While it only has 4GB of storage, you can connect an external hard drive and configure your cloud service similar to Google Drive or Microsoft OneDrive. While the modem doesn’t boast the beefiest specs or even a conventionally attractive shell like most of the competition, the RT2600ac packs many features (like built-in VPN and the ability to aggregate two WAN ports) that make it worthwhile. The company is known chiefly for its NAS boxes. The Synology RT2600ac is what you get when you fuse a traditional wireless router with a network-attached storage device or NAS (well, it gives you a bit more). One unexpected goodie included with the router is a 6-month subscription to Amazon Cloud Drive (double check which one, though, as Amazon killed the ‘unlimited’ tier mentioned in the marketing literature), and that’s an excellent bonus for backup purposes. Also known as WiGig, it operates in the 60GHz spectrum and aims to replace wires altogether. Its most intriguing feature, though, has to be support for 802.11ad, which is short-range, high-speed connectivity that requires a line of sight to work correctly. You can aggregate a pair of them to reach 2Gbps, and there’s even a 10G LAN SPF+ connector for NAS access (assuming you’ve got a device that supports this technology).Īdd in a pair of USB 3.0 ports and some powerful hardware (quad-core ARM processor clocked at 1.7GHz, 1GB RAM, and 512MB storage), and you can see why this Netgear router will appeal to businesses as well as enthusiast-level consumers. As technically advanced as most routers on this list, it is rated at 2600Mbps using 4x4 MU-MIMO and has plenty of LAN ports – seven Gigabit ones. Technically speaking, the Nighthawk X10 is a consumer router, but like the Asus model above, it offers features you will usually find on business routers. Asus has partnered with Trend Micro to offer a built-in security package called AIProtection. There’s a lot more here, including RADIUS support, the ability to aggregate four 1Gb Ethernet ports into a virtual 4Gb one (it has a mighty eight Gigabit Ethernet ports in all), and even support for LTE as a backup connection to improve resilience – the router already has two 1Gbps WAN ports that can be aggregated or used independently.Īs you’d expect from a top-of-the-range router, it offers 4x4 MU-MIMO and theoretical speeds of up to 2.6Gbps with open plan coverage up to 100m (albeit on the 2.4GHz band). Granted, it is excruciatingly expensive but packs the sort of features you’d never expect from a router, like an M.2 slot to plug in an SSD to convert it into a mini-NAS. The BRT-AC828 is its only business router, and the device ticks many boxes, even for small businesses looking for more than ten simultaneous connections. Our Consumer Score represents the percentage of customers who rated the product at least four out of five stars on retail and review sites like Amazon, Walmart, and the manufacturers’ webpages.Asus has a reputation for manufacturing great consumer products, and the Taiwanese firm – known for its laptops and motherboards – has been trying its hand at wireless products. We researched expert sources such as Tech Radar, PC Mag, and PC Gamer, and as well as 2,900 consumer reviews to select the top five gaming routers. You’ll still be able to allocate devices to individual bands, so this is a great option if your router typically sees a lot of traffic and you still want to be able to stream your games. If you need even more bandwidth, you can opt for a tri-band router, which contains two 2.4HGz and one 5Ghz. But most routers will allow you to choose which band you wish to connect your devices to, which makes it easier to work around high-traffic situations. Since 2.4GHz is used by all Bluetooth devices, it can get bogged down. One will be a 2.4GHz band, which is what powers through the walls of your house, and a 5GHz band for high-speed internet. In any decent router, you will find two bands. Radio bands essentially determine how powerful your Wi-Fi will be, and how well it will be able to travel through walls and other barriers. With gaming routers, you’ll want to be particularly aware of how much bandwidth you need for your console or computer, and then how much else you will need for the rest of the house, depending if you have a smart system or a number of other people living with you. But a stronger router is necessary for either a larger house or to use with technology that will put significant strain on your Wi-Fi. If you’re powering only a small apartment, you won’t need a particularly powerful one. When shopping for a new Wi-Fi router, you should first compare the size of your space with the square footage that a router is designed to cover.
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