Router Advice

[HungryHippo]

I am currently in the market for a router as i wish to move my desktop into my bedroom and was wondering if anyone could suggest some good routers for wireless gaming within the 150$ AuD mark as i am a complete novice when it comes to routers and what not

[n0cturnal]

ASUS RT-N66U Dark Knight

[Deleted]

depends what kind of speeds should it support?
personally i just installed my tp-link N750 in my room yesterday and it works like a charm. (see speedtest)

[llDemonll]

i have this NETGEAR WNDR4500 N900 and it's worked well for me so far. dual-band, guest network if needed, easy to administer

all comes down to personal choice really. my decision was between the asus nocturnal linked and this, and i picked this because i could pick it up locally

[Deleted]

Generally, there are no routers made specifically for wireless gaming, nor are there any that really hit the mark over any other in terms of what they can offer to gaming.

Speed wise, 99% of games in todays age require no more than 2MB to run perfectly. I have a friend that is in the middle of no where running a 2mb line (in this day and age) and gets a latency of 20ms world and home within WoW. The myth should be cast aside that "HIGHER SPEED = BETTER GAMING". No. That is not true.
Also bare in mind a router will only provide you as much data as your line supports. If your package is for 15MB and you buy a router that supports 150Mb....you will only ever get 15Mb. Period. and even then, depending on the quality of your line, age of the cables, noise and other variables, you may not even hit 15Mb.

All of the common gamer misnomers corrected; We can move onto suggestions .

Wireless routers are actually really simple to pick up. As you've said, you're a novice when it comes to routers so I'm going to take that quite literally and basically pressume you're not going to be needing some of the more "advanced" features to help with routing various devices to various locations through various means. You're basically just wanting a router that you can use in your home to connect devices to and it just works. Please correct me if I'm wrong

So, generally to future proof things these days you're wanting to look at Routers that are "N-band" classified. This is the most current commercial wireless standard and offers a slightly further broadcast length (It throws the signal out further due to the frequencies it uses), backwards compatiable with all the other wireless classified devices (Your G-band device will connect with it) and can throw out maximum speeds of 54MBs - 600Mbs, depending on the number of antennas. They also tend to support 11 devices connected at the same time, depending again on the number of antennas and the routers capabilities.

So. A bit of the tech specs out of the way - Generally you want to be looking at anything from TP-link or Netgear or if you want to splash the cash out a little more, the previously mentioned ASUS router. It really is upto you as I've always seen a router as a personal choice depending on the cosmetics of the products when simply purchasing something for it to "work" over technical specifications and business use. I've always been fond of the Netgear WNDR4000 N750 http://netgear.com/home/products/wir...WNDR4000.aspx# as it is more than suitable, however it all depends on the aesthetics of your home and how far your computer is going to be AWAY from the router, as contrary to belief, on display antennas generally give slightly better reception

There is of course also the N300 from Netgear http://netgear.com/home/products/wir...WNR3500L.aspx#

Again, its down to what you like and how much you want to spend.

[mojo6912]

I would grab that Asus router, slap Tomato USB firmware on it and buy some high quality antenna for it. Also would get a high quality PCIE Adapter for the computer. This is all if I had absolutely no possible way to use a wire.

[Hanto]

:| Geeze all these expensive routers. I bought a Linksys WRT54G nine years ago and I have to say It's caused me 0 issues with online gaming or anything else for that matter.

[n0cturnal]

:| Geeze all these expensive routers. I bought a Linksys WRT54G nine years ago and I have to say It's caused me 0 issues with online gaming or anything else for that matter.

Some people have higher standards, once you are used to Gbit network and 100Mbit or higher internet connection a nine year old G router really isn't an option.

[Deleted]

:| Geeze all these expensive routers. I bought a Linksys WRT54G nine years ago and I have to say It's caused me 0 issues with online gaming or anything else for that matter.

define expensive? snatched the one i got for 50 euro's which isn't expensive for a dual band router iirc

[HungryHippo]

Thanks for the reply guys, guna look into everyone of the suggested routers

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:43 PM ----------

After looking over everyone's suggestions and advice i came up with these routers;
[1]http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=200_1438&products_id=20373
[2]http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=200_1438&products_id=21210
[3]http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=200_1438&products_id=18455

Thoughts? Also, i am Australian so really don't get much more then 900kbs download rate.

[llDemonll]

I'd get the NETGEAR simply because I've never heard of TP LINK

[majinsnake]

I'd get the linksys wrt54g like "hanto" said. I hate netgear and their customer service.

[mafao]

:| Geeze all these expensive routers. I bought a Linksys WRT54G nine years ago and I have to say It's caused me 0 issues with online gaming or anything else for that matter.

I am very fond that router as well. But it won't give you 450mbit speeds like the high-end routers - its just lacks the hardware. With my new router I can ditch the ethernet completely, as I can transfer files over it with speeds on par or faster than USB2. And it really helps with backups to my NAS (which is integrated into the router).

[Deleted]

I am very fond that router as well. But it won't give you 450mbit speeds like the high-end routers - its just lacks the hardware. With my new router I can ditch the ethernet completely, as I can transfer files over it with speeds on par or faster than USB2. And it really helps with backups to my NAS (which is integrated into the router).

'Wont give you the 450mb like the high end routers' - see - this is what I was talking about earlier. What does that matter? No router, No commercial internet is going to give you 450mb, so why should this ne a factor atall? Your internet comes in at 5/10/15/20/30mb and that is all your going to get out of your router as that is the spees of your internet. No magic is done by your router, it doesnt hold back data and then throw it out you get the speed of your internet service provider. The only people that work even remotley with the top end speeds are businesses with T1/T3 private fiber lines that deal with upwards of 1GB/s in the first place.

So again a higher data stream for wireless technology is simply not needed. As for using the router as a bridge for transfering between files - sure, thats all well and good - but unless you also have the network hardware to support the routers max speeds, your transfers wont even reach those peaks. That means upgrading fr your moterboards standard network port which is generally 10/100mb/s.

Sorry for the mini rant, but it really irritates me when people try to justify more expensive purchases with misleading and information that just doesn't ring in as true.

[n0cturnal]

No commercial internet is going to give you 450mb, so why should this ne a factor atall? Your internet comes in at 5/10/15/20/30mb and that is all your going to get out of your router as that is the spees of your internet. The only people that work even remotley with the top end speeds are businesses with T1/T3 private fiber lines that deal with upwards of 1GB/s in the first place.

There are plenty of commercial internet connections that offer up to 1Gbit. In South Korea 1Gbit is pretty much standard, in Sweden we have plenty of companies that offer 1Gbit and even now in the USA Google started offering 1Gbit, there are also smaller local actors that offer it in some places in the US.

That means upgrading fr your moterboards standard network port which is generally 10/100mb/s.

Gbit network has been standard on motherboards for several years now, even the really cheap $50 motherboards have Gbit network.

[chazus]

Some people have higher standards, once you are used to Gbit network and 100Mbit or higher internet connection a nine year old G router really isn't an option.

Countries that have 100Mbit connection options, step forward.

NOT SO FAST, UNITED STATES. TAKE A SEAT AND WAIT YOUR TURN.

[n0cturnal]

Countries that have 100Mbit connection options, step forward.

NOT SO FAST, UNITED STATES. TAKE A SEAT AND WAIT YOUR TURN.

Don't be sad, your turn will come.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57...tates-by-2015/

[Deleted]

Thanks for the reply guys, guna look into everyone of the suggested routers

---------- Post added 2013-01-21 at 09:43 PM ----------

After looking over everyone's suggestions and advice i came up with these routers;
[1]http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=200_1438&products_id=20373
[2]http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=200_1438&products_id=21210
[3]http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=200_1438&products_id=18455

Thoughts? Also, i am Australian so really don't get much more then 900kbs download rate.

option one no reason to get an antenna less for +-$5 and the other one offers the same performance but is more expensive.

[mafao]

'Wont give you the 450mb like the high end routers' - see - this is what I was talking about earlier. What does that matter? No router, No commercial internet is going to give you 450mb, so why should this ne a factor atall? Your internet comes in at 5/10/15/20/30mb and that is all your going to get out of your router as that is the spees of your internet. No magic is done by your router, it doesnt hold back data and then throw it out you get the speed of your internet service provider. The only people that work even remotley with the top end speeds are businesses with T1/T3 private fiber lines that deal with upwards of 1GB/s in the first place.

True, my internet at home is only 150mbit downstream... still way over what a non-n router can provide. However, you also seem to have missed the rest of my post, where I was talking about NAS over WiFi performance, which is very important for me. I constantly get speeds over 25mb/sec which is more than possible on a 100mbps network - and that while still being able to use internet with good speed. I also wonder where you dig out mainboards with 100mbps ethernet ports, they have been 1000mbps for years... Nevertheless, none of my machines have ethernet, so fast WiFi is a rather convenient thing to have.

Of course, if your connection is slow and you don't have to transfer data on your LAN, then a WRT54G or similar router is still an excellent choice.

[llDemonll]

'Wont give you the 450mb like the high end routers' - see - this is what I was talking about earlier. What does that matter? No router, No commercial internet is going to give you 450mb, so why should this ne a factor atall? Your internet comes in at 5/10/15/20/30mb and that is all your going to get out of your router as that is the spees of your internet. No magic is done by your router, it doesnt hold back data and then throw it out you get the speed of your internet service provider. The only people that work even remotley with the top end speeds are businesses with T1/T3 private fiber lines that deal with upwards of 1GB/s in the first place.

So again a higher data stream for wireless technology is simply not needed. As for using the router as a bridge for transfering between files - sure, thats all well and good - but unless you also have the network hardware to support the routers max speeds, your transfers wont even reach those peaks. That means upgrading fr your moterboards standard network port which is generally 10/100mb/s.

Sorry for the mini rant, but it really irritates me when people try to justify more expensive purchases with misleading and information that just doesn't ring in as true.

like mafao said, this is irrelevant to why he likes the 450mbit router. his entire argument for liking it was the file transfer speeds he got, which is an entirely legitimate reason to get a nice wireless router. So yes, a higher data stream for wireless technology is needed

Your information is misleading, not his.