Why upgrade to AC class router?

[jamesnmandy]

Hi all first post. Yes I have been searching and aparrently the issue I am having isn't commonly inquired about.

I consider myself more competent than the casual home user capable of and having flashed multiple WRT54G routers with DDWRT and configuring a relatively crowded home network with static IP's and port forwarding and such. Also have an adequate HTPC with XBMC(Kodi) and such streaming content from a NAS.

I have been lurking and reading articles here for a number of years, hence the reason I went out of my way to find a used WNDR3700 v1 router which was my first "decent" router after years of using whatever 25-50 dollar router I could get cheap at best buy or walmart because a "router is a router" right? Haha. Thanks to this site as a resource I learned to purchased a decent quality router and my 3700 is still going strong... sort of... .

Now here is my situation. I used to never have to reboot this router (running stock netgear firmware). Now it seems every couple weeks or so the wireless connection gets "saturated" kinda like the old cheap routers would get after a day and a reboot sorts it out.

We also recently got a new 4k hdr TV and PS4 Pro which are on the wireless 5G channel.

I also have several laptops/tablets/phones on WiFi. Also my wired connections are fully maxed and I am actually wishing I had 8 ethernet ports since I could wire the TV and ps4 along with the Netgear Ready NAS(old RND4000v1 sparc model with 1gb ram uograde) , bluray player, Home theater PC, and Tivo cable box and a desktop.

That being said the old WNDR3700 is holding up well as it is capable of providing a maxed out 60 megabit Internet service from my phones(using speed test) and it is streaming 4k HDR content from Netflix, Amazon Prime, and YouTube with no buffering.

This all being said.... I am trying to figure out what to do. I am really fond of the out of the box Netgear products so far.

A. Get a netgear switch and add behind the netgear router and deal with occasional reboots?

A.1? Flash this WNDR3700 with custom firmware that may help that situation? I suspect the router is just getting "tired" since the change appears to be progressive which would indicate hardware not firmware to me.

B. Get a new AC class router to minimize reboots/slowdowns? Is there even any benefit here since the current router can already handle the bandwidth demands?

C. Get an 8 port AC class router? I have like 2 models to choose from from what I have seen and they are far more expensive than I care to invest if they will effectively not A. provide a faster connection to the Internet and B. cost far more than adding a switch to existing router...

Why even upgrade from N to AC if range is not an issue (almost all devices are in home entertainment center literally feet apart) and the N router can already max out my 60mbps Internet?

Sorry so wordy. Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[pete y testing]

Yes I have been searching and aparrently the issue I am having isn't commonly inquired about.

the answer is

Does An AC Router Improve N Device Performance?
https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wir...oes-an-ac-router-improve-n-device-performance

Also my wired connections are fully maxed and I am actually wishing I had 8 ethernet

then get a network switch pretty cheap solution

WNDR3700

also have a look at

wireless AC device coverage comparison
https://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=2384995

included in my testing is the netgear wndr 3800 which is about the same wifi wise as the 3700

as you can see its chalk and cheese as wireless N just doesnt have the coverage or throughput needed these days never mind the client capacity

B. Get a new AC class router to minimize reboots/slowdowns? Is there even any benefit here since the current router can already handle the bandwidth demands?

yes , see above

C. Get an 8 port AC class router?

yup as i said a cheap network giga switch will fix this and a standard 4 port wireless AC router

Why even upgrade

many reasons , client capacity , far faster client to client streaming , able to deal with client load far better etc etc , the top link explains it all

btw i would look at asus as the feature set is always the best and outdoes dd wrt and the like these days

 

[jamesnmandy]

Thank you Pete. Yes I did read that post you linked to previously. I understand I can expect some improvements but wasn't sure if it would be worth it. I have been eyeballing the TMobile version of the 68U on Amazon for 80 bucks. Can be flashed to stock 68U from what I see. Seems like a good value.

Can the 3700 be turned into a switch easily?

 

[pete y testing]

Can the 3700 be turned into a switch easily?

sure but why would you bother a cheap giga switch is like $10

 

[thiggins]

There are no guarantees of performance improvement. But you should get some improvement by moving from N to AC. Whether it is worth it is up to you to judge.

If you want to save money, buy factory refurb product. AC1200 class can also save you money and provide performance benefit if you are on a budget.

And addint a gigabit switch as Pete suggested is the way to go do expand ports.

 

[jamesnmandy]

Thanks for the input. The TM-RT68U that can be flashed to a non TMobile stock 68U seems like a good value at 80 bucks from Amazon. Thoughts?

 

[jamesnmandy]

Found a seller on ebay selling them for $59 shipped and ebay is offering a $10 off discount for a limited time on top of that, cant go wrong for $49 shipped. In case someone else has been considering one of these and comes across this post.

 

[Samir]

Wow, seems like you got a great deal on the rt68u.

Personally, I would have just went with a switch. Why? Because the problems could be related to the wifi getting crowded and taxing the router to the point it has issues. Simple solution--move them off wireless and onto wired so that the wireless is clear again. And the benefit is also faster speeds to the wired equipment. I'm dead curious as to whether a switch and configuration like this would have worked for solving your reboot issues.

 

[jamesnmandy]

I received the TMobile TM-AC1900. It came with 376_3108 firmware. I used various guides and YouTube videos to figure out how to downgrade the firmware to 376_1703 to enable Telnet. Then updated CFE to 1.0.2.1. Then flashed a 380_xxxx more recent firmware which is compatible with the newest MerlinWRT builds to which I upgraded as well. A fully fledged RT-AC68U for 49 bucks delivered and about 2-3 hours of my time taking every step very slowly.

I haven't yet messed with setting up the WNDR3700 as a switch. The new capabilities of the wireless service on the new router seems to be good enough for our needs so might just be leaving more devices wireless until a need to go wired presents itself. It's amazing that I am able to stream 4k HDR content to my new HDTV over wireless.... wireless has never been adequate to me but the new wireless technology is changing that quickly.

Cheers.