Purchased Wrong Router & Uverse Help

[mrsdowfire]

I purchased the RT-AC66u and am thinking about exchanging it (still possible-30 days with newegg) for the RT-N66U. The 5ghz on this unit is not what I expected and has very low signal. Is the N66U 5ghz any better? We use an xbox for streaming in our family room and a sony blu-ray player in our bedroom for streaming netflix (xbox requires live membership to stream netflix so we don't use that feature via xbox); this blu-ray player is also network capable. About the only gaming we do is around the holiday when the kids come home and we use the xbox kinex). I recently installed myplex on an older laptop we were no longer using with an external attached but I'd like to simplify and have all our media/pictures/music on this new 3TB external I purchased and stream from that rather than having an old laptop running all the time. I know its not a great set-up and thats why I purchased a new router. Eventually it might be nice to access the media when away from home but not necessary at the moment.

I've gotten the Asus connected to my residential gateway unit from AT&T but it is currently connected to the WAN port on Asus. Someone at AT&T said I needed to turn off the wireless on the RG and for the ASUS change it's address to 192.168.1.1 and leave the subnet at 255.255.255.0. Then turn off the DHCP server. Then connect the ASUS to the RG using one of the LAN ports. When I did that I get "WAN and LAN should have different IP addresses and subnets" and it won't let me change. Do I not want a WAN address? Should the RG be connected to LAN port on the Asus instead? I have a AT&T Uverse 3800 HGV-B RG and am new to setting this type of thing up but my ultimate goal would be to have my 3TB WD External connected to the Asus router along with my printer. Use the external to backup laptop and stream media, photos and maybe music. I am able to stream thru the xbox and see the asus router and play my media in my family room; have not tested anything with the sony upstairs yet but I'm hoping it is faster with the new router either through Netflix or the WD external. I'm wondering do I need to change the way I've connected the Asus as suggested by this person when so far things seem like they are working. Can someone explain or help me regarding this?

Also contemplating exchanging the AC to N router.

 

[thiggins]

Have you used 5GHz before? 5GHz range is always significantly less than 2.4 GHz with any router.

 

[mrsdowfire]

No I haven't

 

[thiggins]

No I haven't

Well, then you are experiencing the reduced range that comes with 5 GHz. Switching to an AC router isn't going to help.

 

[mrsdowfire]

Is the n router any better? I've only had a g router from AT&T up until I bought this ac router.

 

[Igb]

If i remember right, N performance (what you are actually using) was SIGHTLY better on RT-N66U. But not expect game-changing performance, only maybe 5% improvement, you will have insuficient performance if you actually dont have what you want.

As thiggins said, 5ghz range is always worse than on 2.4Ghz, RT-AC66U is one of the best performing routers even in this band. There is no better options. You can experiment with different possitions (try taking it the furthest possible from walls, or with different antenna possitioning). Note that there is no theoretical improvement from switching from 2.4 to 5ghz on same standard, it only performs better in real life because 2.4ghz band is absolutely saturated in towns, but over long distances (or with some obstacles) is still the best choice. AC networks can solve the worse signal with better possible speeds, but on N networks there is no competition.

If you see no improvement, i suggest you to send it back. Anything that improves the situation dramatically (like adding a 2nd router as receiver or switching to better directional antennas in both sides) are really expensive.

About the configuring, the "right" way is to configure your residential gateway (cablerouter) as a modem, look for the exact model in google to see if there is a way, you can clone its MAC on your router if needed, and let your new, better router to handle all the job with your ISP. But if it works the way you have it, note that your wireless performance has nothing to do with it.