TP-LINK N600 Wireless N Dual Band Gigabit Router w/ 2x USB Ports (TL-WDR3600) $39 after $15 rebate + Free Shipping

Need help here....read through all of this and 90% of it is over my "technical" head....

I currently have a crappy Belkin N150 router...which has been serviceable but with noticeable drops. I have recently started using Directv Cinema Connection to watch the first two seasons of Homeland and have had major issues. Our ISP tests out between 10-16 Mbps on speedtest.net yet when I download an episode my wireless internet basically shuts down while the show is downloading. I have been through Directv and Comcrap (ISP provider) and had no luck other than both saying it is the others fault or the fault of my crappy wireless router.

We just need a serviceable wireless router to run a few laptops, ipods, touchpads (not all at same time) and occasionally download shows via Directv, Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc.

I will not venture into changing the firmware...and whatever else is being discussed here.

Simple question: Is this a decent router out of the box for the money for our needs?

Thanks again to the Slickdeal community. Over the years I have gained a lot and not been able to offer much but still appreciative (I have found several slickdeals only to find that I was beaten to the punch by a better slickdealer...hey, at least I search before 're-posting".)

Quote from fyu : do you have any wireless ac equipment?

I doubt anyone does. Hey, at least you could sit around your house and tell visitors that you have ac WiFi even though no one can use it!

Quote from owiseone : Need help here....read through all of this and 90% of it is over my "technical" head.... I currently have a crappy Belkin N150 router...which has been serviceable but with noticeable drops. I have recently started using Directv Cinema Connection to watch the first two seasons of Homeland and have had major issues. Our ISP tests out between 10-16 Mbps on speedtest.net yet when I download an episode my wireless internet basically shuts down while the show is downloading. I have been through Directv and Comcrap (ISP provider) and had no luck other than both saying it is the others fault or the fault of my crappy wireless router. We just need a serviceable wireless router to run a few laptops, ipods, touchpads (not all at same time) and occasionally download shows via Directv, Netflix, Amazon Prime, etc. I will not venture into changing the firmware...and whatever else is being discussed here. Simple question: Is this a decent router out of the box for the money for our needs? Thanks again to the Slickdeal community. Over the years I have gained a lot and not been able to offer much but still appreciative (I have found several slickdeals only to find that I was beaten to the punch by a better slickdealer...hey, at least I search before 're-posting".)

yes, and sounds like you need to setup QOS. it's pretty easy to do. though it does sound and look complicated.

I wanted to get some input from people on how this would compare to my current router. I'm currently running a Cisco/Linksys E3000 w/Tomato firmware. It seems alright for the most part but I have some network issues from time to time that I'm attributing to my router.

I'm currently running the following on 2.4GHz WiFi:
9 wireless IP cameras
2 wireless smart TVs
3 mobile phones
Laptop


Then wired I have:
Office PC w/Gigabit connection
2 Homerun HD Primes w/6 TV tuners
4 Xbox 360's acting as front-end devices connected via 10/100
Network printer shared via office PC that's always on for TV functionality


As you can see, I've got a fairly good demand for a home network. I do newsgroups/torrent stuff in addition to recording HD programming from the tuners constantly. I play games on LIVE and for the most part that all seems to hum along just fine. The issues I seem to have are when I try to stream larger size & higher bitrate MKV files from movies that I download. These files can be anywhere from 5-12gb depending on compression. I will get a stuttering video and have stripped all of my codecs and started fresh with a setup (by Shark007) that works flawlessly for my buddy who has pretty much the same setup (less router) on the same files. I tried going to a gigabit switch for the tuners & PC hoping that it would help with this issue thinking maybe the router was having issues with higher bitrate files handling them via the LAN ports but that didn't seem to change anything.


I also tend to drop wireless connection from time to time and get horribly slow traffic which I attribute to the 2.4GHz band being occupied by all my wireless devices as well as a few networks of my neighbors within range.


I'm kind of tired of third party firmware (ran DD-WRT on a few previous routers) and all the complications that come with flashing/running them and would prefer an out-of-the-box solution and it seems like this router is a pretty solid performer in that respect so I'm thinking about buying this one to test out and then using my other router as a wireless bridge to get better WiFi out to my shop or possibly even selling it on CL.


If you've made it this far, bless your heart! You might be more of a tech geek than me. lol


Thoughts?

Quote from OstrichSak : I wanted to get some input from people on how this would compare to my current router. I'm currently running a Cisco/Linksys E3000 w/Tomato firmware. It seems alright for the most part but I have some network issues from time to time that I'm attributing to my router. I'm currently running the following on 2.4GHz WiFi: 9 wireless IP cameras 2 wireless smart TVs 3 mobile phones Laptop Then wired I have: Office PC w/Gigabit connection 2 Homerun HD Primes w/6 TV tuners 4 Xbox 360's acting as front-end devices connected via 10/100 Network printer shared via office PC that's always on for TV functionality As you can see, I've got a fairly good demand for a home network. I do newsgroups/torrent stuff in addition to recording HD programming from the tuners constantly. I play games on LIVE and for the most part that all seems to hum along just fine. The issues I seem to have are when I try to stream larger size & higher bitrate MKV files from movies that I download. These files can be anywhere from 5-12gb depending on compression. I will get a stuttering video and have stripped all of my codecs and started fresh with a setup (by Shark007) that works flawlessly for my buddy who has pretty much the same setup (less router) on the same files. I tried going to a gigabit switch for the tuners & PC hoping that it would help with this issue thinking maybe the router was having issues with higher bitrate files handling them via the LAN ports but that didn't seem to change anything. I also tend to drop wireless connection from time to time and get horribly slow traffic which I attribute to the 2.4GHz band being occupied by all my wireless devices as well as a few networks of my neighbors within range. I'm kind of tired of third party firmware (ran DD-WRT on a few previous routers) and all the complications that come with flashing/running them and would prefer an out-of-the-box solution and it seems like this router is a pretty solid performer in that respect so I'm thinking about buying this one to test out and then using my other router as a wireless bridge to get better WiFi out to my shop or possibly even selling it on CL. If you've made it this far, bless your heart! You might be more of a tech geek than me. lol Thoughts?

ouch, that's a lot of high demand wireless clients.

Are any of them capable of 5ghz? you might want to move them to the 5ghz. I'm guessing the 2.4ghz is getting swamped.

Quote from Discombobulated : Newegg Back again for those who missed out here *Note, rebate forms will update shortly TP-LINK TL-WDR3600 N600 Wireless N Dual Band Gigabit Router w/ 2x USB Ports [newegg.com] $38.99 after $15 Rebate [newegg.com] + Free Shipping Promo Code: EMCXVWL24

Is this still live? Showing for me:
74.99
- 6.00 promo code
68.99
-15.00 rebate
53.99 final price?
EDIT: Had to enter the code twice I guess. Still alive! Thanks Tnyc (and op)

Any chance the stock firmware can be modified to include features such as OpenVPN, QoS, transmit power, and stability fixes, etc., similar to Merlin Firmwares for the ASUS RT series?

That way, we can still get Hardware NAT plus all the goodies of 3rd party firmware.

Quote from TAGcaver : Is this still live? Showing for me: 74.99 - 6.00 promo code 68.99 -15.00 rebate 53.99 final price?

It's still alive. Add it to cart and then apply the coupon. Final price should be $53.99 minus the $15 mail-in rebate.

Quote from fyu : ouch, that's a lot of high demand wireless clients. Are any of them capable of 5ghz? you might want to move them to the 5ghz. I'm guessing the 2.4ghz is getting swamped.

Nope. The wireless really isn't the issue though. What I'm having issues with are the wired devices.

Quote from Jhya : Any chance the stock firmware can be modified to include features such as OpenVPN, QoS, transmit power, and stability fixes, etc., similar to Merlin Firmwares for the ASUS RT series? That way, we can still get Hardware NAT plus all the goodies of 3rd party firmware.

I believe QoS, transmit power and stability fixes are all there in the firmware already according to the product specs [tp-link.com]

Thanks!. Got myself a router

Quote from OstrichSak : Nope. The wireless really isn't the issue though. What I'm having issues with are the wired devices.

You aren't pushing them limits of the wired network by any stretch. I would guess your bottle neck is your PC. Nothing you listed network wise should be an issue. I am streaming MKVs to my Xbox (which we all know is 100 base) and I've never had an issue. Do you have extra switches in the equation?

Quote from get2Brad : You aren't pushing them limits of the wired network by any stretch. I would guess your bottle neck is your PC. Nothing you listed network wise should be an issue. I am streaming MKVs to my Xbox (which we all know is 100 base) and I've never had an issue. Do you have extra switches in the equation?

I realize my network is plenty sufficient and other than my PC to TV Tuners connection the rest is all 10/100. As I sometimes record several HD programs at once 100 would be insufficient for that leg but the rest is fine on 10/100 since the Xboxes can't connect any faster anyway.


As to the PC, it's a couple year old quad-core processor with 16gb of RAM running Win7 64bit. It doesn't seem to matter if I'm recording no programs or downloading any files or if I'm recording 4 HD programs while downloading larger HD video files ... perceived performance remains about the same. While streaming none of the cores exceeds 20% (highest at 18/19% and the other three will hover around 10%) and the RAM is always below 50% so I'm not thinking the PC is the problem.


Switches: There is a 4 channel gigabit switch I added next to the router (ground level, in the office) to take the tuners and PC off of the router LAN ports to see if that was the issue but it doesn't seem to affect anything so this is why I was thinking it may not be the router but I'm not sure what else it would be. I do have one other switch in the basement that feeds the rest of my home network and it's a D-Link 24 port 10/100 switch. It's been a rock solid unit but maybe it could use a power cycle or something since it's been on for about 7yrs straight. I don't feel like this is my issue either though but at this point I don't know what to suspect other than the router handling traffic.

Quote from OstrichSak : I don't feel like this is my issue either though but at this point I don't know what to suspect other than the router handling traffic.

Can you tell explain your network topology a bit more? Can you tell me every device your MKV hits before it goes on your screen. For example:
PC ---- switch ----- router ----- Xbox ------- TV

If you were just going from PC to the tuners, you wouldn't even touch your router since they are all on the same switch. I prefer to keep all my devices on the same network level (if you will). So I have a 24 port gigabit switch that everything plugs into so every situation would look like this:
source ---- switch ----- destination

I realize not everyone can do that. I would try putting your devices as close as you can (network-wise) and see what happens. Another suggestion would be to try a program like TVersity.