good wireless adapter?

[neatfeatguy]

Lots of good examples from folks here. Thanks for the ideas. I may try out the Netgear powerline adapter, if that doesn't work I've seen a few wireless cards suggested here that I could try.

My last run with wireless wasn't terribly fun. Constant spikes/drops and abnormally, constant high pings. But, that was 10 or so years back on an 802.11g router....a Linksys WRT54G???? wireless router. I even installed Tomato on it and overclocked it to see if that would help, but there really wasn't much of a difference. When I moved my desk to where it is now, downstairs with the modem and router, I ran a cable under the carpet and I've been wired the past 8 or 9 years.

I've had the ASUS 802.11ac router for the past 4 years or so. If wireless has improved over the years as other have suggested, hopefully any decent wireless adapter will manage things just fine for me.

 

[TheLostSwede]

It looks like that's a variant on the RT-AC68x, so you should be able to install Merlin's firmware on it, which would improve security if nothing else.

About | Asuswrt-Merlin

www.asuswrt-merlin.net

It's not the greatest router in the world, but it's built on a well known platform and you could've had something far worse.
I got a version of the RT-AC68x for my stepmum and the only real difference appears to be the housing and placement of the ports, due to different housing.

No need to fork out a lot of money on a too fancy network card, but then again, the price difference tend to be minimal if you go for one of the internal ones.
I think Intel had some bug with one of their models, but I can't remember which one it is, as it had some connectivity issues with Broadcom based routers, which yours is, so look that up before buying. That said, Intel makes most of the decent M.2 modules that are fitted to the PCIe cards out there, so not a whole bunch of choice. I wouldn't go with USB unless you have to.

 

[Shou Miko]

It looks like that's a variant on the RT-AC68x, so you should be able to install Merlin's firmware on it, which would improve security if nothing else.

About | Asuswrt-Merlin

www.asuswrt-merlin.net

It's not the greatest router in the world, but it's built on a well known platform and you could've had something far worse.
I got a version of the RT-AC68x for my stepmum and the only real difference appears to be the housing and placement of the ports, due to different housing.

No need to fork out a lot of money on a too fancy network card, but then again, the price difference tend to be minimal if you go for one of the internal ones.
I think Intel had some bug with one of their models, but I can't remember which one it is, as it had some connectivity issues with Broadcom based routers, which yours is, so look that up before buying. That said, Intel makes most of the decent M.2 modules that are fitted to the PCIe cards out there, so not a whole bunch of choice. I wouldn't go with USB unless you have to.

I use the merlin firmware myself and it actually does wifi better for me then Asus' own firmware so that's a plus

 

[newtekie1]

Constant spikes/drops and abnormally, constant high pings.

IME, wireless hasn't really gotten better in that regard. Yes, the speeds have gotten much faster, but you still get a random interference that causes a ping spike. It got better for a while when 5GHz was new, but now even the 5GHz band is getting crowded and the increase in interference is making the connection unstable. Wireless is great for just your normal internet browsing, where random ping spikes aren't really noticeable. But it's still pretty bad for gaming.