I have owned this product for > 6 months at the time of writing this review.
To start, I am fairly knowledgable (through experience) on setting up networks. I had (and still have) a Netgear N300 (WNR3500L) that I received for free through the SamKnows program. If you're not familiar, that is an organization that reports ISP performance to the FCC, grades it if you will. Anyway, it replaced my old Linksys (which I also still have, and which was running open-source firmware). I was happy with the Netgear's performance but noticed slowly that the 2.4Ghz spectrum was getting crowded around where I live, and that the range was not as good as I liked (this being used in a 2 story old 1950s home). Still for free, the router was great.
Eventually I really needed better wi-fi range. I also realized I had many products that could utilize the 5Ghz band. (And later, by late 2013, I had more than a few devices which could utilize 802.11ac). After much research I settled upon this router. It had good reviews, and I also really like the ASUS brand based on other devices I had used (motherboards, the Nexus 7 2012 and 2013).
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Setup was painless. I did it twice, let me explain why:
First setup was your traditional setup, router to your ISP's modem, in this case my Comcast modem. You plug in your computer directly to this device's ethernet port (ports 1-4), and have it plugged in and powered on. It'll give your computer an IP address, get on a browser and it'll automatically re-direct to the built-in setup pages. I simply followed the instructions and I was up and running. At some point during setup it had asked me to connect the router to the Comcast modem, and I set the MAC address for Comcast that I know works (further explained below), and I was up and running.
(The MAC thing)
Now for anyone not familiar, some ISPs (including Comcast, at least here in Chicago) "imprint" on the MAC address of the device you activated your Comcast connection with. Basically every device that can connect to a network has its own MAC address, it's like the device's social security number, something unique to identify the device with. So I first activated my service long ago with an old laptop, and I had saved the MAC address I used, let's pretend it was "ABC". From there on, I knew anytime I needed to connect something to the Comcast modem, the device's MAC address needed to be "ABC." Now I know I just said MAC addresses are unique, but you can also manually set a device's MAC address. So when I had my old Netgear connected to the Comcast modem, it's MAC address was set to ABC, and now that I connected the ASUS, I needed to change it's MAC to be the same. Failure to do so would mean your connection to Comcast will intermittently but reliably drop, slow down, etc.
So why the second setup? Well I was happy with my setup but after a few weeks I realized that without having my SamKnows router connected, the organization couldn't collect and grade my ISP. So I had to re-arrange my network.
I went from: INTERNET > Comcast Modem > this ASUS router > all of the devices in my home
to this: INTERNET > Comcast Modem > Netgear router > this ASUS router > all of the devices in my home
And I could've actually left the setup the way it was but I chose to switch this router from the standard "Wireless Router Mode" to the "Access Point mode" which means it basically serves as a traffic manager, and the actual IP addresses are given out by the Netgear router.
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I turned off the Netgear router's wi-fi radio. Nothing is connected via ethernet to my router(s). Everything is wireless and it all goes through this ASUS. How many things? Well in a house with 6, many!
Devices connected wirelessly to this ASUS at all times:
- Computers: 2 Macs, 4 PCs
- Tablets: 3 (an iPad, an iPad mini, and a Nexus 7 2013)
- Phones: 6 (or more) including a Lumia 920, iPhone, Galaxy S2 and Galaxy S4, a Nexus 5, a Moto X
Others:
- Wireless Print Server by Linksys
- Wireless printer/fax by Brother
- 2x Roku 2 XS devices (used mainly for Amazon VoD, Netflix, international IPTV channels)
- 2x Chromecast devices (used mainly for Netflix, Google Play Movies and Music)
- Receiver for our 5.1 setup
- Video Game systems: Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii
- 2 Bluray players (Sony, Panasonic)
- visitor's laptops, phones on occasion
That's all I can remember off the top of my head. As you can see the list is long but probably not too different from many typical households.
Except for 1 Roku and the Brother print/fax, all of those devices are in a different room from the router. (Even the tablets and phones). Half of the devices (including one Mac, the Moto X, the Nexus 5, the Xbox and Wii, the receiver) are in the basement, and not just below the router but a good 20-30 feet East or West of the router.
Yet performance never suffers. Comcast gives me just about 50Mbps if I check a computer connected via ethernet to the Comcast modem. With this ASUS router I typically receive 40-50Mbps when I'm on the same floor or below the router, and about 30-40 Mbps when I'm 2 or more rooms away. That's both the 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz (though typically the 5Ghz is faster). It also depends on which device I'm testing though, because the Mac Pro can get 50Mbps even when it's on another floor and as far away from the router as possible. Essentially, I suffer little or no loss in performance going through 2 routers with the last step the ASUS wireless antennas.
On any given day there could be, simultaneously, one person using Chromecast to watch Netflix, another using the Roku for Amazon VoD, multiple people browsing on their computer/tablet/phone, and not one person is complaining. I get that this is partially due to the bandwith my ISP gives me but my point is this router isn't choking on the performance I'm paying my ISP for, it actually delivers it to the end users.
The range extends far outdoors too. I can shovel the snow and continue streaming music on my phone with Google Play or Pandora, and not have to use my cellular connection.
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Features are good too. When I switched to the Netgear, I missed my Linksys because I could run open source firmware on it but this has a lot of the features I would want already.
- switching router modes is easy, as you saw above; in addition to the router mode, AP mode, there is also a wireless repeating mode and a "media" mode for which ideally you'd have 2 of these, and they would talk to each other over 802.11ac, and the 2nd would then have ethernet connections to your Xbox or some other "media" device, this way you can wireless transmit a FAST connection
- Guest network with 2.4/5Ghz support, the guest network will allow people access to the internet but not the intranet (so my devices are safe from nosy visitors)
- once you have your router setup the way you want (for example, I need it in AP mode, I have 2 wireless networks broadcasting with different SSIDs and a guest network, I have certain MACs getting specific IPs, etc.) you can SAVE your configuration so that if you ever for some reason needed to do a factory reset or someone changes settings and screws things up, you can "restore" to your personal settings with that file
- upgrading firmware is easy
- you can enable/disable specific radios (2.4Ghz, 5Ghz), you can have it set so that the 5Ghz radio is only active on weekends or on Mondays and Tues, or whatever you want! -- you can adjust the broadcast power output of the signal! (these are things that were previously only available if you installed custom firmware on older routers)
- 2 USB 2.0 ports.. of course now I wish this was USB 3.0 but to be honest I will never use these ports for storage (I use Google Drive) -- but the COOL thing is that you can use these ports as a way of providing 3G/4G access as the "source" internet for the router .. so let's pretend Comcast is down but you want to use your phone (or you have a USB dongle) and you want to share your 3G/4G internet to the whole house .. this router will let you do that as a "backup" option
- it has print server capabilities, again via USB ports
- links on every page in the GUI to the router's support page, router's manual page and router's utilities page
- can quickly/easily switch the language, if that's your thing
There are many more features, which I don't use or maybe don't even know about.
So setup is easy. Performance is great. Features are extensive. I also think the thing looks very cool. I highly recommend this router.
| Standing screen display size | 8.1 Inches |
|---|---|
| Wireless Type | 802.11a/b/g/n/ac |
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 1 |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 1 |
