RT-AC68U vs R7000 buying advice

[George Coat]

After a little homework I came down to this two routers on the top of AC1900 group and I would like to ask for your advice.
Which one to buy?
RT-AC68U or R7000?
I noticed several threads comparing these two routers but I think that after firmware, CPU upgrades and retests on SmallNetBuilder it would be worth to look at it again.
My house is with 2 floors and my old D-Link DIR-601-A1 (running DD-WRT v24-sp2 (03/25/13) std
(SVN revision 21061) with TP-LINK Powerline Extender are not good enough anymore to cover my wifi needs in the house.
Ranker shows R7000 on top of the AC1900 group mainly due to the 5GHz performance and range.
Comparing 2.4GHz performance for short distances RT-AC68U looks better in wireless throughput.
But for longer distances R7000 is not only better in 5GHz throughput but also in 2.4GHz throughput and range.
What were the distance locations for those testing conditions?
For the house with 2 floors and currently mostly 2GHz usage, which router would be better choice?
Thank you.

 

[microchip]

Only get the R7000 is you're prepared to run third party FW like XVortex, DDWRT, Shibby,etc

Yes, it's true the R7000 has slightly better coverage and throughput compared to the AC68U

 

[L&LD]

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/tools/charts/router/view

Click 'test information' in the link above to get some of your questions answered (follow the links).

You have another thread where you effectively ask the same thing; check there for my answer.

 

[George Coat]

Thank you for the answers (also at other threads).
If I understand correctly, ASUS combined with Merlin's modifications are better choice.
Slightly better coverage of R7000 would be worth something probably only if I flash it with DDWRT firmware and keep it up to date.
So RT-AC68U is better than R7000.
Maybe someone who has both routers at home or has experience with both of them would be able to answer the question which one is better in real conditions with walls and interferences.
I checked and followed the links you suggested, but could not find what was the distances of locations A, B, C, D, E, F from router.
"A" is the highest throughput number (in mbps) and it is getting smaller towards F. So I assume A is closest to the router and F is the most far. Maybe the A is endpoint 12" apart from router as explained here. But how far are the others (B-F)?

 

[sfx2000]

FWIW - the R7000 is the reference device that Tim Higgins uses for his testing...

The R7000 and Asus RT-68U are both fairly stable and well supported by third party firmware - it really comes down to what you've used in the past, and what's your comfortable moving forward - the hardware is very similar...

 

[George Coat]

Thank you!
I think RT-AC68U looks better, especially now when it is selling as B1 revision with the same 1Ghz CPU as R7000.
Thank you guys for advice.

 

[System Error Message]

When comparing these 2 just get both. Cant go wrong with 2 good pieces of hardware.

 

[Shamiro]

I use both devices as access points.
Looking at
-wired and wireless performance I could not recommend one over the other.
-firmware I would definitely get the AC68U - no matter if using original ASUSWRT or ASUSWRT-MERLIN
-storage usage I would tend to R7000, as I experienced higher read/write speeds compared to AC68U.

 

[pete y testing]

-storage usage I would tend to R7000, as I experienced higher read/write speeds compared to AC68U.

in my testing it was the reverse

asus rt-ac68u

usb3 to ethernet

read 52 MB/s write 38 Mb/s

netgear r7000

usb3 to ethernet

read 42 MB/s write 27 MB/s

but i dont recommend ether for storage anyway as usb is still to slow on these models , the newer 88u on the other hand is very good usb 3 performance wise

 

[Shamiro]

I wouldn´t recommend to compare the USB storage with a NAS, but it can be used in a quite comfortable way if the user isn´t in need of all the functions the latter provides.

It seems the speeds differ quite a lot, that might depend on the connected disk.

 

[pete y testing]

It seems the speeds differ quite a lot, that might depend on the connected disk.

sure compare that to 110MB/s with ethernet connected nas and then you forget usb all together

 

[Shamiro]

My Qnap TS-231+ provides data fast enough for me, but I`m still using a HD connected to my router.
The NAS is mainly used for backups of notebooks/desktops and for pics/vids from the router connected HD.
I like the usb disk as it consumes very low power and provides the first fast and easy step for data storage in my family.

Again, I´m not going to compare usb and nas storage.
I´m just using both.

 

[sfx2000]

I wouldn´t recommend to compare the USB storage with a NAS, but it can be used in a quite comfortable way if the user isn´t in need of all the functions the latter provides.

Having one of the best of SNB class Router/AP's on USB/eSATA storage (Linksys WRT1900ac) vs. a NAS Box (QNAP TS-453Pro), I'll take the NAS box... it's not that the WRT is slow, it's just that the NAS box is that much faster...

Just my two cents on this thread...