I have an Apple Extreme but it is not doing the job. Range and throughput associated with range drop off dramatically. What is the killer router I should get with Plex in mind. I saw the nighthawk but 80% of what I do is DNLA so I don’t see the logic of putting plex server in the router if that doesn’t work. Any ideas?
I used this router in my previous home which was approx. 6000 sq ft. and got great coverage everywhere. However, I was NOT using PLEX in it at the time. Now I have a house half that size, with a router on the 1st floor, and it covers my 3 floors with PLEX, no problem. I can stream 10,000 bit rate streams to my 3rd floor bedrooms.
Netgear R7500 Nighthawk X4 AC2350 Dual Band WiFi Router
Asus RT-AC66U, RT-AC68U, etc. I started out with the N66U and upgraded to the AC model a while back. Even the N66U is a good model… I do have a few walls to go through so I have a second AC66U as an access point wired to the first where I need better reception.
Walls, and their contents are going to attenuate any radio signals going either way. (Wires, pipes, nails, etc.) And your neighbor’s radios are going to cause potential interference problems. It means you are going to want to run a site survey to see if there are conflicting radios that could cause problems. Most good routers have this option built in, so you can run it on the router (usually) and it can give you an idea of open or less congested channels to select. Look at the channels in use, and select one with lower usage, or less power to interfere with the router.
I don’t know about the Apple Extreme, if it has that option or not. You would have to look in the manual for it to find out.
thanks much for the thoughts.
im looking into the Netgear AC5300 Nighthawk X8 Tri-Band WiFi Router (R8500-100NAS) prob overkill but i have a gig Ethernet feed and tired of crappy wifi speeds 
Looks like I posted twice accidentally.
Good info. Thanks.
Forgo consumer grade rubbish and look at enterprise grade,
I use Ubiquiti router, switches and APs works great, I will never buy consumer again.
Have a look at this
I used to use Asus and Linksys all rubbish. Asus melted, ( RT-AC68U) and Linksys just gave up and shutdown.
ASUS AC68U is the best choice of price and performance IMO.
The tri/quad band routers range is going to be similar. Unless your devices can fully support the tri/quad band routers you won’t see any speed improvement over a AC1900 router. That means buying additional adapters for those devices. For devices like smartphones your stuck with what is built-in.
Your home may also have deadspots for wifi coverage. Only solution may be to add an access point.
I have a nighthawk R7000 and it’s glorious, so I would imagine most of the rest of the nighthawk lineup is also good (albeit perhaps overkill, but overkill is fun).
As Mike said, channel adjustments help a lot, as does dual-band (true dual-band, not that “2.4 OR 5” garbage linksys puts in their cheap routers), and if you have an Android phone, install “WiFi Analyzer” by farproc…it will scan the airwaves and recommend channels (or the nighthawk can also be set to auto-adjust the 2.4 channel, or bridge 2.4 & 5 under a single SSID and auto-juggle it)
The ubiquiti recommendation I can’t speak to personally, but I agree with the sentiment, aside from the nighthawk or the resurrected WRT line…consumer routers are almost all a hot mess. If it has an MSRP below $150, you very likely will hate it if you know anything at all about networking.
I’ve been using an ASUS RT-AC87U for two years and it works flawless and has a really long range. Don’t listen people saying these routers are rubbish, this is a big lie. If you’re a regular user living in a regular house, you won’t have any problem. You don’t need to spend thousands of euros/dollars in a REAL enterprise router.
Recommendation for a killer router.
Personally I don’t want a killer router but perhaps something made by Skynet
Something worth very serious consideration is separation of your router and your access points (APs). This enables you to upgrade the two individually and as you see fit. I did this and it affords me a lot of flexibility I would not have otherwise.
On routers, I know many have been happy with Ubiquiti’s Edge Router X. I cannot speak to it personally but if I were to replace my current router I’d likely get that. My router (MikroTik) requires significant networking knowledge to understand and configure. If you are happy with the router aspect of your Airport, you can continue to use it as such switching off the wireless on it and connecting your APs to it via ethernet.
On APs, I do have a Ubiquiti AP-AC-Pro. One device easily covers my entire house. If you have areas where WiFi coverage is difficult, such as radio blocking building materials, you may want to look at Ubiquiti’s mesh APs. They can wirelessly connect to other APs and retransmit to extend range. Unlike some of the cheaper products, they use two sets of radios to connect upstream and downstream simultaneously. Ars reviewed these as well: Hands-on: Ubiquiti’s Amplifi covers the whole house in a Wi-Fi mesh | Ars Technica
It is worth noting that Ubiquiti’s equipment is geared toward enterprise, so sometimes it is a little rough around the edges. In spite of that, I love their equipment as it functions well.
@jkalland said:
I have a nighthawk R7000 and it’s glorious, so I would imagine most of the rest of the nighthawk lineup is also good (albeit perhaps overkill, but overkill is fun).As Mike said, channel adjustments help a lot, as does dual-band (true dual-band, not that “2.4 OR 5” garbage linksys puts in their cheap routers), and if you have an Android phone, install “WiFi Analyzer” by farproc…it will scan the airwaves and recommend channels (or the nighthawk can also be set to auto-adjust the 2.4 channel, or bridge 2.4 & 5 under a single SSID and auto-juggle it)
The ubiquiti recommendation I can’t speak to personally, but I agree with the sentiment, aside from the nighthawk or the resurrected WRT line…consumer routers are almost all a hot mess. If it has an MSRP below $150, you very likely will hate it if you know anything at all about networking.
I have the D7000 and when it works, it’s glorious, but it has a tendency to completely stop responding to any requests (both wifi and wired) every few weeks so it needs a reboot. Unfortunately, there is no third party firmware for it (the R7000 does have third party software), and you might want to look at this:
well, i guess I would also add that i refuse to own any modem+router combo, just because even the expensive ones always seem to lock up on me (as you noted. I’ve had that EXACT issue with motorola surfboards (pre-arris), arris surfboards, SMC cable gateways, etc.)
As for the netgear security issue, yes, that’s valid, but for starters, they’re hardly the only router to ever have a security hole, and also, I have a “security through obscurity” model going on where I live…namely I live in the middle of nowhere and the only houses within range of my wifi are not of the “technically savvy” class of people and from the SSIDs they all have 2Wire gateway routers from AT&T 
but in all seriousness, yes, if you live in a populated area where wifi security is a real concern, avoid netgear routers until they patch that (gaping) hole.
@jkalland - the issue is that someone can embed a link that you can click on that can compromise your router from your own computer, potentially. It would be a form of a watering-hole attack. For instance, I could tell you to click on this link (hxxp://www.routerlogin.com/cgi-bin/;reboot), while you are connected to your R7000, and your router will reboot. It looks like a public link, but if you ping www.routerlogin.com you will see it resolved to your internal IP of your netgear router. If someone changed the command from reboot to a nc or some other listener, they might have a path in. It is a bigger deal than many realize.
@savalone said:
I have an Apple Extreme but it is not doing the job. Range and throughput associated with range drop off dramatically. What is the killer router I should get with Plex in mind. I saw the nighthawk but 80% of what I do is DNLA so I don’t see the logic of putting plex server in the router if that doesn’t work. Any ideas?
Asus I believe is best bang for buck.
As for security go to Steve Gibson site and explore.
I have an old PC with Intel Pentium 4 HT @ 3.0GHz with 1GB RAM and 3 dual Intel Pro/1000 Server Gigabit NICs running pfSense as my router and using an ASUS router configured as an access point. This setup has been working wonderfully the past 2 years. No bottlenecks. I have a dedicated WiFi access point (Engenius ENS202EXT) and firewalled my Guest Network from being able to talk to my other networks.
Steve Gibson uses pfSense and loves it. Youtube video about Steve Gibson talking about pfsense in Security Now #530: https://youtu.be/PfCuL8I7onU?t=43m51s
pfSense Website: https://pfsense.org/
Minmum and Recommended Requirements for pfSense:
https://pfsense.org/hardware/#requirements
@DeruGuy said:
I have an old PC with Intel Pentium 4 HT @ 3.0GHz with 1GB RAM and 3 dual Intel Pro/1000 Server Gigabit NICs running pfSense as my router and using an ASUS router configured as an access point. This setup has been working wonderfully the past 2 years. No bottlenecks. I have a dedicated WiFi access point (Engenius ENS202EXT) and firewalled my Guest Network from being able to talk to my other networks.Steve Gibson uses pfSense and loves it. Youtube video about Steve Gibson talking about pfsense in Security Now #530: https://youtu.be/PfCuL8I7onU?t=43m51s
pfSense Website: https://pfsense.org/
Minmum and Recommended Requirements for pfSense:
Official pfSense Hardware, Appliances, and Security Gateways
As i said GRC
I work in IT and I am using Meraki for Firewall and AP.
If you look, you can sign up for webinars that will get you a free MR18 Meraki AP. These APs are glorious. Just holding one you can tell the quality difference in enterprise vs. consumer. Let alone the features.
My FW is a MX64 and it works wonderfully. Once the licensing on these expires, I will probably switch to a PFSense home-build with Ubiquiti APs.
My personal opinion for those not involved in IT would be to go ASUS.
Huge bang for the buck.
If you’re an IT guy specializing in security then it’s a wet dream if you know what you’re doing with it.
So any ASUS router that fits your budget would be my vote.
I’ve been extremely happy with my Netgear R7000. It covers all 3 floors of the house, the outside property, and even the wireless adapter link into the (separate) garage. I also make heavy use of the integrated VPN.
There is that security bug that was just discovered, but unusual and we’re taking precautions until the fix is out.
Plex recently introduced a router on their blog. Is it Plex branded? How are the reviews for this device?
