TP-LINK TL-WDR4300 N750 Wireless N Dual Band Gigabit Router w/ 2x USB Ports $52 after $30 rebate + Free Shipping

Quote from rifleman1 : BH Photo sold 4300 through 12/1 for 40 AR...didn't arrive for almost a month...set up was a breeze, looks like a giant cyclops from a 60s japanese scifi on your desk, worked well for a week then mysteriously stopped connecting/disconnecting lappy and smartphone...hours and hours of aggravation ensued...got returned (refunded for half the price)..still awaiting the rebate for other half..wouldn't really touch TP again....

Ditto, ditto, ditto!

Upgraded the firmware to 12/25, cured the disconnects, and granted me with shit-ass internet performance.

Mine's going back tomorrow... I wonder if they're giving me a half refund, too?

p.s. - Don't know about 3rd party firmware, but with stock firmware: THIS ROUTER SUCKS! My POS D-LINK WBR-1310 blows this out of the water!!!

Amazon charges some of us tax. And paying tax on a rebate is a non-starter for me. Maybe next time...

Quote from manonfire : looks pretty boss. how does this compare to the Cisco Linksys EA3500 that's also on sale?

EA3500 [amazon.com] - very comparable in regards to transmission rates (300+450) and I think they have the same number of antennas (3).

Quote from zerorhythm : Try OpenWRT not the gargoyle version cause it's limiting in features. Luci is good and a few others. I have 3 routers running in repeater bridge , I've tried DD-WRT and It runs a lot slower on wireless and not as stable as OpenWRT, and I don't like gargoyle's interface and features.

Are you using Attitude Adjustment, or did you pull from trunk? It wasn't particularly clear from the wiki which was required for the N600. It's something I'm planning on trying, but the things I need to work seamlessly are USB printer and scanner sharing. OpenWRT looks like it has the printer aspect down, but USBIP seems unmaintained and the SANE frontend seems rather barebones.

Quote from boltman2007 : This is a good deal seems custom firmware makes it rock solid dual-band Gateway. Also has a Gigabit switch a definite must for XBOX. Looks decent too. Pretty good deal for a solid dual-band router for right at $50-ish (That's a good bang for buck) Its not Black Friday but close "In the ballpark pricing"..I bit saved me a lot over my next choices.

Why do need gigabit for xbox? It's only 10/100 port on the xbox 360. That being said, 100mbps is plenty to stream HD

Question for the masses: I have a Belkin router with USB support for an external hard drive but from what I've seen and read, my router doesn't support anything past 2 TB and I have a 3 TB drive I'd like to hook up. Is there a way to know for sure that this router supports larger drives? And if not, can someone suggest one that does?

Thanks for your help.

Quote from ddiede : I have a 3 TB drive I'd like to hook up. Is there a way to know for sure that this router supports larger drives?

I have a 3TB drive as well. Can someone confirm or refute this?

Does my desktop have to support gigabit ethernet in order to get gigabit speeds? I am not sure what my desktop wired connection speed is.

Quote from quotidian : Are you using Attitude Adjustment, or did you pull from trunk? It wasn't particularly clear from the wiki which was required for the N600. It's something I'm planning on trying, but the things I need to work seamlessly are USB printer and scanner sharing. OpenWRT looks like it has the printer aspect down, but USBIP seems unmaintained and the SANE frontend seems rather barebones.

I'm using Backfire for my N600 it seems to be the best performance from the other at the time when I flash the the bios, I've tired many until I settled on backfire. I haven't really done much to it since setting it all up. I install a few packages to get the repeater to run at full speed using dual band. I've had this setup for almost a year I think. I don't do much USB stuff for my router so I can't say much about that. You can check the Open WRT forums. I got so many info at the time when setting up my routers. Check to see if someone has a build for your desired need, they are very informative.

Quote from DaSoul : Does anyone know the following? If I buy this from a third party on Amazon to avoid paying the tax would I still qualify for the rebate?

It clearly states on the rebate form "Valid ONLY for purchases made at Amazon"

So I would say no, you might be out of luck

Just an FYI, I did the rebate last time this was FP and the rebate came quickly with no issues.

Also flashed with the latest TPLink firmware and it has been going strong ever since.

Grabbing gargoyle in case the TPLink firmware gives me issues, but a little confused:

What is the other gargoyle file (with suffix: [...]sysUpgrade.bin) supposed to be used for?

Quote from QuestorJones : Grabbing gargoyle in case the TPLink firmware gives me issues, but a little confused: What is the other gargoyle file (with suffix: [...]sysUpgrade.bin) supposed to be used for?

The factory.bin files are meant to be flashed over factory stock
firmware routers - they usually have some extra "magic bytes"
i.e. a trick header - to fool the factory firmware into thinking its
reading its own factory firmware, not 3rd party firmware.


Sysupgrade.bin is for any router that is currently running either
openwrt or gargoyle and can be flashed via the GUI.

Quote from zerorhythm : Try OpenWRT not the gargoyle version cause it's limiting in features. Luci is good and a few others. I have 3 routers running in repeater bridge , I've tried DD-WRT and It runs a lot slower on wireless and not as stable as OpenWRT, and I don't like gargoyle's interface and features.

Can you point us to the version you speak of ? Is this version just as easy to flash and not brick?

Just a heads up on this router; I bought it during Black Friday and have enjoyed it for the most part.

Pros:
Dual Simultaneous Band
Two USB Ports
Stable

Cons:
5GHz wireless strength is AWFUL, I have to connect to the 2.4GHz if I am upstairs and want decent signal; overall, signal strength is poor
USB transfer is slow, very slow
Put DD-WRT on it and just about bricked itself after install

It is a great router, I simply had much higher expectations. My last wireless router had twice the signal reach in my opinion and my cheap, crappy, ATT Uverse wireless modem router is much more powerful than this one. I still use this one, and turned off the wireless on my modem, but that is only because I use it for USB storage.