Netgear WNDR3700 or ASUS RT-N56U (maybe even DIR-655)?

[Syllinger]

Hey folks,

So I'm trying to decide which of these two to get. I've narrowed everything down to these two (maybe 3), and at the very least I'm leaning towards the WNDR3700 since I can flash it with DD-WRT.

The major concern that I have is whether this is even needed. The two routers are about the same price, but for $20 less I can get the tried-and-true DIR-655 that everyone seems to love so much. I don't actually have any devices that use wireless N aside from my iPhone, but I may in the future when I buy a new laptop.

Is it worth it to spend an extra $20 to seemingly future-proof? If so, which of these two routers would you recommend?

EDIT: Also, with the WNDR3700v3 apparently around the corner, would it be worth it to wait for the v3 to ship?

 

[claykin]

Trust me. Get the WNDR3700 or WNDR4000 or forthcoming WNDR3800. Or Linksys E4200.

Cannot comment on the Asus but stay away from Dlink. Their firmware support is horrid! Plus the 655 has a Ubicom CPU so no DDWRT for you!

 

[Syllinger]

Thanks for the input claykin.

I read a review here on SNB and it stated taht there is not much of a difference between the WNDR3700 or the WNDR4000. I don't know much about the WNDR3800, but would it be worth it to wait around for 3700v3?

 

[claykin]

Thanks for the input claykin.

I read a review here on SNB and it stated taht there is not much of a difference between the WNDR3700 or the WNDR4000. I don't know much about the WNDR3800, but would it be worth it to wait around for 3700v3?

As Tim advises in his reviews, the differences are minor. The WNDR4000 or E4200 are possibly worth considering if you ave a 3x3 Wifi card such as the Intel 6300.

No telling when the 3700V3 will be available for purchase. Its based on a Broadcom design likely similar to the WNDR4000 however 2x2 stream only.

FYI, the 3800 has been on Netgears website for a few months and is only just now beginning to trickle out into the real world. The 3800 offers mostly new toys, not necessarily a better wifi router than the 3700V2. The 3700V2 and 3800 are both based on Atheros 2x2 stream designs.

I have a WNDR3700V2 at home and it works great. Haven't rebooted it in ages. Over 5Ghz I can sustain 9-10MB/s transfer rate.

If you visit the Netgear forums you'll find lovers and haters of all products. Its just about finding what works in your environment and with your wifi clients.

Same holds true for the Linksys E4200.

 

[Syllinger]

Well, I looked at the 3800, and like the 4000 it doesn't seem that there is a lot of substance there to back up the price increase. Also, it's hard to find them in Canada. When you say 2x2 and 3x3, what exactly do you mean? I know that it refers to the number of streams, but what does the other number represent? The number of radios? And is more always better in this case?

If you had to buy now, would you go with the 3700 again, get something else, or wait? Also, are you happy with the performance of the 3700 enough that you're not actively seeking the latest and greatest, or are you awaiting a suitable replacement? And finally, are you running factory firmware or DD-WRT?

 

[claykin]

2 stream is 300Mb/s theoretical throughput
3 stream is 450Mb/s theoretical throughput

Many N wifi cards are 2 stream, but there are still some sold today that are single stream. Intel has a N1000 card that is used by major laptop vendors and this is single stream limited to 150Mb/s theoretical.

Check your wifi card specs first. Also think about what you may purchase in the near future.

I am happy with the 3700V2. Range is acceptable and throughput is good with my Intel 6200 and 6205 equipped laptops. These are 2 stream. In my case I previously had a Dlink DIR-825 Ver B and this POS was not capable of more than 3MB/s transfer on my LAN. Even tried DDWRT and had no better performance. I could link up at 300Mb/s, but as soon as I'd send a large file over the LAN the 825 would quickly drop speed. Other Dlink users had the same problem and Dlink did nothing to resolve the issue. With the 3700 I get 9-10MB/s with Netgear firmware.

I am always looking for the next great thing. Looking doesn't necessarily mean purchasing. I purchase when I have a need, not a desire. Hope that makes sense.

Can I ask how you will use your wifi router? Just to connect to the internet or will you network and share data between PC's? Do you plan to stream video? Tell us more.

 

[Syllinger]

No problem providing more info. Just remember, you asked for it!

Originally I wanted to create my own router using an old box I had lying around, but it was suggested by GregN that running both a Router and NAS on the same box would probably present a large security issue. So, after deciding it was best to split the project and focus on a NAS/Web server and simply buy a wireless router/switch combo, I ended up here.

At the moment, I have everything running in one computer. All my storage drives are in the same system that I use for browsing the web and playing vidya games. My goal is to centralize all of my files in one place so that I can access them on any computer in my house. I've started to spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking, so I have a computer there. I also have an HTPC in the living room, an old computer in my bedroom that simply streams content to play on a TV, and of course my iPhone. My goal is to be able to access my media anywhere I go. Like carrying your file server around with you.

Although this has worked pretty well so far, it makes my computer REALLY damn loud and it generates a freaking ton of heat. This computer is also in a small den-like room, and although it's generally comfortable, once that video card gets cranking all that heat adds up and you end up with your very own unintentional sauna/environmental catastrophe.

Sadly, this environmental offense is probably less of a concern when you consider that I'm running all this solely on WINDOWS. I know, what a sacrelige. Also, I've been planning to get back to working with Linux and I figure that this project will help me do it. So, I'm giong to create this NAS running (probably) Ubuntu Server, loading it up with all of my drives, and then every computer wired or not will access this beast through the wireless router. So, it's both functional, and a fun little project.

All of that considered, the main function of this router will be networked DATA SHARING, so both wired AND wireless throughput are of utmost importance. Looking at the charts I noticed that the ASUS seemingly had the highest throughput, but I later realized that this is partially skewed due to the gigabit WAN to LAN speeds. I don't have gigabit internet nor is it available (I wish it was) so I think a standard 100mbps port will tide me over on the WAN front.

This will be replacing my AWFUL D-Link DI-624 that won't even allow me to run Steam (even with correct port forwarding set up) and stutters every time I try to stream a BluRay movie over wireless at 802.11g speeds. Also, I will probably end up flashing the firmware with DD-WRT just so that I can get some better QoS packet managment as well as bandwidth monitoring features. I want to know exactly how traffic's moving around the network.

Also, it probably bears mentioning that in this NAS I'll have a couple of 2TB low-RPM archive drives and some WD Caviar Black 1TB drives in a RAID setup for files that I frequently access like music/movies/tv episodes. I can transfer files at 100 MB/s from one WD Black to the other internally, and I want to try to retain this speed as best I can over the network. I realize that things will be a bit slower over wires and a few client intermediaries, but I don't expect TOO MUCH of a slowdown.

 

[claykin]

What are your wifi clients adapters? make and model.

 

[Syllinger]

No idea, they are onboard, and probably only 802.11g speced. But, I will be looking to upgrade a few of them, in the future, just not at the moment. Wired throughput is more important since I have ethernet wired throughout my house. Almost every room has an ethernet jack next to the power outlet.

 

[RogerSC]

I may be missing a bunch here, but if you're talking about heavy-duty streaming, I'd be looking at hardwired technologies like MOCA and powerline networking rather than wireless. Best is to use hardwired ethernet, but a lot of us don't have that available, it would be very expensive to add to my house for example. But there is already coax for cable TV in the walls, so I'm using that via MOCA for streaming, and that works really well.

And if it is helpful to you, you can add GB hardwired network interface card to just about any computer...they're really cheap, and are available for just about any internal I/O bus that is around. Not sure where you have 100Mb/sec and where you have 1Gb/sec, but whatever router you get will most likely provide 1Gb/sec hardwired ports. That won't help you if you aren't transferring from computer to computer using hardwired ports, so this is just a data point in that case.

From what I see on the wireless charts for the many wireless routers reviewed here, you're lucky to get a consistent 80Mb/sec via wireless on a single connection, and this can be lowered by a lot of factors, like neighbor's wireless networks, interference from cordless phones, microwave ovens, etc. I tend to use wireless for laptops and smartphones, where I'm not likely to be doing intense streaming, and find hardwired methods for the streaming applications. For example, I tried to use 5GHz. wireless for streaming video, and couldn't get the bandwidth that I needed due to the more limited range of 5GHz. wireless, so that got me looking at alternatives.

Just some thoughts. Again I'm sorry if I'm missing the full picture here.

 

[wombatch]

Some experience

Probably you have long since made your choice but since I just went through the same thing I wanted to post my experience somewhere.
I had a Dlink Dir-655, had it for years, it has the latest firmware on it, giviing me guest zone features.
Ok so I dont use the shared USB/Printer support I have other things for that.
I was tempted by a good write up of the WNDR3800, it must have been a good write up becuase my previous experience of netgear was not good.
So I try to make an objective comparison based on my experence of the two side by side, there are probably loads of features i dont use so my view is based on what I see.
First the 5GHz wireless, I dont use so the Netgear didn't buy me anything here.
I use the more traditional g/n network so my first comment is about this, the netgear was more stable but weaker signal than the DIR-655.
This is really the only positive I have when compared to the DIR-655 the rest from my perpecive is all bad news.
I use the guest zone, both of these routers have a guest zone but on the netgear you cant tell what is connected to that and what is connected to the base zone.
I thought the netgear parental controls sounded good, but since they are not transparent, you have to connect using an extra user from your pc in order to gain your defined access they too were considerably short of the network rules and configuation possible with the DIR-655.
Both routers provide a DHCP service, you can set up filters on both to prevent access to sites or protocols, the dlink will do this based on client MAC or IP addresss but the Netgear needs you to asssign (reserve an IP for the MAC address) because it can only filter on IP.
The both provide schedules when rules can be put in place, netgear allows only one schedule the dlink allows you to define many.
Dlink masks the wireless passphrase in the gui, with netgear it if one of the first thinsg you see when you log onto the router.
I guess you can tell I am not over impressed. I don't want to be unfair I think the netgear is a good product but aimed at the home market and people with little technical knowledge. The Dlink is dated, it has some quirks and the wireless is probably not as reliable but overall for my purpose it is far superior to the netgear.
I would still like to update the DIR-655, it is several years old now and there must be better routers on the market, Perhaps with different firmware the netgear could be it, that I have still to investigate.

 

[wombatch]

Since I wrote my last post I investigated some of the alternative firmware for the WNDR3800.
So here are some early results, it seems the best supported and useful one is OpenWRT. I tried Gargoyle (because the user interface is simpler) but it seems not to allow the set up of an extra network zone (i.e. guest zone) so I ditched that.
OpenWRT has some advantages and some disadvantages,
The bad: I am reasonably technical but you really need to understand what you are doing to set this up, everything requires creating a rule so it is very flexible but potentially a lot of work.
The good: Best news is that I found that I can tell the OpenWRT software I am in the US (or fail to tell it I am not) and that pushes up the available wireless radio power so the signal is pretty much on a par with the dlink.
The other good point about this is that Netgear make it very easy to change the firmware and to avoid bricking the box doing it.
So, much more positive.