Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi everyone I am looking into getting virgin media (200 or 350) once it goes live in my area hopefully later this year and was looking to see if people thought I should invest in a separate router or stick with the home hub 3 provided.


I am far from technically minded so would literally need to be plug and play for me to be able to set it up.

My budget is £200 max


My house is quite bit and internet range is very poor due to think walls etc. I have two netgear internet switches running as lots of my things are hard wired in my home. In terms of WIFI devices used then 2 x Iphone X, an Ipad and also a Samsung tablet and that's it wireless wise.

Any and all suggestions massively appreciated in advance.



Jason

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

A lot depends on what you want to do with your router. If you want a good media server, secure VPN for your phones and when you are abroad then go for something beefier. If you want only good WiFi all over your house then you go for cheap wired-in access points, instead of a router, to get around those walls and fridges.

This isn't necessarily a recommendation, but I have gone for a an ASUS RT-AC88U for it's power, throughput, excellent wifi, USB 3 ports, media server, VPN, game boost mode and Alexa support. In my largish house I still supplement the wifi and media storage space with my old ASUS N66U wired in from the attic.

Hopefully, you will get lots of recommendations, but do focus on what you actually want now and might want in the future.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi thanks for your recommendation I want good speeds and good coverage both wired and wireless

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

so use the wireless on the virgin modem, and boost it with some additional powerline adapters.



https://www.amazon.co.uk/TL-WPA8630K...e+adapter+wifi



and then get another extra adapter itself, I have the cheaper option and the connection at 500mbps is okay wired and for the wireless it is decent and you don't notice a speed drop (this is what I have got https://www.amazon.co.uk/TL-WPA4220K...e+adapter+wifi) was in the bargain bin at WHSmith's a while back for £25)

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

In that case my router would be going OTT.

Use the SH3 but with access points elsewhere. Powerline adaptors are good, as DocDutch says, if you get ones with adequate throughput and if your mains wiring isn't ancient and complicated.

You can also use wireless access points such as the TP-LINK TL-WA901ND 450 Mbps Wireless N Access Point. These can be placed strategically around the house as wifi extenders, but, in my view, work best if wired into the hub. Have you got ethernet elsewhere in the house?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-LINK-TL-...+access+points

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I agree with roughbeast and have got the next one down, the AC68u and I love it. Tbh the shubs are cack no matter which way you want to look at it so if you have got the dosh I would strongly recommend buying a proper router anyway and just having the shub in modem mode and if you do want to increase the wifi range further then you have still got some spare $$$ to explore other options such as the homeplugs.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi guys are these easy to setup and do they actually make a difference with speeds and WiFi coverage ?

Jason

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

It depends what you have in place already. For the wired in additional access point you need an ethernet cable to a suitable location elsewhere in the house, e.g. an upstairs room, attic or at least an opposite corner of the house, close to you weak signal spots. Setting up the access point using the TP-Link router, I provided a link to, is easy. Use its user interface to set it up as an access point rather than as a full LAN server. It will give you the option to select. Enter wifi SSID details as usual.

The power line option requires at least two adapters, one next to the SHub and another in the poor signal part of your house. A third or fourth can be added if required. The set up instructions are pretty easy to follow. It is best if you plug them direct into a mains wall socket, rather than into an extension lead.

As an extra signal boost to your powerline adaptors you could run an access point off one of them, as described above, instead of running it off ethernet.

If you have dead or weak wifi spots either option will make a significant difference enabling you to use most PC, pad, smart TV or phone apps with no problem. e.g. video streaming or file transfer.

I hope this is clear enough. Come back to us if you get stuck.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Think it's come down to the ASUS RT-AC88U vs Asus AC68u after doing a little research they both seem amazing routers and reviewed very highly.

Question is which to choose that will give me the best wireless coverage, speed for wireless and speed for hard wired connection in my house.

My current router has all 4 ports full then goes to 8 way 1gb switch that has 5 ports full then in my office a further 4 way switch that has 4 ports full.

Over to you lol

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Are any of those switches upstairs? If so try to place whatever router you buy upstairs so that the wireless signal can cascade down through the house, through ceilings rather than sideways through internal brick walls. Make sure, if possible, that your router is placed before all your other switches. If you go for my 8 LAN port router it could replace your 8-port switch to give you more flexibility.

So, when you get your new router, first thing you need to do is convert your SHub to modem only mode. Just type 192.168.1.1 into your browser address bar to access the Shub interface. Then log into the interface. You'll soon find the right place. Be aware that changing to modem only mode will change your WAN IP address. This isn't a problem for most users. Also the local IP address for your SHub will have changed to 192.168.100.1

When the SHub is in modem only mode all your pre-existing network function will be gone. At this point connect your new router to an ethernet cable coming from your SHub. Make sure it goes into the WAN port. The address for this for you to browse to should now be 192.168.1.1 By default the router will be in LAN Router mode. All you need to get started is run the quick internet setup wizard at the top, then we you are sure you are connected to the internet go to the next tab down 'Network map'. There you can set up wireless for both channels. The 5GHz channel is the one that will give you the best wifi signal, but only to 5GHz compatible wifi devices. I set both SSIDs with the same name and password for simplicity sake.

Routers normally come with default settings with firewall etc on, but do check. Go to the Firewall tab to be sure and particularly check that DoS protection is on. I enable "Respond ICMP Echo (ping) Request from WAN" so that I can monitor my network quality through a Think Broadband graph.

After that you should be set to go plugging in all your switches devices etc. and connecting your wifi devices. If all is working well and your ethernet cables and patch cables are CAT5e, or better, then you should get full download speed on all your wired-in devices.

Everything I have said so far will apply to General Maximus' router suggestion except that the AC68U has 5 LAN ports not 8.


Please don't feel restricted by our suggestions. There's plenty amazing routers out there. If you had had others respond you would no doubt have had other recommendations.

Here's a good site for Router spec/performance comparison. Have a look before you decide. Type the router you want to look at in the product search box. https://www.smallnetbuilder.com/tool...=ASUS_RT-AC88U

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

JUST SIMPLY AMAZING THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR HELP

That advise is simple enough for even me to follow lol

Jason

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

is the ASUS RT-AC86U better choice than the Asus AC68u its a lot more expensive though

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

the 86u is defo better and I wanted it myself when I was router hunting, I just didn't have the $$$ at the time. Technically it has faster wifi (not that you'll use it) and the wan to lan throughput is an extra 100mbits (>900) but you won't be using that either. The wifi is great and I have no problems getting max wan connection speed on my ac capable devices which is ~350mbits.

One other thing you can think of though if you have got cables running to other rooms of the house as roughbeast has already suggested is putting a wireless router in there. Asus routers are awesome and have different modes you can use them in and you can specifically set to them serve as a wireless access point and use AI Mesh to create a mesh wifi network to work in conjunction with another Asus router. If I was you I would get the AC68u and have it on one side of the house (upstairs/downstairs) as your main router and get this to use as a wireless access point and have it on the other side of the house upstairs/downstairs.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi general I will thank you like I've thanked the others on here and I know your a very well respected source of everything virgin media so I truly appreciate your time and opinions.

If the 86u is better I'm going for that it's 50 more and it's newer also I'm lead to believe.

I have comtrend powerline WiFi extender other side of the house for WiFi and also hard wired cat 6 extension boxes in most rooms.

I would only therefore need one really good stable router to be a whole lot better than home hub 3 to manage my 350 connection to it's max potential.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Cool, you defo want the ac86u then. There are loads of fantastic features which will put the shub to shame but a biggy, and one of the first things you should do, is manually input new dns server entries which will override anything vm sends down by dhcp. I have used 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 for years and never had a single problem.
I'll tell you about the wifi tomorrow because i am lying in bed watching iron fist atm :)

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I have iptv app and home camera app on my phone there wouldn't be any issues through this Asus router or home hub 3 would there?

Cheers

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Nope, the other thing you can think of doing as well is setting up some sort of addressing scheme on your network so you know which device is which just by looking at the ip address. The router doesnt have to be 192.168.1.1 for example and you can assign addresses to all your known devices such as pcs, printers, phones, tv.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Thank you so much if you had the ££££ would you pay the £50
Extra mate for the better router?

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I would have done if i could. I did a lot of reading at the time and that was pretty much the best router money could buy but i wanted a new router, 3 hdds and a graphics card so i had to make some tough decisions. I still love my ac68u though.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Ok brilliant thanks once again so the one you would have got will definitely be easy to setup and fully compatiablr via home hub 3?

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

ya, although it isn't so much as what is compatible with the shub 3, it is what the shub is compatible with. You can be 99.9% sure that if you ever have a networking issue it is the shub that is the problem but that is more to do with general stability and quality rather than compatibility problems. There are international standards it has to comply with to guarantee it will work with other devices but the whole point of putting it in modem mode is that you are getting it to do as little as possible, not getting it to do any real networking stuff and leaving it all to a proper router.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Sound advice ����

I knew this was the place to ask and get good feedback

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

tbh it is just as refreshing for us to see people actually take the advice. Many people come on moaning about the shub and asking for advice and when I say the only solution is to buy a proper router they aren't interested. People want magic for free.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Trust me I really do value your opinion and anyone else nice enough to dedicate their time to actually HELPING people like me on here. You do it because your good people and clearly very knowledgeable. At the end of the day I’m here to find out / learn and greatful for anything positive or negative said.

You can’t please all the people all the time and some people just like a good moan lol

Your all doing great on here keep up the GREAT WORK.

Thanks again

Jason

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

To create an imesh you need two ASUS routers that support it. The AC88U definitely does, but you would need another. I was looking into this, but none of the routers with this ability come cheap.

The cheaper option, if you still haven't got good coverage after following our earlier advice, is to invest in a TP Link as described above to cover your not spots.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Thanks rough beast will do

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

If you do go with the asus router route I would recommend using the merlin firmware.
( https://asuswrt.lostrealm.ca/ )

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi thanks but going to literally keep it as simple as possible with standard firmware I have no expertise at all and need it literally plug and go

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

That's the wise course at this point.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

my ac68u does and I assumed all Asus routers did. Doesn't matter though, the cheaper £50 one I linked to would still serve a decent wireless access point.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

General what were you going to mention about the WIFI on an earlier post?

"I'll tell you about the wifi tomorrow because i am lying in bed watching iron fist atm"

---------- Post added at 08:42 ---------- Previous post was at 08:34 ----------

Also what does this mean and what will It do exactly?

" There are loads of fantastic features which will put the shub to shame but a biggy, and one of the first things you should do, is manually input new dns server entries which will override anything vm sends down by dhcp. I have used 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 for years and never had a single problem."

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Not all ASUS routers do. My old RT-N66U doesn't. I use it as an additional access, but it won't imesh. The AC66U B1 does though. Full list at the bottom of this link.

https://www.asus.com/AiMesh/

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

If you want the best 5Ghz range, go with the R7800. Can usually pick them up pretty cheap

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

The General is referring to the DNS* server settings. If you do nothing then the router will use the VM DNS by default. However they are not the most reliable and also filter some sites and refuse to release the IP for them, directing you to an internal page in VM's network.

The settings 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 are Googles DNS servers. There are several others that can be used but the Google ones are pretty solid.

*DNS = Domain Name Server. A server that holds a table of IP addresses referenced from website names.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Ok superb how would this normally be entered?
Thanks btw

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

You log into your router at its base address:

mine is at 192.168.11.1 but most are at 192.168.1.1. You just enter that in your browser address bar.

That takes you to a login page from your router.

Once logged in there'll be a number of configuration tabs, here is the relevent one from my Buffalo router:

https://www.cableforum.uk/board/atta...8&d=1536759714

The DNS is set here as Google primary and FreeDNS as secondary.

As a precaution I only allow router configuration from a wired Ethernet connection. This is set within the router on another tab.

Attachment 27538

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Ok thanks

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

you pay for what you get and the good thing about buying a proper router in addition to performance and stability are options. You have one menu for setting up "your" 2.4ghz and 5ghz networks with the ssids and passwords etc you want and then there is a completely different menu for guest networks. If someone comes round to your house and they ask for your wifi password because they want to do something you don't have to worry about them having access to everything on your lan or screwing everything up. You can setup multiple guest networks very easily with individual names which will restrict access to your lan and can be time sensitive whether it be for 1 hour or 1 day and when the time has elapsed (e.g. if your neighbour comes round for a coffee) it just disappears as if it were never there and you don't have to worry about a messy gui and having to delete everything and clean it up.



I'll try and keep it simples. When you ring your mum on your mobile phone you ring "mum" in your contacts list but you know your phone is actually ringing 07123 123456. Websites are the same and when you go to amazon.co.uk you are actually going to 52.222.239.109. When you type a website name (url) into your browsers address bar your pc fires off a request to the dns server (like an address book) for the ip address of the name you have entered.
You think of routers as the superhub or the thing you want to buy for you home network but there are obviously bigger ones and the thing which your vm connection connects to is VM's router (cmts) and in addition to providing your router with an ip address for your home connection it tells your router what it's default gateway is (the ip address of vm's router you are connecting to) and the dns server. One of the many reasons why the shub's are rubbish is because any good router allows you to set your dns servers manually but the shubs don't because vm want you to use theirs.
The problem is that if your dns server goes down you think your internet connection is down because your browser throws up an error message of some sorts. The thing is that your connection is actually fine and if you knew the ip address of the site you wanted to go to you wouldn't have a problem but you don't know the ip address of each and every site you want to visit.
Using the isp's dns servers isn't bad per se if they work but the problem is that vm's dns servers break far more than they should and if often takes them at least half a day to fix it. If you use another provider's dns server (e.g. google) which has a higher level of redundancy (and google care a lot more) it is just one of many things you can cross off your list of not having to worry about. This is what I mean when I say to people "you need to buy a proper router" and there are multiple reasons for it. Changing the dns server is a very simple thing to do and takes seconds but it is such a huge benefit which you probably won't even notice. The funny thing is that when vm's dns servers go down you won't even notice because you aren't using them and you'll be plodding along quite happily at home doing whatever you are doing. It is only if you visit this forum or equivalent that you'll see a tonne of people posting messages from their smart phones asking what is going on and you'll see smug ****s like me saying "buy a proper router".
In case you are wondering, the reason why VM don't let you set your own dns servers is because of what I have already described above; if you screw it up it can give the appearance that your connection is broke when it isn't. If vm let you change stuff like that around then it is one more thing for the ming mongs in India to have to deal when trying to troubleshoot network connectivity issues.
So, as an example, atm you are using vm's dns servers and if you go to a command prompt (windows key, cmd, enter) and type "nslookup" and hit enter you'll see the ip address of vm's dns server you are currently using. When you override that on your router when all the clients on your network retrieve their configuration information from your router by dhcp they'll get an ip address, the default gateway (the lan address of your router) and whatever dns server you specify and that will apply to all your pc's, tablets, phones, TV's etc so it is well worth doing. This is what happens when you change it so you know it is working properly.

https://www.cableforum.uk/images/local/2018/09/3.jpg

Following on from what other users have described above this is the screen in the Asus gui where you would set it along with the other things I have talked about in previous posts such as addressing schemes and setting static ips for the known devices on your network. It is very easy, you click on lan and dhcp and everything is there.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi general once again thanks for your very detailed explanation can I just ask though how do you know my mum's number lol?

Seriously though I am going for Asus router so so long as I literally put in all the relevant numbers on the screen shot you provided I will be good yeah Literally copying everything like for like?

Do I have to change these regularly or once they are in they are in yeah?

The manually assigned ip dhcp do I have to do that as well or does it generate the name and details manually once you enter everything above in in screen shot first?

Obviously don't want mine generalmaximus lol

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

you don't have to copy any of the above at all, it was just an example of the options available and how the fields can be populated. 99% of people will leave the address pool at the default which will be something like 192.168.1.100. Unless you know what you are doing networking wise you wont gain anything from changing it and I do it for pure novelty.
The reason why I mentioned the static ip addresses/dhcp reservation in the beginning is because you mentioned switches running off to different places and different devices and normally people who make the effort to setup networks that work properly take an interest in their management. You can't see it but if I clicked on that drop down list it would have displayed the device name and mac address of all the devices that had connected to my network, both wired and wireless, and it is easy to see what is what. General Maximus is my pc, the Sky boxes say something like BSkyB bla bla, anything which is set to default settings with say Galaxy Tab A, Galaxy S7, Sony Bravia TV etc.
You don't have to do any manual assignments at all and you can leave your router to sort everything out and everything will work fine forever. The only reason why I suggested it is going back to networking enthusiasts again, there is an accepted standard how you assign devices ip addresses on your network if you want to keep track of what is what and what things are doing, it just makes everything easier to read.

Anyways, the beautiful thing about having a proper decent quality router is that once it is setup it works, nothing ever goes wrong, you never have to reboot it and everyone lives happily ever after (unlike the shub's). Priority number one is to change the dns server, setup your wireless networks, have a look at everything else and once it is done you are sorted and you'll never have to login again. It prompts you to setup a password on initial startup so either write it down or choose something you'll remember because you'll be logging in so so rarely that you are likely to forget it. I made that mistake and ended up having to do a factory reset a year later and setup everything up from scratch again :)

I doubt you'll be doing it but if you going between tabs changing lots of settings make sure you click on save at the bottom of each tab before you move onto the next tab otherwise any changes will be lost when you navigate to a different page.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Quick final question general when I go over to virgin hopefully early 2019 the way work progressed and get my Asus would I be able to private message you to get it just right please it would mean a lot to me?

Jason

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Sure

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Much appreciate to you general and everyone else here that has answered my post it has really helped me no end.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

If you are on DSL now and your current modem/router can be run in modem/bridged mode you could set everything up now then when you get VM just replace with the SuperHub switch that to modem mode and nothing else really needs changing.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi I’m on sky fibre at the min with a sky sr2 router and wouldn’t have a clue how to do it lol

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

A small word of caution. The General is absolutely correct in what he says about the benefits and ease of changing DNS to a better server than VM offer. However, when you use the 'nslookup' command on your PC, you might not get a confirmation that you are now using the 8.8.8.8 IP, for example. What you may get is something like this:

Server: router.asus.com
Address: 192.168.1.1

This is, of course, the default IP for your router that all your devices use as a gateway.

This does not mean that you aren't using your chosen DNS server, its just that your device isn't registering it.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Thanks roughbeast

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

why? you are querying the dns server and not the default gateway. I have never heard of that happening.

Another way to check then which is a more bloviated way of doing it is this way:

https://www.cableforum.uk/images/local/2018/09/8.jpg

You don't need to get your nickers in a twist over it, both methods are diagnostic tools which you'll probably never have to use. The only time you would want to check/confirm which dns server you are using is if you start having problems or error messages pop up, you have checked the router config and you want to make sure your client is receiving the correct info via dhcp. If there is an issue with the dns server you can then change it to an alternate on the router to bypass the problem. The problem is though, and the whole point of this discussion anyway, is that you cant do it on the shub and although you can do it on proper routers, if you use a proper dns server like google's to start off with you should never have to change it because it never breaks. I only showed you how to do just so you know there is a way of checking it rather than just closing your eyes and keeping your fingers crossed that it is magically working.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

It surprised me too, but that is the result I consistently get with the nslookup command.

Server: router.asus.com
Address: 192.168.1.1

I checked this out and found someone else querying that result. https://forums.whirlpool.net.au/archive/2716336

It's no problem. I never usually look up my dns either. I just wanted Jay to know that he might not get confirmation of his new dns through nslookup.

ipconfig /all gets the same result

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I understand, just another awesome feature of Asus router's which I didn't know about.

Just so everyone understands, the router acts as a dns cache server and caches dns queries so if another devices on the lan went to www.bbc.co.uk, when you want to go to it as well the router doesn't have to fire off a request over the internet to the dns server to look up the ip address because it already knows what the address is and thus the whole process is sped up. Sweeeeeeet :)

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Brilliant isn't it? I'm learning all the time and I've had this router for a year now.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Yup, I think quite a lot of routers do this these days but it's certainly a great feature.

I don't believe this but after many years my Asus RT-N66U has died.

So no home automation or Alexa.

Reading this I'm looking at the Asus RT-AC88U to replace it.

---------- Post added at 23:52 ---------- Previous post was at 23:02 ----------

Just had a idea I turned off the router via it's power switch and it turned off but the switch wont go back on

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

:tu:

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I have found out the switch on my RT-N66U is busted, but a bit of card a duct tape has solved it.

But I will replace it with the RT-AC66U.

I'll see if my brother in-law can fix it then he can have it.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Sometimes it is nice just to have the updated technology with the better wifi and wan to lan throughput

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

The spring in the routher is stronger than bloody duct tape.

Just had to near wrap the dam thing, in it :D

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I'm going to buy the Asus RT-AC68U this week. My Shrub3 is dropping Wi-Fi like dead flys for some reason..Been good until 2 months ago. Got my TP-Link power plugs attached to it but it's dropping out all the time throughout the house. Even 6 inches away from it. Even my Epson Printer drops Wi-Fi n its less than 6ft away...Not sure if it is Virgins fault, Router fault or TP-Link fault. Done my head in lol.. Good Info in here, but whether I can follow it remains to be seen lol. Cheers..

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

All you need to do is ask here again.

Setting up the AC68U and AC88U for ordinary everyday functioning is really easy. Use the quick internet set up. You can do the trickier operations at your leisure later, according to your needs.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

what does it do? I plugged mine in, typed in the ip address for the gui and configured everything myself, it isn't hard.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Interesting, the exact same thing happened to my N66-U as well. I thought I'd maybe knocked it or dropped it by accident, but like yourself I just used a chunk of tape to sort it.

EDIT: I googled around and it seems to be a common issue on all of Asus' routers from around that era: https://www.snbforums.com/threads/br...-button.13601/

Disappointing, really.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Hi guys
Been watching this thread with interest, and have today successfully installed my asus AC68U :)

One quick question ... What does the 802.1 authentication do, and should I be using it? It`s default set to "none" and if I hit the drop down box, two more fields appear. Am I correct in assuming it needs my log in details etc?

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

If you are talking about 802.11x it is for large enterprises and to do with their network credentials and how they log onto stuff so you dont need to worry about it. You want wpa2.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Great stuff. Thank you

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Ok so the RT-AC88U's is broken and I got no or intermittant 2.4GHz, and the Amazon chat confirmed this and it was returned.

So I what a router that I could still get a strong 2.4GHz/5GHz 2 miles away :D

You know what I mean.

I was looking at the netgear nighthawk x6 or anthing better?

Budget is whatever I can get but not silly/wasteful cost.

---------- Post added at 18:23 ---------- Previous post was at 18:23 ----------

I'm on VM cable (Not DSL)

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

The top range Netgear Nighthawks are not reported in some sources as best for wireless. From dim memory the R7800 (I have R7000) is one of the best bang for buck in the range. The R8000 is a little cheaper but may not perform as well is some circumstances.

You are best looking at what you need then finding out what best fits, some are better at some "features" than others e.g. range through walls, performance at range etc.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I need one that can give a strong wifi signal.

My Asus RT-N66U has a strong wifi signal downstairs.

So want one that a equal or stronger

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I`ve just got the asus RT-AC68 U and today got the PCE-68 card. Three bed 1930`s semi with router upstairs, and pc downstairs.
This is what I`m getting, and very happy :)


https://www.cableforum.uk/images/local/2018/09/6.png

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

The RT-AC68U is a good unit. if you have a couple (or more), you can use their AiMesh firmware to give you continuous, full speed coverage through the house with the use of repeaters. You have a choice of Ethernet or 5GHz backhaul although, for the best speeds, Ethernet is better.

I have 3 units, one on each floor and I can get good speeds from Wifi everywhere e.g.

Attachment 27552

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

Subsequent to the previous conversations in this thread the router I use downstairs as a wireless access point died last week so I have had to replace it. I bought an Asus AC53 which arrived today. The gui is exactly the same as my AC68u minus the advanced options but I put it in access point mode and hooked it up in a few mins and it works a treat. It is a great router for the price. The only you need to beware of is that it wouldn't make a great primary router because it only has 2 lan/switch ports and not the traditional 5. It works out fine for me because I only needed 2 anyway for where it is but a primary router it ain't good.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I use a pfSense install (virtualized) with a Meraki MR33 access point and a few Meraki MS220-8P POE gigabit switches (the latter devices obtained free via their webinar program, with 3 year licences on each device).

Granted, after the free 3y licence is up, it'll cost a fair bit, but for me 3 years is a decent enough time with the kit before I ditch it for something less expensive.

The VM for pfSense is running off the free VMWare ESXi hypervisor which in turn is running off an old computer with 16GB of RAM. Total cost almost nothing as it's what I had lying around.

Re: Best Router to Use with Home Hub 3
 

I bought the Netgear Nighthawk X6.

Its a triband router.


The only issue I had was 2 devices had the same IP.