Wi-Fi 7 worth upgrade?

[Optimus2357]

I have a Asus rt-ax86u(not pro) and looking at the Flint 3 router and I am wondering if it is worth the upgrade. I was feeling the need with all the recent exploits and security concerns to upgrade to third-party firmware and I know gl-inet uses a flavor of dd-wrt. Is that the best hardware to both use and learn dd-wrt? My usage is low. Only two people with about nine devices total and maybe four devices online any given time with the priority being my wired desktop. I only pay for 500/500Mbps fiber and that is more than enough speed for me. The house is also small and the router I have now provides more than enough coverage so I don't need a mesh or wired AP solution. The area is also not very congested physically, so congestion of the Wi-Fi band is also really not an issue. I guess I am only tempted because I hear so many great things about the Flint routers and want to try them. Are there any benefits to Wi-Fi 7 I haven't thought of? Like improve latency to Wi-Fi cameras if I ever choose to install them outside? Or is that not a big issue? Thanks for the input.

 

[degrub]

Sounds like a mild case of G.A.S. Get one if you want to play, but based on your description, it is a solution in search of a problem for the use case. And wifi 7 is a work in progress.

 

[Analog-1]

Nope not worth it for most. It's a lot of market hype with very little difference over all.

 

[Tech9]

I know gl-inet uses a flavor of dd-wrt

OpenWrt.

Are there any benefits to Wi-Fi 7

For your use case - No.

 

[Optimus2357]

Sounds like a mild case of G.A.S. Get one if you want to play, but based on your description, it is a solution in search of a problem for the use case. And wifi 7 is a work in progress.

So is Wi-Fi 7 still in draft? I thought it was ratified. I was glad I upgraded from Wi-Fi 5 to Wi-Fi 6 because it had certain security upgrades like WPA3 and handled congestion better. It also gave me full wireless speed that my ISP was providing, although that isn't too important since those wireless devices are mainly for video streaming which never takes up more than 50 Mbps. I was never interested in Wi-Fi 6E because I had no devices that supported the 6 GHz band but I thought Wi-Fi 7 might have some general improvements I was not aware of. If not, is there any Wi-Fi generation on the horizon that I should eventually consider upgrading to? I am all for not fixing what is not broken but I also want the best possible product at the highest value and I know that changes with time. Should I focus on firmware instead of new hardware?

 

[Optimus2357]

OpenWrt.



For your use case - No.

Thank you for the correction. Asus commonly uses DD-wrt right? What are the main differences? I thought DD-wrt was more for the power user. Also, how good is the particular flavor of open wrt that they use?

 

[opq]

So is Wi-Fi 7 still in draft? I thought it was ratified. I was glad I upgraded from Wi-Fi 5 to Wi-Fi 6 because it had certain security upgrades like WPA3 and handled congestion better. It also gave me full wireless speed that my ISP was providing, although that isn't too important since those wireless devices are mainly for video streaming which never takes up more than 50 Mbps. I was never interested in Wi-Fi 6E because I had no devices that supported the 6 GHz band but I thought Wi-Fi 7 might have some general improvements I was not aware of. If not, is there any Wi-Fi generation on the horizon that I should eventually consider upgrading to? I am all for not fixing what is not broken but I also want the best possible product at the highest value and I know that changes with time. Should I focus on firmware instead of new hardware?

It’s ratified but it always takes manufacturers a few years to work out the bugs in their FW. 6E became widely available in 2021 products but at least for Asus it took them another year or two to make 6Ghz usable and stable.

 

[Optimus2357]

It’s ratified but it always takes manufacturers a few years to work out the bugs in their FW. 6E became widely available in 2021 products but at least for Asus it took them another year or two to make 6Ghz usable and stable.

I guess the only thing that would really interest me would be an increase in range so I can have better coverage in my backyard without having to put an external AP. Wiring in my house is tricky because there is concrete blocks. Wasn't there some new Wi-Fi standard where you could get miles of line of sight coverage? I know the connection rate was slow but that really isn't an issue with iot. Will this be Incorporated into the Wi-Fi standard or is it its own separate thing like Bluetooth?

 

[bbunge]

I guess the only thing that would really interest me would be an increase in range so I can have better coverage in my backyard without having to put an external AP. Wiring in my house is tricky because there is concrete blocks. Wasn't there some new Wi-Fi standard where you could get miles of line of sight coverage? I know the connection rate was slow but that really isn't an issue with iot. Will this be Incorporated into the Wi-Fi standard or is it its own separate thing like Bluetooth?

You will get no increase in range with WIFI 7. If you get a tri-band WIFI 7 the upper band will have a really short range. Your AX86U probably has the best range of any of the Asus routers. I sometimes connect my old AX86U as an AiMesh node to my AX86U Pro and discover many of my WIFI clients connecting to it. I have a 2.4 GHz printer five feet away from the AX86U Pro but it likes the AX86U 30 feet and one floor lower away.
If you want to spend money on a new router, look for an AX86U Pro on sale. Then make the AX86U an AiMesh node near the back of the house to reach outside.

 

[Tech9]

Asus commonly uses DD-wrt right?

Asuswrt.

I thought DD-wrt was more for the power user.

It was... many years ago.

 

[heysoundude]

Just to be a little contrarian to the general stream of thought around here, I say go for it. You may have to wait a while before you have any devices to justify it, but it will be in place and functioning when you do. And something else will have come along to replace it in the meantime, so the whole cycle will begin again. (Why are you asking us how to spend your money? Spending it is why you work for it; if a little retail therapy justifies something, I'm not going to judge.)

 

[tgl]

I guess the only thing that would really interest me would be an increase in range so I can have better coverage in my backyard without having to put an external AP.

You're barking up the wrong tree then. Wifi 6E and 7 standards are not about increasing range. They are about adding the 6GHz band (which is inherently shorter-range than lower frequencies) and squeezing a few more bits-per-second out of the legally mandated channel bandwidth and transmit power limitations (which implies lower signal-to-noise ratio and thus shorter range than older standards).

Your money would be far better spent on that additional AP that you seem so resistant to.