I'll be upgrading my broadband next week to FTTC with Zen. Zen have sent me a TG589vn router but I'd forgotten how basic Zen's router are and they don't supply any routers with dual band options. I'm currently using a Netgear 834GT as the main router and providing 2.4GHz wireless with a bridged Netgear DGND3300v2 providing the 5GHz band and due to problems in the past, particulalry with my printer have assigned static IP addresses to all devices on the network. I couldn't use the 3300 as the sole router because it wouldn't provide a stable 2.4GHz wireless connection. I've looked at the Manual and the TG589vn router appears to be so basic that I'm not sure I can assign static IP addresses and I'd like something with a better interface as well as dual band. I'm not really sure what sort of Router I'm looking for as I thought it'd be something specific to Fibre but the TG589vn to be just like a normal one. Edit: Just remembered, I would also like a gigabit ethernet port(s). Any suggestions please under £100 although I will pay a bit more if necessary?
I'm unable to offer any feedback based on experience yet, though I've just ordered an Asus RT-AC68U based on a bunch of reviews and a recommendation along the way, as means to go towards solving some wifi coverage issues I'm having. It's not the fastest compared to AC3200 counterparts available now, but seems to be best for legacy devices and range. You could use the Zen-supplied kit as a modem only and plumb through to the AC68U to do the heavy lifting or alternatively look at the DSL-AC68U with integrated modem. UK shops will want an amount sufficiently outstripping your budget, but have a look at Amazon.es/fr/de/it, as the weak Euro means some good deals. E.g. RT-AC68U for £115 delivered on Amazon.fr
I've been working my way through reviews but hadn't come across that Router and the DSL-AC68U in particular looks attractive for features albeit expensive. I might have to rethink my budget. I'm really not sure how these things work but if I just bought a RT-AC68U router and used the Zen TG589vn as the modem wouldn't the ethernet connection speeds be limited to that of the TG589vn rather than gigabit ethernet through the RT-AC68U?
The connection between the Asus and Zen box would be limited to 10/100 but everything connected to the Asus would be capable of gigabit speeds.
Your broadband will be slower than the 100-Mbit/s network ports so you won't be causing a bottleneck by doing what you suggest.
Mister_Tad - Definitely interested in your thoughts on the Asus RT-AC68U. All I can say about the TG589 is that it works, otherwise it's a pile of **** with an interface from 10 years ago. It took me 90 minutes just to setup 13 wireless devices solely due to the slow speed of the interface. It would have taken 15-20 minutes on the Netgear. I'm hoping that I can setup the Netgear 3300 as a wireless access point for my wireless N devices as the speed of the TG589 is pathetic when you consider that it's supposed to deliver 150Mbps but actually is closer to the 54Mbps of the DG834.
My ADSL2+ line network has been running on an ASUS RT-AC68U for just over a year now and I cannot fault it. I use two additional Ubiquiti UniFi AC access points to ensure excellent coverage throughout the house. All work flawlessly together, the weak point of this particular network at the moment is the TP Link TD-8817 modem. It locks up once every couple of weeks, and is obviously incapable of the throughput I need it to handle. When I re-patched my old Cisco SBS modem/router from the fiber line in the workshop to the ADSL line in the house for a few weeks over Christmas, there were no problems whatsoever. Restarting the TP-Link always solves the problem. I will be upgrading the ADSL line to Infinity soon; I was putting it off until the other fiber line was in and running stably because the switchover time from LLU to Infinity will take 4-8 weeks. I couldn't recommend the AC68U enough. It has all the features any home user could ever need and is an excellent performer too.
It turned up yesterday morning and I've done all of the setup on it, going to plumb it and a couple new switches in tonight. From a setup point of view, the stock firmware is easy to navigate and figure out what's where, though I feel like they tried a bit hard to make the interface "leet" at the expense of a little bit of usability. There's nothing I can complain about though. I did note that upon updating to the latest firmware from the Asus site, the change isn't reflected on the router - it downloads, something happens, and then restarts and says the same version it was on before. Not letting this bother me too much as I'm likely to reflash to a third party firmware anyway.
Whilst we're talking about the firmware and interface, it's worth noting that the AC68U is fully capable of running DD-WRT. I'm not running it on mine yet, but I might in the future.
That's one of the reason why I'm considering the AC68U too. I can just about scrape a semi-usable wireless signal at the farthest extremities of the house with my bundled Plusnet wifi router and the extra LAN port will save me cluttering the corner of the lounge with a switch.
It turns out that they've postponed my upgrade until next week but forgot to tell me. After the experience of setting up this TG589 (it really is a POS, which probably explains why it's free) I'll be looking to replace it completely so would probably get the DSL-AC68U. After saying that I've noticed that Netgear are releasing the D6400 next week so I might wait for reviews of that.
The 2.4GHz reach is quite a bit better than the router it replaced and the 5GHz reach beats the pants off it. The opposite corner of the house is still a stretch though, less so than before, but some further experimentation needed. It's looking likely I'll pop asuswrt-merlin on it, partly for stability, partly for wifi tweaking and partly because it's something else I can tinker with. From what I can tell, the latest version has more aggressive caps on Tx power as per FCC regulations whereas there's an older fork that does not, so not sure what flavour I'll use yet. The stock firmware allows 100mW on 2.4GHz and 200mW on 5GHz though, which is already fairly high. I'll do some experimenting/research to figure out where the sweet spot is and then decide where to go form there.
