with the client->router connection, rather than the router->internet connection.