New router needed asap

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Mr Feesh

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Just returned from holiday to find that lightning strike our telephone line and anything connected to it has blown. One of the things being the router.
I need a router with the following specs

  • Adsl 2++
  • Wireless N
  • 4 Ethernet ports
  • At least one usb port preferably 2.

Whats the story with the 2.4ghs & 5ghz dual band signal?? Heard its better to have a router that has both?
 
Damn. Woulda sold you mine. But its a telkom mega one. Dont think it meets your requirements.

Sent from my GT-I9000 using MyBroadband Android App
 
Mr Feesh said:
Just returned from holiday to find that lightning strike our telephone line and anything connected to it has blown. One of the things being the router.
I need a router with the following specs

  • Adsl 2++
  • Wireless N
  • 4 Ethernet ports
  • At least one usb port preferably 2.

Whats the story with the 2.4ghs & 5ghz dual band signal?? Heard its better to have a router that has both?
Click to expand...

What on earth would you need the 2 USB ports for?
 
Hi Bearcru

Also in the market for a wireless router. Please let me know specs of urs
 
My advice:

Get Asus RT-N16 and flash it with DD-Wrt (~R980 from Esquire)
Then get a DLink DSL-2500U (R200 from Sybaritic without shipping)

The DLink DSL-2500u is connected to the Asus RT-N16 WAN port and in the Asus RT-N16 config page you go to Setup -> WAN Connection Type -> PPPoE, Type your ISP username and password.
The Asus will then make the connection for you and every PC connected to it will have internet access.

That router has 2xUSB 2.0, 1x WAN, 4xLAN (Gigabit), Wireless b/g/n (up to 300mb/s). That DLink is probably one of the best ADSL2+ routers I've used (doesn't drop on bad lines and it's dirt cheap), everything else I used either hung or couldn't hang on because we have heavy signal loss on our line (very old lines).

There is nothing better out there except if you use a computer with IPCop/M0N0Wall/etc. or spend thousand on a corporate router from Cisco or etc.

You don't need DD-Wrt but it is significantly better than the standard Asus firmware and really easy to upgrade. OpenWrt or Tamato is also a possibility. You could also use GateCrasher's (MyBB member) Local/International splitting script if you want to split international and local traffic between 2 accounts (or more).
 
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I'm with Gnome one this one: get the D-Link DSL-2500U modem + an Ethernet router.

Please just note that the firmware that came with that Asus router is quite buggy, so you'll have to flash it with DD-WRT firmware in any case.
I'm not sure if that Asus router, even with DD-WRT firmware installed, can provide enough power for USB-powered drives! See the CNet review for this problem.

Another alternative to that Asus router would be the TP-Link WR1043ND (R589.00 ex VAT) which is a router with 5x 1Gbps LAN (4 LAN, 1 WAN), 802.11n wireless and has 1x USB2 port.

@Steve-rsa: that wireless router has only 1x USB 2.0 port and it can only be used for 3G/HSDPA devices.
 
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Pada said:
See the CNet review for this problem.
Click to expand...

Also covered on the DD-Wrt forum, standard power adapter is 12V @ 1.25a, they recommend upgrading to 12v @ 2.5amp if you plan on using higher power USB devices.

Don't know other locations but Communica in Midrand is located right next to Esquire, they sell those 12v 2.5amp adapters for less than R 100

Overall if you don't mind spending the cash DD-Wrt is great (once you go DD-Wrt you'll never go back to normal routers). Else the TP-Link'll work also.
 
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settled on the netgear dgn2200 met all my needs and had a decent price., thanks for the help
 
Rather stay away from Netgear stuff, especially that DGN 2200, since it can't even do bridge mode AND their SNR margins are usually poor compared to the other brands.
 
Pada said:
I'm with Gnome one this one: get the D-Link DSL-2500U modem + an Ethernet router.

Please just note that the firmware that came with that Asus router is quite buggy, so you'll have to flash it with DD-WRT firmware in any case.
I'm not sure if that Asus router, even with DD-WRT firmware installed, can provide enough power for USB-powered drives! See the CNet review for this problem.

Another alternative to that Asus router would be the TP-Link WR1043ND (R589.00 ex VAT) which is a router with 5x 1Gbps LAN (4 LAN, 1 WAN), 802.11n wireless and has 1x USB2 port.

@Steve-rsa: that wireless router has only 1x USB 2.0 port and it can only be used for 3G/HSDPA devices.
Click to expand...

I don't want to steal the thread, but I am also looking for a new Router and Modem. I personally don't mind spending the cash up front, but then I want reliability for what I am paying for. I did some research and came across the following Linksys WAG320N

http://www.pc-direct.co.za/pWAG320N...reless-N-ADSL2-Modem-Router-with-Gigabit.aspx

So my question is do I got the D-Link DSL-2500U modem + an Ethernet router or the above. I also need a router/modem option, not sure which one, that will allow me to connect to 2 ISP's. So looking at which 1 will be the easiest to setup to allow this. If this does not make a difference, then guess its not important
 
craigdoepie said:
I also need a router/modem option, not sure which one, that will allow me to connect to 2 ISP's. So looking at which 1 will be the easiest to setup to allow this. If this does not make a difference, then guess its not important
Click to expand...

For what purpose? Do you want to split local/international, you do want load balancing? What's the deal?

Let me put it upfront. If you want the best, without spending more than R2000, a router that will support DD-WRT, OpenWRT or Tomato is the go to option. If you want to spend more, then either a Atom based IPCop system (~R3000) or R10K for a Cisco router.
 
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Gnome said:
For what purpose? Do you want to split local/international, you do want load balancing? What's the deal?

Let me put it upfront. If you want the best, without spending more than R2000, a router that will support DD-WRT, OpenWRT or Tomato is the go to option. If you want to spend more, then either a Atom based IPCop system (~R3000) or R10K for a Cisco router.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info Gnome, I got a Afrihost free account. So will be using that for International and then a Telkom 1gb with 10gb local so want to use that for Local downloading. Not much, but use that for now. But I see you and Pada got two different options with regards to the ASUS and TP-Link WR1043ND. So which one is really better ?
 
craigdoepie said:
Thanks for the info Gnome, I got a Afrihost free account. So will be using that for International and then a Telkom 1gb with 10gb local so want to use that for Local downloading. Not much, but use that for now. But I see you and Pada got two different options with regards to the ASUS and TP-Link WR1043ND. So which one is really better ?
Click to expand...
The TP-Link isn't in the DD-Wrt support list, so the Asus IMHO. But there are other routers (look at the links above) that support DD-Wrt.

If you want to directly compare features, take the hardware of whichever router you pick that support DD-Wrt then compare that + the DD-Wrt functionality list to a non-DD-Wrt router and see which you think is best. You'll soon find out why DD-Wrt is superior ;) Pretty much everything is configurable in DD-Wrt (including the ability to run the local/international split on the router itself). Hell you can overclock the CPU/RAM increase the Wireless Radio broadcast power, it's highly configurable in every way!

Both DD-Wrt/OpenWrt/Tomato are aftermarket Linux based OSs developed for many devices. Considering the amount of development time that has gone into DD-Wrt/OpenWrt it is no wonder nothing can compete with it...

EDIT: Btw. if you are interested, I'm upgrading to the Asus router and plan on selling my Linksys WRT54GL preloaded with DD-Wrt.
 
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Gnome: TP-Link is in the supported DD-WRT router database: http://www.dd-wrt.com/site/support/router-database

The cool thing about the TP-Link WR1043ND is that you can ask Uniterm Direct to install DD-WRT firmware for you (at an additional R50), but then you get to keep the warranty!

The best router that you can get for DD-WRT would be a Buffalo router, but I doubt that you'll find one in SA.
 
Pada said:
Gnome: TP-Link is in the supported DD-WRT router database: http://www.dd-wrt.com/site/support/router-database
Click to expand...

:erm: my bad :p

Sorry Pada, I checked but should have used search rather than my eyes ;)

In that case it is down to comparing their hardware and what you think you want. Asus has more memory (128mb vs 32mb), flash memory (32mb vs 8mb) and a extra USB port. However I'm running a WRT54GL with 16mb RAM and it never crashes and works well so doubt the extra ram is required.
 
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Gnome said:
:erm: my bad :p

Sorry Pada, I checked but should have used search rather than my eyes ;)

In that case it is down to comparing their hardware and what you think you want. Asus has more memory (128mb vs 32mb), flash memory (32mb vs 8mb) and a extra USB port. However I'm running a WRT54GL with 16mb RAM and it never crashes and works well so doubt the extra ram is required.
Click to expand...

Thanks again for the info guys. I decided that I am gonna go for the TP-Link WR1043ND. Last question hopefully, what is the difference between the two Firmwares DD-WRT and OpenWRT. These things are totally new to me. I know what a Router and a Modem, but when it goes deeper than that. I seem to get lost
 
OpenWRT is completely open source with many developers (eg. anyone can contribute) and focused more on customization. The WUI (Web user interface) isn't as nice as that of DD-Wrt but you can install just about anything using the package manager (if you don't know what a package manager is or anything about Linux then you probably shouldn't bother with OpenWRT).

DD-Wrt is closed source with few developers and on the verge of being commercialized but it has a well put together WUI, very wide hardware support and it is very stable. Not that OpenWrt is unstable...

Unless you need special functionality (like load balancing multiple WANs) I'd go with DD-Wrt at this point.
 
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