ASUS Routers

[LMITOUT]

ASUS routers seem to be the "thing" lately for high speed networking in the home and I was wondering if anyone has any experience with them? Specifically their "Black Diamond" series. They score pretty high in different performance categories.

[Whoaru99]

They seem to be a hot ticket but I've not tried them. All my "power" computing at home is done on a 1Gbps hardwire pipeline to other computers and the modem for Internet. That said, on the Internet side I'm only signed up for 30Mbps so the 1Gbps fat pipe is overkill in that regard, and I can usually get 20Mbps, give or take, through the wireless on my old WRT54G

[Nick Kuhn]

I've heard some decent things about them, but haven't used them. I've had good luck with their motherboards and the built in WiFi in them though.

[mamohr686]

I upgraded to the ASUS RT-N66U router and I highly recommend it. At the time I bought it the AC version wasn't out but I don't have any AC compatable buit-in Wi-Fi components anyway. I have 100mps charter internet and it screams. My old router was a cisco dual band WRT600N. We have over 12 components on the asus router and it never skips a beat. I've had to power it down and restart it a few time after internet outages, the cisco was a little better at that. Speed is much better and the biggest difference is the signal strenght is actually double with the new router compared the cisco with an internal antenna.

[LMITOUT]

Yesterday the RT-N56U that I ordered was delivered. Set up was quick and easy. Downloaded the latest firmware as well to make sure it was up to date right out of the box. Seems to be working well in the short time that I've had it and wi-fi range is a little better than the Linksys that it replaced.

There is custom firmware available on the web but I'm going to use this for a while before I venture into that territory, although everyone seems to really like those customized versions.

[LMITOUT]

Oh, and the other noticeable change is that Sling Box finally works like it should on my phone over wi-fi. With the other router I could never watch in HD because the app would freeze after playing for a few seconds even though the bitrate was more than adequate for HD. SD was fine. This router seems to handle it better for whatever reason.

[rundrave]

any more feedback on these? I have been reading some reviews online and not getting a good vibe but something tells me that most of those folks are not very technical.

I am looking for something new and remembered this thread. Can you guys provide any updates?

[ted4887]

I just recently picked one up. I've got one major issue with it while trying to connect to an online database. All that Asus can figure out is that it is indeed a problem in the wireless connection, but they have no idea how to fix it. It's the only HSOforum that I can't access, which is odd, because I access plenty of other nearly identical databases by the same company.

With that one exception, I really like the router.

Mine is the Asus RT-N65R.

[Whoaru99]

any more feedback on these? I have been reading some reviews online and not getting a good vibe but something tells me that most of those folks are not very technical.

I am looking for something new and remembered this thread. Can you guys provide any updates?

No, but I looked long and hard at them as my first choice and ended very recently ordering a B-stock D-link DIR-655 for a fraction of the cost ($32) that should fit my needs just fine. For me the ASUS models having a built-in VPN server was a strong lure, but not quite strong enough to spend the $$.

[LMITOUT]

any more feedback on these? I have been reading some reviews online and not getting a good vibe but something tells me that most of those folks are not very technical.

I am looking for something new and remembered this thread. Can you guys provide any updates?

Mine is just a tad over a month old with no issues. Setup was fairly straight forward and I was up and running in short order. No complaints thus far.

[rundrave]

well I kept debating what to get and then I had a my current router drop signal again. I ordered the RT-N56U should be here in a day or 2.

I am anxious to see how it works out or if I will see any performance gains while telecommuting with my works VPN. Whenever I work from home and run programs like Visual Studio or SQL Server BIDS its pretty laggy. Its not so much the run time but just basic things like keystrokes while typing in say a query window is a pain.

Probably gonna throw a nice big hard drive on one of the USB ports so my wife can back up her photography so that will also be nice option to have now.

[upnorth]

Unless your wireless connection is really krap, the bottleneck is most likely going to be the broadband connection.

[rundrave]

so far so good after a couple weeks of use and its been thoroughly tested with work, gaming, netflix etc. It was pretty easy to set up right out of the box. I had some issues with some devices but once I updated the firmware its been smooth sailing.

I did some speed tests and got 33.95mbps down and 4.95mbps up and I am only paying for 30mbps. When I test speed on my vpn its significantly slower but that is all irrelevant because I am going through my works network to the net. Basically tunneling from my ISP to my work, back through my work etc so that's probably always going to be slow.

I really wasn't looking to gain much, but my other router was on its last leg. Just good to be on a connection that isn't dropping devices all the time.

[upnorth]

If you tunnel to work by way of VPN and then to the web, you also be restricted by their internet bandwidth Speed. Many businesses are a lot slower as the pay to make sure that they get fully dedicated bandwidth not susceptible to what other people are using and also the connections tend to be full duplex, same speed up and down. Not always the case on full duplex but most.

[Whoaru99]

so far so good after a couple weeks of use and its been thoroughly tested with work, gaming, netflix etc. It was pretty easy to set up right out of the box. I had some issues with some devices but once I updated the firmware its been smooth sailing.

I did some speed tests and got 33.95mbps down and 4.95mbps up and I am only paying for 30mbps. When I test speed on my vpn its significantly slower but that is all irrelevant because I am going through my works network to the net. Basically tunneling from my ISP to my work, back through my work etc so that's probably always going to be slow.

I really wasn't looking to gain much, but my other router was on its last leg. Just good to be on a connection that isn't dropping devices all the time.

It's not unheard of to get higher than your service speed. On speed tests I consistently get from a little to quite a bit more. However, if I do enough parallel large downloads to saturate my connection, it's pretty much spot on what I'm paying for.

As far as VPN, if you're serving (hosting?) the VPN then your speed when remotely connected to your VPN would be (at best) what your upload speed is but typically something less than that.

[Jameson]

I have had the ASUS RT-N66U for a little over a month and am very happy with it. I chose this router by simply going to the computer store and asking what one they recommend. When the cable internet installer was here, he mentioned that my router is the one he recommends to all his friends. I purchased mine at MicroCenter, but have since been told it is sold cheaper at Walmart.