I recommend buying a simple Access Point (AP) but with enterprisy components, like xclaim xi-3, and treat it as a stupid radio device while running layer 3 services with DHCP, firewall, etc on a separate device (or a vm) with pfSense. This way if you have problems with radio signal, you can just replace or buy a different brand AP without changing anything on your network stack.
Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
81–90 of 123 posts
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#82I know others have recommended this already, but I would also say that your best bet is to buy some Ubiquiti hardware. An EdgeRouter X + UniFI Pro dual-band AP is on the order of $200 from Amazon and has way, way better functionality than SOHO hardware of same price point, with the principal issue that it is enterprise hardware, and is very much not point-and-click to set up. I think the tradeoff in functionality and…
Their recent firmware has made it pretty plug and play. Edge router has a nice wizard for setting up basic routing and the AC pro can be setup via their UniFi phone app. Shouldn't take you any longer than an hour to be fully setup.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#83Earlier quoted context omitted.
There was a pretty detailed discussion on HN on the split [0] I personally hope that the situation won't become as [1]. [0] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11624374 [1] - https://xkcd.com/927/
Sure, having competing standards isn't always a good thing but we're not talking about a standard here. It's a new router firmware distribution and I think having more of them is a good thing as it gives people more choice. The major problem that I do see here is that LEDE has been forked from OpenWRT, but has nowhere near the level of device support that OpenWRT has. I have a TP-Link WDR4300 which I bought specifica…
> However, LEDE doesn't list this router amongst its supported devices (though there are newer WDRXXXX devices listed).
What list are you looking at?
LEDE does builds for the WDR4300, and given that it's an ath9k router, it is and will continue to be very well supported. The only caveat is that I don't know whether they've added the necessary signature to allow the firmware to be accepted as a valid upgrade by recent TP-Link stock firmware, but once any third-party firmware is installed, there's definitely no barrier to upgrading to LEDE.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#84I recommend a custom built PC and pfsense.
pfSense for the routing part (and many other features not found in consumer Wi-fi routers) is very good, but is using it for Wi-Fi such a good idea ? The mantra in the pfSense forums is not to hassle with Wi-Fi, as it is a big pita. Moreover, are there any AC cards supported? Based on the list provided by them[0] and info on the forums there aren't? [0] - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11cF4UoNL68Me5ZC6qhjF..…
pfSense is FreeBSD based right? If so, then no, there is no AC support at all in most of the BSD operating systems out there. AC is a pretty big fundamental difference from bgn. There are devs working to support it, but anything out there is likely to be alpha/beta state right now.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#85Earlier quoted context omitted.
I found https://www.amazon.com/Qotom-Q190G4-Celeron-Processor-Barebo... a fantastic device for the price. There's a non-Atom Celeron, a Broadwell chip and four Intel LAN ports in a <$150 package without moving parts. My home is small so this also handles the wifi for me.
How do you make it do WiFi? USB WiFi adapter?
It has two mini PCIe slots, one for mSATA, one for wifi. It has the usual antenna holes as well. You need an mPCIe card (Intel 7260HMW is popular) and two U.FL to RP-SMA connectors and be done. But yes, you could use USB as well. They sell kits as well but they use inferior cards IMO.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#86PC Engines APU2 (or Soekris net6501) + OpenBSD is the best router you can get.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#87I have the Asus RT-AC68U/TM-AC1900. I bought it from T-Mobile for $60 and flashed it to stock and then put Asuswrt-Merlin on it (but you can use Tomato or DD-WRT). It does take a little work to flash it to stock (like Telnet'ing into the router), but it wasn't bad and for $60 I ended up with a wonderful router. There are guides online for flashing it back to stock. If you're looking for information, I suggest SmallNe…
I'll third the Asus RT series. I just replace my FIOS router with an ASUS RT-AC66U running AsusWRT-Merlin (I understand the stock firmware is based on Tomato). It is very fast, stable, has great coverage and is extremely configurable/hackable. I think I paid $75 for it from Amazon Warehouse Deals.
> extremely configurable/hackable.
Except for the closed-source WiFi drivers, which also limit the choice of kernel versions.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
I built a firewall/router out of this board, with Linux and shorewall. It took a trick with the installer to get it to go, but it's run for a couple of years now without hardly a thought. I love it. http://www.pcengines.ch/apu1d4.htm I agree with the separation comment, but you can buy a radio for this board, and make it do wifi as well. The case even has pre-cut holes for the antennas. I've thought about doing it ju…
I love the APU2, but it draws 5 times more power than my TP Link.
At 11 cents/kWh for electricity, and an average load of 9W, that makes the APUD14 cost a whopping $8.67 per year to run. I'll gladly trade $7 over the course of a whole year in order to have a general-purpose OS on which I can run all sorts of interesting things.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#89For now, by my research the best candidates are - TP-Link Archer C7 (supported by both DD-WRT and OpenWRT, and recommended by the latter) - Linksys WRT1200AC/1900AC (supported by both DD-WRT and OpenWRT) - Ubiquiti UAP-AC-LITE/LR/PRO (OpenWRT, diffrent models depending how much speed/range do you need. No routing here, just access points.) For any models discussed, please keep in mind that depending on the hardware v…
Software support for the Marvell platform used by those Linksys routers is nowhere near as mature as for Qualcomm-Atheros hardware. It's improving, but definitely hasn't seen the kind of thorough widespread testing that QCA platforms get.
Re: Ask HN: Best current model routers for OpenWRT, DD-WRT, Tomato, etc.?
#90I know others have recommended this already, but I would also say that your best bet is to buy some Ubiquiti hardware. An EdgeRouter X + UniFI Pro dual-band AP is on the order of $200 from Amazon and has way, way better functionality than SOHO hardware of same price point, with the principal issue that it is enterprise hardware, and is very much not point-and-click to set up. I think the tradeoff in functionality and…
I can second this. I recently upgraded my home network to an EdgeRouter PoE + Netgear R7000 (flashed to DD-WRT) and wish I would've gone with Ubiquiti across the board. That side of things was much, much easier to get configured how I wanted it than DD-WRT on the Netgear. The VLAN tagging in DD-WRT for that hardware only partially worked via the GUI configuration, and I ended up having to go in via the CLI to finish it off.