Router suggestions?

[TechLady]

Okay I'm in network hell right now and am thinking about a different router for my house. Suggestions? Consumer-grade is fine--I don't have $500 to blow on a router anyway.

Current device is an Asus RT-N10+

 

[Martyn]

I'm running the RT N66U on this page. Great bit of kit.

http://www.asus.com/us/Networking/Wireless_Routers_Products/

 

[Metanis]

Top of the line

I just installed the Linksys EA6900 for a customer. $190 at Newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833124505&Tpk=ea6900

Extremely nice home grade router. All the bells & whistles and really fast wireless. I used segregated 2.4GHz and 5.0GHz networks so their old "G" class devices didn't have to slow down their newer "N" devices.

And the range was exceptional enough I was able to retire a Hawking range extender I had installed there 2 years ago.

-Mike

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

What are your needs?
Hard to provide some options for you without knowing what your needs are.

Yes..I can assume "To share an internet connection with a couple of computers"...and probably throw in "wireless".

But do you have a simple or more complicated network setup?
Any servers? What kind of firewall abilities and port forwarding rules?
Do you use multiple public IP addresses?
Do you need an edge device that can support VLANs?
VPN tunnels?
How many computers behind it?
What kind of connection on the WAN side?

Some advice...a UTM appliance, if you work on infected computers...helps make your work easier because "bad traffic and requests for payload downloads" coming from infected computers can be squashed.

 

[TechLady]

What are your needs?
Hard to provide some options for you without knowing what your needs are.

Yeah sorry about that. To be honest, my needs are pretty much exactly what the Skydog device is all about. I just now came across that and I think I'll give it a go. (Thanks for all the recommendations though...I may go with one of those also, especially if the "dog" turns out to be a dog...). I love OpenDNS but the broad policies have always been a problem. If that device works well it would be a LIVESAFER for my residential clients.

Some advice...a UTM appliance, if you work on infected computers...helps make your work easier because "bad traffic and requests for payload downloads" coming from infected computers can be squashed.

Yes, that's one area that's still a concern, however. All I have in the workshop is a switch. My solution thus far has been simply not to hook up incoming machines until I have a good look at them, but obviously some kind of firewall would be better. A shop locally here got themselves blacklisted with their ISP because of this exact situation.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Don't forget you can build yourself a UTM firewall for cheap...even free, using old x86 hardware and an hour or two of your time. For a computer tech, often no excuse not to have one...even if the words "but I can't afford one yet" are muttered.

 

[SAG]

Don't forget you can build yourself a UTM firewall for cheap...even free, using old x86 hardware and an hour or two of your time. For a computer tech, often no excuse not to have one...even if the words "but I can't afford one yet" are muttered.

^What he said.
Take an old P4, or Atom, or Celeron.
Toss in a couple of NICs.
Install - Enjoy!

I'd look more at Untangle and Endian (my top two pics).
If you decide Endian, I'll give you a hand with configuring it if you'd like.

 

[Markverhyden]

^What he said.
Take an old P4, or Atom, or Celeron.
Toss in a couple of NICs.
Install - Enjoy!

I'd look more at Untangle and Endian (my top two pics).
If you decide Endian, I'll give you a hand with configuring it if you'd like.

What they both said. Any old computer will do and, in reality, the hardware performance could equal higher end current routers in many facets, especially if you have a couple of good NIC's. There are also many distro's that run on recent retail routers, such as DDWRT and Tomato.

 

[coffee]

I run an older computer that I built from spare parts. Its just got a single Athlon 64 processor and 2gb of ram. I have 2 nics in it and it makes a great file server and router/firewall. ubuntu 12.04 server. Does a great job.

You could with the right wireless pci card also do wireless routing. Or perhaps just buy an access point instead and run a cable over to switch.

My neighbor is right now looking at replacing her router for the third time. They tend to fail alot for some reason. Currently she has a linksys E1200.

To me, Its just alot less problems running your own home grown router.

coffee

 

[kpk1]

If its for home use.... has anyone seen this..... http://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/free-tools/sophos-utm-home-edition.aspx

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

If its for home use.... has anyone seen this..... http://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/free-tools/sophos-utm-home-edition.aspx

It's the new name for Astaro's free home version which was fully UTM featured. I ran the Astaro version at home for about a year.....great product, very matured.

Astaro had a free firewall product for businesses...but it didn't have UTM features in it, businesses had to purchase a license for the UTM product.

Sophos bought up Astaro a couple of years ago.

 

[pceinc]

I'm liking easytomato on the Asus RT-n16. Router cost $83 and took about 5 minutes to install.

 

[JustInspired]

If its for home use.... has anyone seen this..... http://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/free-tools/sophos-utm-home-edition.aspx

Hmm that's interesting. I've been looking at setting up something here at home. Might give this a try.

Is there any other info available about it? Mostly want to find out if I can allow only a select few sites through to my little one's iPad.

 

[Markverhyden]

If its for home use.... has anyone seen this..... http://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/free-tools/sophos-utm-home-edition.aspx

No. Thanks for posting.

 

[pc-rebuilders]

What is utm?

If I got it, you can use an old machine with proper software n a couple of nic's and it can replace your standard router?

 

[altrenda]

If I got it, you can use an old machine with proper software n a couple of nic's and it can replace your standard router?

Yes. I personally prefer pfSense. It's is a great free firewall/router, just add any old wifi router in bridge mode to provide wireless access. Others as mentioned before like Untangle or Endian, work as well.

Besides having more capability and throughput than normal household routers, it's a good way to learn something that you can apply for customers to use. Almost every small office I set up uses either pfSense or Untangle.

 

[Markverhyden]

I don't really have as much time as I used to for test driving distros. But I'm really liking this Sopho's UTM thing. As YSC said it is Astaro but turns out it is based on SUSE. I was kind of surprised. Not sure I have seen a router/UTM distro based on SUSE.

At any rate I've d/l and installed it on a mini-ITX box I had purchased a while ago just for that function. Sailed through no problems. Now I just need to put together the routing tables, etc.

I had originally wanted to use Vyatta but they dropped the GUI on the community version and I don't have time to learn the CLI. Yes, there is a huge number of options but the GUI seems fairly intuitive. Nomenclature and layout makes sense. +1 to kpk1 for posting the link.

 

[pceinc]

http://www.mondaiji.com/blog/other/...the-ultimate-free-open-source-firewall-distro

Interesting comment about Sophos distro regarding privacy and 3rd party sharing of collected data.

 

[Markverhyden]

http://www.mondaiji.com/blog/other/...the-ultimate-free-open-source-firewall-distro

Interesting comment about Sophos distro regarding privacy and 3rd party sharing of collected data.

From what I understand those types of T&C's are very common everywhere. No personal data, just metadata. There was a number of articles recently about how the various cell companies were doing the same thing with browsing and searchs on smart phones.

I don't agree with it But I gave up on the idea of any major privacy on the Internet a long time ago.

 

[ohio_grad_06]

I'll be the odd one out. I'm a fan of netgear products. No major issues with their products. Maybe grab one of their dual band routers and put the homebrew firewall together if you want extra security.