Need a good wireless N router any ideas?

Depending on the size of your house you could also buy a Wireless Access Point (WAP). It will help distribute the signal to the other side of your house.

Everyone has their own opinions on which brand is better. I have troubleshooted almost everyone, they all have their ups and downs but the most important part is placement and setup. Different models amongst the brands have their own problems as well.

My professional advice, buy the D-Link Dir-655 from Newegg. Its cheaper and performs very well. If you don't like it or you don't think it performs to your standards just send it back. Newegg has great customer service.

The Apple sounds like it would perform well since you have a Mac. I looked into a little bit and most of the problems came from users using a mix of Windows and OSx on their network. But it is rather expensive.

I personally don't think you could go wrong with either one. Just get the one you feel comfortable with.

 

My belkin works fine

 

It still lacks external antennas but otherwise specs look great. DD-WRT compatible, to boot.


If you are using Mac, the time machine/time capsule whatever it's called is awesome if you can afford it. Wireless N, wireless storage, I think it can be a print server, and it does automated backups of your computer whenever you are in range.

 

How does Apple make the best router? The specs on the Airport Extreme and the Linksys E3000 are almost completely identical. The Linksys E3000 is at least cheaper. The Airport Extreme finally just got updated to support dual band wireless networking.

I am sure you will like it.

Living inside a 2000 sq ft house with aluminum studs, I can get 2/4 bars on my MacBook Pro on the other side of the street. The difference in signal strength is very minimal.

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/wireless/wireless-features/30483-where-have-all-the-antennas-gone

 

I'm merely saying that an internal antenna does not allow you to attach a high-gain antenna. It's not so much of a concern for a residential customer, but I guess I liked that feeling of potential tweaking.

 

I do a lot of gaming from direct connection to the router to my xbox would I notice any difference from the Airport Extreme and the D-Link Gigabit ports?

 

Thanks for the input guys.....................................

 

Apple airport express is the way to go, also hook up your printer wirelessly, hook up speakers wirelessly and control with your iphone, apple rocks

 

No. The router doesn't change your internet speed. The ports are the same on both. As far as speed goes, the only way you would even be able to tell a difference between 802.11g and 802.11n would be when your sending files over the network to another computer. They do have better range and there is an improvement but you would barely notice it.

Which brings up another important point I forgot to ask. What ISP do you have and what internet speed are you on? You might wanna look into upgrading if you really wanna boost your internet speed.

 

X1000

 

I have road runner turbo and speeds up to 10megs tested on dslreports.com

 

Ok. I'm not questioning your intelligence but a huge misconception is that upgrading to wireless N will boost your internet speeds and that is not true. I just wanna make sure you know that so when you do decide on a router your not disappointed and think you made the wrong choice.

 

I know that I just want a router that will have good range and solid speeds wirelessly. I have an older G router not being used right now it's a

$95 Linksys WRT54GL Linksys Open Source WiFi Wireless-G Broadband Router, Speeds up to (AC1200) 1.2Gbps - WRT54GL

Linksys WRT54GL v. 1.1. I heard this is a pretty solid router though.

 

Thats the router I have I've had it for years and its never failed me.

 

No, as both routers have gigabit ports.

 

Well then what's the main differences between the airport and the d-link?

 

apple's name

 

That, matches your other Apple products, customer support and easy to setup.

 

The reason apple makes the best router is because it just works!! Easiest setup ever and customer support is great incase I need them down the road. I liked Linksys routers before I purchased apple. I always had problem with losing connections, and the router would slow down. Although everything was fixed with a simple reboot of the router it was still a pain to loose internet when you need it. I always come up with an excuse not to buy the apple router and instead kept buying something cheaper just because the initial cost was less. After 3 different routers in a year and a half span 2 linksys and 1 belking. It ended up costing me more that if I had just gone with apple in the first place. Maybe I was just unlucky, but i love the Airport extreme and will keep it until it dies or I upgrade to a new one. Mine came with the dual band but I haven't had the need for it so I just use the wireless N.

 

Just pulled the trigger on the airport express. Got it for $159 using the school discount online.