Your suggestions needed for router upgrade

[dasus]

Imo you would be silly to buy anything besides an AC86U or AX88U, at which point your decision would come down to price and how long you want the device to last (the latter being a quad core, twice the ram, AX support, WPA3 support coming soon)

Except two AC86U will get you the same ram and processing power but double the range

 

[dasus]

Thank guys for your suggestions, no way for me to put an 86U on the wall, too many ETH cables, same problem laying it on front side. The router is in the middle of a living room, very visible, and my wife will kill me if cables are visible.

Why not put the router and cables in a custom wooden box to make it look like a piece of furniture?

 

[Val D.]

Knowing this, would the 86U be the best bet here?

Oh, you need a router only then!
In this case I would take a completely different approach and build a pfSense router based on Intel x86 (i5/i7) with 8/16GB RAM, 60/120GB SSD, PCIe Intel Gigabit NICs and use the existing Orbi APs. You can buy one from Netgate, but the price is very high. It requires a bit more technical knowledge and is not that user friendly to setup, but no consumer router can beat the performance. And you can actually enjoy your Gigabit Internet connection with no limitations, plus you can have great network control and monitoring tools. With 50+ devices, 4K streaming, probably NAS file sharing and Gigagit Internet connection I wouldn't recommend any consumer grade router.

 

[azilko]

Oh, you need a router only then!
In this case I would take a completely different approach and build a pfSense router based on Intel x86 (i5/i7) with 8/16GB RAM, 60/120GB SSD, PCIe Intel Gigabit NICs and use the existing Orbi APs. You can buy one from Netgate, but the price is very high. It requires a bit more technical knowledge and is not that user friendly to setup, but no consumer router can beat the performance. And you can actually enjoy your Gigabit Internet connection with no limitations, plus you can have great network control and monitoring tools. With 50+ devices, 4K streaming, probably NAS file sharing and Gigagit Internet connection I wouldn't recommend any consumer grade router.

Man, I've learned a TON today. Never heard of this product...so I'll do a bit of homework. The UniFi system is also looking quite interesting as well. Any thoughts on this?

BTW, I don't mean to thread jack here. I am happy to start a new thread if needed.

My concern w/ this, and the UniFi, is the overall ease of use and config. I'm by no means an advanced user. I really just want a home network that works with consumer based products well, and without issues.

 

[Val D.]

My concern w/ this, and the UniFi, is the overall ease of use and config. I'm by no means an advanced user. I really just want a home network that works with consumer based products well, and without issues.

You need something with a lot of routing power to feed all your wired devices and APs. From ASUS products GT-AX11000 is the most powerful router in this case. It's a new product and no much information about reliability though. I personally don't like the alien spider design and the "gaming" marketing of this product. Can't take it seriously with it's flashing lights. It's only $500 though, ready to go product with easy to setup interface. UniFi products are expensive for what they are as hardware and not that user friendly as software.

Not sure what to recommend in your case. Don't buy RT-AC86U though, it has a small issue with not coming on after soft reboot. Not every time, but it happens every now and then and there is no solution found for now. You have to power it off and back on manually. ASUS may fix it at some point with a firmware update, time will tell. It is a very powerful router, but just because of this issue I can't recommend it as a set and forget solution. It's advantages are low price, Asuswrt-Merlin support, small footprint.

I don't work in IT. Used to years ago. Now I run my own business in a completely different field and from time to time I need to change the subject by doing some DIY projects. I decide what I want, do a thorough research, purchase what I need and start building it when I have the time.

 

[Marc66]

In a router-only scenario, I'd go with a Unify Security Gateway.
I'm in a similar situation (RT-AC66U) and am about to upgrade it to a USG. I just need a long enough maintenance window to coordinate (DHCP) WAN MAC address change with my provider

 

[Val D.]

In a router-only scenario, I'd go with a Unify Security Gateway.

Unifi Security Gateway is a weak hardware device. Go for the same brand to keep compatibility, but get something better.

 

[azilko]

Unifi Security Gateway is a weak hardware device. Go for the same brand to keep compatibility, but get something better.

What would you recommend over the USG?

I agree that it's not as powerful, but it's pretty cheap, and could likely be easily swapped later on. However, I know they have their new Dream Machine, but it's all integrated and in Beta.

 

[Val D.]

What would you recommend over the USG?

Get it if you like Ubiquiti products. They don't offer much of a choice in lower price range anyway. It's a good Gigabit router and routing doesn't require a lot of processing power. If you need VPN though, you'll have to run a VPN Client on a PC.