recommend AC gaming router

Id like to hear from people what wireless ac router they would recommend getting. I am looking ay under $200, though under $150 would be better. Needs to have gigabit ethernet.

So if you guys would give me some recommendations, why you recommend that product, and if there is custom firmware for what you recommend, do you suggest installing that custom firmware, that would be great!

I thought i wanted to go Asus, but looking at reviews on online stores of many of their ac routers, makes me hesitant.

 

From my experience the ASUS routers are no longer very good. I had an RT-N16 and loved it. I decided towards the end of august I wanted to upgrade to an ac router. I ended up returning the AC56U and the AC66U. Both had mega problems on the 2.4ghz band. I tried out the N66U, but it was also problematic.

I tried out a netgear 6250, but it was as big a piece of junk as the Asus routers.

I started doing some research and ended up buying a ruckus wireless access point and I'm building a box to run PFsense as my "router". For the time being the access point is hooked to my RT-N16 with the wireless disabled.

The ruckus really impressed me with the throughput and range. Ideally you should never be gaming over wireless as it is only half duplex.

 

I don't plan to use the wireless for gaming, the gigabit Ethernet is for that. i may just get a wireless N, but i feel at this point in time that it'd almost be a waste and i'd just want to get an AC router later...

 

So does this mean that most of the complaints and problems people have had with what looks like most AC routers is no longer valid?

 

I like my Asus AC66U (asuswrt-merlin) and have zero issues with the wifi 2/5ghz then again i dont and will never game on wifi connection.

My only complaint about it is the AC66U is incapable of producing/handling much more then 105mbit via wired gigabit lan with QOS on as the cpu started to get pegged @ 100% at around 100mbit. Now if you dont use QOS it more then capable of handling speeds past 105+ mbit via the gigabit lan.

 

I've been using an asus ac68u for a few months and have had no issues running stock asus firmware. Got about 16 devices on via wireless, direct wire and moca bridges.

On a side note, if you have t-mobile, they will give you an ac68u for a $25 deposit. Just have to call them and say you get crappy signal. Kinda wish I waited buying mine lol

 

For a budget option I have the TP-Link Archer C2. Very nice it is to for the £47 I paid for it on Amazon.

Not the fastest in the world but has AC and I've never had an issue with mine.

 

Just fyi, i've built my son a gaming PC for xmas. Due to where his bedroom is I couldnt be bothered to route a cat 6 cable like my PC is connected.

I got a Qualcomm/Bigfoot killer 1202n mini Pcie (wireless N only) and a mini pcie to pcie adapter.

Our router is a Netgear R7000 Nighthawk.

My pings over cat 6 gigabit are ~9ms and 0 jitter to pingtest.
His pings are ~9m and 1 jitter.

Gaming wise in BF4, you cant tell any difference between the 2 systems.

His pc also receives all our Internet 80mb/20mb throughput from it easily aswell.

Gaming wise, he has the same near as dammit experience my wired connection has.

Just some food thought. I always believed gaming over wifi would be inferior, but I was wrong.

 

I'd say go with the Asus RT-AC66U, great for the price and monster-like performance!
GUI is also very good, comes a s*** load of options!

 

The ac66u will never support the ac beam forming spec...

 

I've got the Net gear 7000. It rocks the whole house.
Even works great through 4 walls !

 

Yes, that's a nice additional boost, but "as is" is good enough.

I recently moved to an apartment, 3rd floor, backside. When I'm outside on the front I still have enough juice for 20Mbit

 

I ended up getting the TP-LINK Archer C8 AC1750. I wasn't going to change routers based off of reviews and etc. but my current router is giving me problems, so i looked again, and the TP-LINK Archer C8 AC1750 seems to be the only router out there with AC that really doesn't have any negative reviews. They are few and far between, every product will have bad reviews, but how many is what i look at, and it's the only one. Hopefully when it gets here i will be able to set it up and see if i made a good call!

 

So darn funny, nearly crapped my pants when I saw this (no offense btw!). I've been having issues with this thing since day one. In the first 4 weeks I've had one self destruct it's 5GHz chip and 3 others refusing to connect to multiple tablets and phones. And to top it all, all these devices had some firmware quirks. And yes that is personal experience! Let me know how it goes, I sincerely hope they solved these issues!

 

Wellllllll i hope that doesn't happen to me.... lol

 

Well, installed it, installed latest firmware update, so far no problems, speeds great, the thing restarts so fast compared to the DIR-655, that thing took FOREVER to restart. Wifi isn't giving me any problems so far, the DIR-655 i believe was dieing as it would randomly stop allowing the wifi to, well, work. You could connect to it, get an IP, etc. etc. but nothing would work in terms of internet. Would have to restart the router to get it working again. We'll see how it goes!

 

I have over 5 DIR655s installed in various places (relatives and across different houses) when they were one of the best routers several years ago. Yeah they take forever to restart, and they never really gotten any new features via updates. I've had 2 of them so far crap out by starting to slow down or disconnect Wireless devices. One of them that had wireless issues also has switch issues (WAN port will disconnect sporadically), leading me to believe that roughly 3-4 years of service from them is about as good as they get. I've since swapped the two of them out for N66Us which were on sale a year or two? ago. I almost never use the stock firmware, instead, opting for Merlin's slightly modded variant. In my opinion, if you have a flaky router, return it ASAP since it is most likely a lemon. The good thing is that most of the time, these things last for several years if you don't have any problems in the first few months. I bought some TP Links (N ones) before the N66Us since they were so cheap but the interface and speed of the routers (wireless transfers and USB storage) were quite lacking IMO. I don't have any experience with their AC routers though.

I'm still sticking with ASUS in the mean time due to the great firmware support they have. Even though the N66 is old, at least it still gets some new features and updates, especially security patches (my Dlink routers and smart switches never got any new updates after a year or so after they were released...).

I'm currently debating between the AC68 as a small upgrade since I need another router to cover the whole house. Debating between the higher end models or to continue waiting...

 

I had probably 3-4 years with mine aswell, so that would explain it....i mean, honestly it's probably exactly 3-4 years.

Necro thread i know, but just incase anyone is wondering if they should go with the TP-LINK Archer C8 AC1750 router, so far still absolutely excellent! i have not have ONE problem with this router so far and that's.....just surprising (not because it's TP-Link but because i'm use to having at least SOMETHING go wrong when it comes to routers at some point or another)