Netgear nighthawk R7000: recommend

[wintermute000]

Just upgraded my carrier supplied crapola all-in-one router/cable modem to a Netgear Nighthawk R7000.


Man this thing's wireless blows the carrier one away, and presumably won't lock up every 30 days (fingers crossed LOL). Throughput from the former worst spot in the house (the master bedroom... convenient eh) has almost tripled on 2.4Ghz alone and 5Ghz is unbelievable (the ISP device did not have 5ghz).


All my wife's streaming video complaints have stopped, winner.


I know there's R8000 out but I didn't really care for Wave 2 AC or spending another 150 bucks, and from my research, the custom firmware for the R7000 is much better/stable. Though so far I don't see any major need for it, the stock seems to be performing fine and doing everything I want (OpenVPN, dynamic DNS, static DHCP reservations).


The two minor niggles that the stock firmware doesn't cover off are the ability to NAT a second IP range (which is apparently possible via iptables syntax in DDWRT or the like) as well as add static DNS entries instead of just relaying everything, but I'm not sure when I'll be able to get CAB i.e. wife approval for another outage window LOL.


The only thing I don't like is because I have cable, now I need to run two boxes (the ISP device as a bridge), can't be helped.

[mmcgurty]

Man, I was hoping this was a cable modem/router combo so I could replace the crap that Comcast bundles.  I am a Comcast TriplePlay subscriber (TV, Internet, VOIP) and I have been looking for something for some time I could drop their all-in-one-does-nothing-well-combo-modem/router.  The VOIP always seems to be the hitch.

[routerdork]

I've got the Netgear Nighthawk X4 (R7500)
Bought it about 2 years ago and it has been solid for the most part. I run mine in AP mode as I have a 3825 in front. The thing has great coverage. When I first got it there were some bugs but they were fixed withing a few months. A couple times I've had it reboot randomly but nothing major and it's very rare when it happens.

It blew the free Meraki I was using out of the water, I couldn't get more than 15-20Mbps out of the Meraki on a Speedtest. Same settings/connection speeds on the Netgear and I hit my 50Mbps with ease.

[icecream-guy]

Man, I was hoping this was a cable modem/router combo so I could replace the crap that Comcrap bundles.  I am a Comcrap TriplePlay subscriber (TV, Internet, VOIP) and I have been looking for something for some time I could drop their all-in-one-does-nothing-well-combo-modem/router.  The VOIP always seems to be the hitch.

Fixed that for you...

[mmcgurty]

Maybe it is just the area I live in but Comcast has been pretty solid for me.  Now their Android based DVR still is partially sucky but better than when we first got it.  The voice is voice...how hard can that be to do.  My main issue is the price.  We have no pay channels but two DTA's and one HD DVR and it runs us like $216/month.  I think that is ridiculous.  If I had kids that were older, we would just have Internet.

[wintermute000]

Man, I was hoping this was a cable modem/router combo so I could replace the crap that Comcast bundles.  I am a Comcast TriplePlay subscriber (TV, Internet, VOIP) and I have been looking for something for some time I could drop their all-in-one-does-nothing-well-combo-modem/router.  The VOIP always seems to be the hitch.

Not sure if this is local to my country or not, but you don't seem to be able to find any cable modem/router combo boxes, and people don't seem to buy cable modems standalone, they are always supplied by the telco. I don't know much about DOCSIS so maybe this is due to how the modem must be setup (I know for sure you have to register the MAC for example).
Everyone in local nerd forums just takes it as given that you'll bridge the ISP modem to your router of choice, I haven't really seen anyone talking about getting their own modem (other than recycling old ones).

[mmcgurty]

I know lots of folks I work with do the bring your own modem.  I think my situation is unique because we do the TriplePlay service the cable mode/router/ATA comes with an analog port for voice off of it.  Most of the people I know rolling their own modem are strictly Internet or Internet/TV only.  They are usually younger folks who have grown up with a cell phone and have always had the same number.  Up until last year, I have always had a company supplied cell phone at which point they scrapped for savings and went BYOD.  I can see within the next year or so my wife and I might just drop the voice side.