On Tue, 23 Nov 2021, J C Nash wrote:
Any suggestions from the LO community? I prefer to have equipment
used rather than sitting on the shelf, but it could be the cost of
a new router (< $100 for wifi and 4 ports) is a whole lot less
trouble.
Hi John,
Could you use an inexpensive 5 or 8 port gigabit ethernet switch with your
existing wifi router?
But first, does your current wifi router have security-patched software or
is it very old?
2.4 GHz wifi, not surprisingly, is becoming increasingly congested
depending on your nearby neighbours.
You may want to consider actual wifi performance (i.e. read reviews) and
also additional wireless support for 5 GHz if you devices can use that.
Mind you, 6G penetration through walls and floors sucks.
The SmartRGs are generally considered to have substandard wifi performance
This may not matter depending on what you do with your mobile devices, but
if you stream video to tvs, phones and tablets a better wifi router might
lead to a better experience.
Of course Real Men & Women® already have their homes wired with 10 Gb
ethernet to everything :-)
If you are using SmartRG as a DSL modem/router instead of a bridge, you
may be susceptible to your internet provider or a cracker getting at more
data than you would like them to, using TR-069 and possible bugs:
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TR-069#Security)
I use my DSL SmartRG only as a bridged modem to my Linux pppoe interface /
router / firewall which I trust because I can know and determine what
traffic it is passing. I cannot use the SmartRG wifi in bridged mode. I
use Advanced Tomato firmware on my older Linksys wifi router which has a
lot of nice features, which I ironically mostly don't use because I really
only use it as a wireless access point.
If you buy another wifi router I encourage you to look at what F/LOSS
firmware is supported before you buy. Here are some pointers: I think they
all have lists of supported devices::
https://www.networkstraining.com/best-open-source-router-os/
cheers,
Brett