Recommendation to Replace WNDR3700

[christoman]

I am looking to increase my range and ideally performance from the WNDR3700. Overall, I have been very happy with the Netgear, but I am having a hard time streaming to the corner of my house.

I am currently trying the Amped AP20000G AP, and it seems inconsistent. Range is generally better, but performance varies from great to borderline OK.

When I bought the Netgear, it was widely considered the best at the time in terms of combination of performance and range. Would that now be the Asus RT-N66U? It's not clear to me if that's the case. Price is not a factor for me - just performance, range, and general reliability.

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
If you are streaming on wireless, location of the router in the house is a factor for whole house coverage. If you can't relocate your router for best coverage, new router may not be enough to solve your problem.
Consider using another router as AP, repeater or bridge whichever suits
your need.

 

[remixedcat]

Please ensure you have your AP20000G communicating on a non congested wireless channel. You can go to the Google Play store and search for the Amped Wireless Wifi Analytics tool>download it>it will tell you the least congested channels to use as well as other tools.

You may also download the program called InSSIDer if you have a windows based laptop and it will also scan networks and provide the congestion data as well.

From there you would go to the following Access Point Control Panel area:
More Settings>2.4Ghz Settings>Basic Settings>Select the channel that is the least congested>Apply
Do the same for the 5Ghz band as well.

Please let us know if this helps.

 

[christoman]

Thanks, remixedcat. I did use InSSIDer to measure old/new performance and for channel selection. This is how I could see that signal strength was marginally better (but not as much as I expected).

Most of my testing has been on my laptop with Intel 5300 AGN adapter, and nobody in my house seems to be complaining. It's possible that it could be isolated to the single client.

I have several more weeks of return window. Really wanted to get some suggestions on alternatives to try.

 

[Sparxxx]

if you are considering buying an Asus RT-AC66U please DON'T.

I have replaced my WNDR3700 last weekend with this Asus model and it's a piece of sh*t. 2.4Ghz network is extremely bad. 80% packet losses, downloads don't go over 1mbit.

Tomorow I will bring it back and replace it with a Netgear or Linksys.

 

[christoman]

Sparxxx, thank you. That's interesting. Was considering the AC66U, but was leaning toward the N66U given the reviews and posts. Let me know what you end up doing and how it goes.

 

[remixedcat]

Did you try any other devices at that part of the house and try streaming, etc from there with the other devices?

Also you may want to try to use another WLAN adapter as well to isolate a problem with the Intel WLAN adapter.

 

[Sparxxx]

Yup, believe it or not I have tried everything that was in my power.
My WNDR3700 was in the same spot and for almost 4 years never had issues with it.
I returned the Asus and got my money. Back to Wndr3700 untill new models

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
If you use WNDR3700, ever tried Trondah's OpenWrt f/w for the router? It worked for me very well when I had Netgear.

 

[Sparxxx]

Nope, never tried it. Had a look and seems to be a nice custom firmware. Which one do you recommend? Dangerous Benchmark latest build?

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
You can try latest one. If you don't like it you can flash back to whatever you were running on. I wnet thru Netgear WNDR3700, 3700V2, 4000, 4500 and ASUS N66U, AC66U
and now on commercial grade router.

 

[christoman]

Tony, what commercial grade router did you settle on?