Best Wireless N + Gigabit Router that I can install Tomato on?

[Mussels]

There are some switches that will limit all traffic to 100mbps if one port is connected at 100mbps. However, they are not supposed to do this. The proper way is to just limit that port to 100mbps, and the rest still function at 1000mbps.

a hub acts like that, but not a switch (switched hub) - all gigas are switched hubs however.

As you say however... it just shouldnt happen. Quite an odd issue, i agree. (still haven't figured out a viable reason for why it happened myself)

 

[newtekie1]

a hub acts like that, but not a switch (switched hub) - all gigas are switched hubs however.

As you say however... it just shouldnt happen. Quite an odd issue, i agree. (still haven't figured out a viable reason for why it happened myself)

Correct, it shouldn't happen like that, but I've seen it do it with my own eye(otherwise I wouldn't believe it either). The early consumer level cheap gigabit switches seemed to do it the most. I recieved a few networking calls about this, and the problem was always solved by buying a slightly more higher end switch.

 

[Mussels]

i even had a friend test a 10Mb non-switching hub, half duplex and everything... that one port slowed riiiiiight down (twas nasty lol) but the others still worked at full speed.


I suppose its possible you guys got a cheap arse switch that had a unique problem - would make sense if it was a brand thats not common here in Au (hence me never hearing about it)

 

[Wile E]

Correct, it shouldn't happen like that, bit I've seen it do it with my own eye(otherwise I wouldn't believe it either). The early consumer level cheap gigabit switches seemed to do it the most. I recieved a few networking calls about this, and the problem was always solved by buying a slightly more higher end switch.

This is one of the early revisions of D-Link's 5 port Gb switch (non-green edition), so maybe it's one of those. I have suspicions that it has issues with my PS3 as well. I can't seem to get more than 250-300Mb to my ps3. I need a couple more ports now, so I might step up to a nicer 8 port model.

 

[Mussels]

This is one of the early revisions of D-Link's 5 port Gb switch (non-green edition), so maybe it's one of those. I have suspicions that it has issues with my PS3 as well. I can't seem to get more than 250-300Mb to my ps3. I need a couple more ports now, so I might step up to a nicer 8 port model.

i have some asus gigaX one, 8 port gibabit... doesnt use an external power brick, internal 'psu' and only uses 4.5W of power. love it.

 

[newtekie1]

This is one of the early revisions of D-Link's 5 port Gb switch (non-green edition), so maybe it's one of those. I have suspicions that it has issues with my PS3 as well. I can't seem to get more than 250-300Mb to my ps3. I need a couple more ports now, so I might step up to a nicer 8 port model.

The PS3 might be limitted by the hard drive in the PS3.

 

[Mussels]

The PS3 might be limitted by the hard drive in the PS3.

i'd say so - 2.5" drives arent known for fast write speeds.

 

[hat]

Hrm... I added a switch to my network just now after reading this. Now instead of having the router in my room, I put it back next to the modem where it used to be. I moved the router to my room so I could connect my quake server with a wire (I didn't have a wire long enough to reach the router where it normally is), but I could have just put the switch there... why didn't I do that in the first place?

Now... I have a Netgear wireless access point that should work well with my Netgear wireless router. How much of a gain would I see from shutting down the wireless radio in the wireless router and using the access point as a dedicated wireless processor rather than having the router do it? Sometimes I worry about the number of connections utorrent hogs and how much it slows down the network...

There's only two wireless devices, my laptop and my mom's computer. My laptop only uses the wireless for maybe a few minutes out of the day as it connects to the WCG server, or on the rare occasion where I look up something on the laptop if my gaming computer is tied up... usually by a game and I don't want to exit it. However, when the router was in my room, the wireless would be going nuts all day if my mom was awake... she plays a loooot of farmville... it's sickening.

 

[Mussels]

having the wireless running wont slow it down at all. wireless itself is just slow.


Utorrents connections are a large cause of jitter, sudden high pings and router disconnects. i have mine set to 20 connections max.

the only reason for using an access point, is to get it closer to the PC's than the router

 

[hat]

Yeah, but without the router handling the work it takes to run wireless, like the security encryption and the MAC address filter and such, it should have more resources available to it, no?

 

[Mussels]

Yeah, but without the router handling the work it takes to run wireless, like the security encryption and the MAC address filter and such, it should have more resources available to it, no?

no, cause it has dedicated hardware for it. regardless of what does the wireless, all connections still have to pass through the modem part of the router regardless, in the exact same way.

 

[hat]

I see... so it's akin to having a processor to do most of the gruntwork, and having a graphics card to handle video-gruntwork...

Hrm, well I feel like giving it a try anyway. The worst that can happen in 0% performance gain...

 

[Wile E]

The PS3 might be limitted by the hard drive in the PS3.

The hard drive in it is a 120GB 7200rpm that averages 65MB/s read/write. I should be seeing at least 400+.

 

[kid41212003]

I believe only Layer 2 switch and up offer routing, all the pc connected to the switch will ask the 100Mbps router for routing and that can limit the transfer speed.

Even if the switch can do routing, it will still need to talk to the router and auto-routing itself with the router.

@Wile, did you try to unplug the router, assign manual IP address, and try to transfer files between pc to test for speed?

Sorry to the OP.

 

[Mussels]

I believe only Layer 2 switch and up offer routing, all the pc connected to the switch will ask the 100Mbps router for routing and that can limit the transfer speed.

Even if the switch can do routing, it will still need to talk to the router and auto-routing itself with the router.

@Wile, did you try to unplug the router, assign manual IP address, and try to transfer files between pc to test for speed?

Sorry to the OP.

no, doesnt work that way. they do not pass through the router at all with LAN traffic - the entire purpose of a switched hub is that it takes the shortest route, and only on ports that it is required to.

i get 100MB/s + transfers here, with a 100Mb router, 1 Gigabit non-managed switch, and a 54Mb wireless access point off the giga switch.

 

[TIGR]

Keep the WRT54GL, add a Gigabit switch and a Wireless N access point?

^^ This.

 

[dcdivenut]

hi all

So I was reading this thread while looking for some wireless N router recommendations and think I found a whole other idea... let me explain

I live in a 5 level townhouse, actually about 3.5 stories. My home office is in the lowest level, living room is one floor up, and then two more levels to the master bedroom. My problem is getting good signal to the master bedroom. I have two constraints...
1. Office is in the lowest level and need wired connection there
2. Living room (one floor up) is where TV is and I cannot split signal there b/c it causes signal problems.

I do however basically have a patch panel from the office to the living room. Currently I have the modem and wireless router in the office, with my gaming PC and work PC connected wired. I also have a line running up to the living room and a Gigabit switch there with the Blu-ray, media PC and Squeezebox up there. I was frustrated because I couldn't move the router up to the living room to get better signal upstairs.

however, after reading this I am thinking...
1. leave modem and wireless router in my office, turn off wireless.
2. Buy another GB switch and connect to router for my 2 PCs in the office
3. Buy a N access point and connect to current switch in living room.

Does this make sense? I would imagine I will get decent speeds, right? Sorry to ask what may be a stupid ? but I would rather figure it out here than go to the store and then have to return stuff if it doesn't work... also any thoughts/tips on wireless N access points? I have always lived in smaller apartments and never had to worry since a simple router took care of the whole space.

PS...
1. I am pretty sure my router (DLink WBR2310) is not a gigabit router. Do I need to upgrade this to get GB speeds if the switches I use are all GB? I would like to make sure I am keeping the upgrade path clear and not having to buy more equipment down the road to get to GB although it is not essential.

 

[[I.R.A]_FBi]

welcome to tpu buddy

 

[dcdivenut]

welcome to tpu buddy

Thanks... sorry to jump in with a ? right away, and appreciate the welcome.

 

[Zedicus]

first for anyone looking for new hardware get one of theese.
http://www.tp-link.com/products/productDetails.asp?class=wlan&pmodel=TL-WR1043ND
about 75 shipped, less if yur a bargain hunter. MIMO N and gigabit onboard, openwrt support, atheros based. faster cpu then lynksis uses.

hanging a gig switch and N access point off of your old router is impractical. also access points are routers unless configured to be bridges. plus this can add a fair amount of latency if you are gaming.

2 options,

1. get a new core router with built in wireless, and gig ports. if you run out of ports hang a gig switch off of it.

2. ditch the router and use a random pc that is always on as your 'router' and have a gig switch and acces point behind it. this has tons of pros and cons but is still a viable option since most people have a computer that is running 24x7 anyways. set it up on a folding/crunching machine, routing doesnt take much power so it wont be noticed.


also wanted to add that going from the basement to the upper floor you will want to turn an antenna to radiate in that direction (lay it down flat, the waves come off of the antenna outward. like a donut getting bigger and bigger) if that does not help enough then go for a powered directional antenna.

you should NEVER have all the antennas all lining up perfectly parallel to each other. this causes noise.

 

[Mussels]

access points are not configured to be routers from the get go, or they would be called a router. You seem to be confused on that point - routers can be turned into access points, but not all access points are routers.

Why is it impractical? If you have a perfectly fine router (such as mine, which averages 6 months of uptime between resets) - why would i replace it with a router likely to be less awesome, when i can easily add gigabit or N functionality?

 

[Zedicus]

most cheep access points are set up default to hand out private IP schemes. sure if you get into the $400 and up access points most of thouse come bare and you have to config them to do anything before they are even usable. the average person is not putting one of thouse in their house.

your bandaiding devices on top of devices when 1 decent (sub 100$) device will do all of that. and if your current router only runs 6 months between reboots it is do for replacement. look specifically for hardware that can run ddwrt or openwrt and you will be going YEARS and never thinking about rebooting the router.

im not saying its wrong, im just saying why have a router that the only thing it dsoes is hand out IP address, a switch that connects a hop away to provide gigabit, a access point (you probably disabled the wireless on the router, OR you only got an N 5GHZ access point and are using the router for backwards compatibility in B-G). your just overcomplicating things and it will not be any better, and might be worse then having 1 single device. its 3 things to maintain, its 3 points of failure, its going to be 3 times the headache just to use. and your family will see no benefit over 1 devices doing all that same stuff.

 

[newtekie1]

Most access points are not set up to hand out any IPs, the router they are connected to(or whatever DHCP server is on the network handing out IPs) gives IPs. Most cheap access points have no ability at all to hand out IPs themselves.

 

[Zedicus]

Most access points are not set up to hand out any IPs, the router they are connected to(or whatever DHCP server is on the network handing out IPs) gives IPs. Most cheap access points have no ability at all to hand out IPs themselves.

ive only been able to find devices like that labled as 'wireless bridges'.

most of the devices ive set up that home users have bought have had some sort of private ip scheme handed out default, and had to be set to 'bridge' mode to use upstream dhcp.

at work we have used cisco, netgear, and enterasys AP's all of thouse you have to console into and get basic setup done before they do anything.

i realise its totally dependent on the device purchased, just saying this is what ive seen.

 

[newtekie1]

ive only been able to find devices like that labled as 'wireless bridges'.

most of the devices ive set up that home users have bought have had some sort of private ip scheme handed out default, and had to be set to 'bridge' mode to use upstream dhcp.

at work we have used cisco, netgear, and enterasys AP's all of thouse you have to console into and get basic setup done before they do anything.

i realise its totally dependent on the device purchased, just saying this is what ive seen.

Every cheap access point I've ever worked with has no ability to hand out IPs, that is what the DHCP server is for, Access Points by definition do not have the ability to hand out IPs. The only IP related thing involved with access points is setting the static IP to access the access points config page.

There are positives and negatives to everything. Yes, with 3 sepearte devices, there are 3 failure points. You can argue that there is also higher latency, but really there isn't. Ping on my network, from my main computer through 2 Gigabit switches to the router are less than 1ms. Maybe if I was connected directly to the router it would be 0.1ms and with the switches it is 0.5ms, but really it is all under 1ms so the difference is relatively nothing. Of course the negative to having one device do everything is that you now have one point of failure that brings you totally down. If the router fails, the whole network dies. With my setup, if the router dies, the network still works including wirless, I just loose internet access. If the switch dies, I plug everything into the router and everything still works, I just loose gigabit. If the access point dies, I just re-enable wireless on the router and everything still works, I just loose wireless N.