Open Source Router To Replace WRT54GL?

jeremyz writes "With the inclusion of 802.11n in more and more Wi-Fi devices, the WRT54GL is losing its usefulness, even though it's still the de-facto standard for open source, Linux-running wireless routers. I've been looking around for a 802.11n router to replace the WRT54GL, but haven't really found anything besides the Netgear's WNR3500L. At first look, the WNR3500L looked great, but after some further investigation, I found that Netgear hasn't released all of the source, as they should have to comply with the GPL. Are there any good 802.11n routers to replace my aging WRT54GL?"

Comments

Here you go

[Anonymous Coward]

DDWRT Supported Devices

CTRL+F

"b/g/n"

Conversation over.

Re:Here you go

[Baloo Uriza]

Not quite. DDWRT's also got some proprietary issues. I think you meant OpenWRT, from the same people who brought you Debian.

Re:Here you go

[KonoWatakushi]

The complaint about documentation is spot on. Following the documentation link for the latest release on the main page leads you to a page with an empty "Installation" section. The download link leads to a directory containing the various architecture specific image files, with no information on how to choose the correct one. At that point, most prospective users probably probably throw up their hands and go elsewhere, which is a shame.

However, OpenWRT itself is a nice system, and if the developers want to concentrate on the system, I can't blame them. For interested users, start with the Wiki. Some digging for various documentation may be required, but most of the important stuff is there somewhere. If you have given the search an honest effort, the forums will likely be a lot more receptive to your questions.

Re:Here you go

[bcrowell]

DD-WRT isn't as open as it could be: http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/columns/article.php/3816236 This is the reason that I'm currently running openwrt+gargoyle on my wrt54g. Gargoyle (the browser-based interface) actually isn't all that great -- very bare-bones.

My experience is that the real problem with consumer-grade routers has very little to do with the quality or openness of the software. The real problem I've always had with the damn things is that the hardware seems to be crap. I've been through three models, and it's always been the same story. Some people seem to have better luck with them, but mine lock up once or twice a week and need to be power-cycled. People told me to get one of the older wrt's, which had more memory, so I did. That's what I have now, and it's not really any better. I've run factory firmware, dd-wrt, and openwrt; none of them were measurably better or worse than the others. People told me that many routers were very sensitive to power glitches, and I should get an uninterruptible power supply. Did that, didn't help.

Re:Here you go

[Anonymous Coward]

The documentation isn't great, but the build system is. ddwrt seems to made it hard to produce your own version of that project, while openwrt makes it easy. There build system not only builds the final product, but also the tools (including a compatible cross compiler) needed to build your own firmware image on a normal PC.
I have built custom images from trunk to add things such as ifb support. And it isn't hard to do.

Soekris Engineering

[DaMattster]

Soekris Engineering makes low power computers that you could easily turn into a router using whatever choice of free/open source operating systems that you like. I have used OpenBSD on one of these with amazing success.

Re:Soekris Engineering

[jgreco]

The Soekris platforms are getting a bit dated. You may have some of the same problems with the Soekris that you'd have with a WRT54G: slow CPU, only 10/100 ethernet, etc. On the other hand, the Soekris are i386-compatible, generally have more memory, and you can add gobs of flash and other options. The latest stuff (net55xx) is somewhat faster, but even that's a bit dated and limited performance-wise, sadly.

NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of them

[Joe The Dragon]

NO gig-e low number of ports and pci bus for most of them and most of them don't even have more then 1 pci slot.

to make a one that can use gig-e and n wifi pci-e is better.

Netgear WNDR3700

[Anonymous Coward]

Netgear's firmware is based on OpenWRT for this router as well, and the official OpenWRT runs on it as of Backfire 10.03. Wireless works with the ath9k open source drivers. It has great performance and works well with the open source 3rd party firmware.

Re:ALIX

[raddan]

There's also Soekris stuff. I've had my trusty net4801 for many years now, running off the same 2GB CF card. I'm running OpenBSD + PF. I originally set it up to provide wireless to my house from a cable connection. Recently I moved into a place that already had wireless, so by simply changing a couple macros in PF, I am now feeding wireless into my wired PC, essentially the same thing as a wireless gateway, but in reverse. Try that with a wireless router you get at Best Buy.

Soekris gear is a bit on the pricey side, but it's pretty damned durable stuff. If you're looking for something cheaper, Atom-based motherboards are relatively inexpensive these days. Get an old case, a new mobo, and a wireless PCI card and you're good to go. I did something similar with an old Pentium Pro for the 3 years prior to the Soekris (which has been running 24/7 now for about 5).

ASUS RT-N16

[TheDawgter]

The ASUS RT-N16 is the best consumer product I've found for dd-wrt so far. 128Mb RAM and 480mHz processor, 802.11n and 2 usb ports.

Re:ASUS RT-N16

[BobPaul]

Wikipedia is your friend. 802.11n supports both 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, using the same channels as b/g and a. This means that on 5ghz not only do you have fewer devices competing for resources, but you also have non-overlapping channels. So when you want to take up 2 channels for the higher speed 40MHz mode, you can often find a section on 5 that has 0 conflicts.

Look for a router that supports a/b/g/n. The best ones are "simultaneous dual band". Just "dual band" means it can use 2.4GHz or 5GHz, but not necessarily at the same time (so if you want your Wii, PDA, etc on the network, you're stuck with 2.4GHz for everything). Some of the simultaneous dual bands even let you run separate SSIDs and subnets for the two frequencies.

Re:ASUS RT-N16

[BikeHelmet]

Here's some info on installing Tomato on the RT-N16.

http://www.linksysinfo.org/forums/showthread.php?t=63587

The forums are temporarily down for upgrades. (good timing! :P )

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[mrsteveman1]

If you need gigabit routing, soekris is coming out with some new boards that have it, but they're 2x+ as expensive as an Alix. They aren't listed on their main page right now, i believe i heard about it through one of the community forums.

I've got an Alix 2D13 with an Atheros 5416 card in it, works fine with pfSense but the 802.11n rates don't work yet so it's still doing 54g at the moment, stable though. Hopefully once freebsd gets 802.11n rate support it will be a good router for years to come. 802.11n on this card might work in any Linux based system though, such as dd-wrt x86 (but they charge for that...)

Buffalo Technology gets my vote.

[Banichi]

Buffalo Technology http://www.buffalotech.com/ is my starting point for all my future networking needs. I don't need anything more than a windows compatable 802.11g router for the foreseeable future, so I have no experience with linux compatability or open source availability.

I bought a WHR-HP-G54 a few years back and am thrilled with it. I think I've only needed to reboot it twice since I bought it and neither time was the routers fault. Possibly the simplest to get working, user friendliest, least problematic piece of tech I've ever owned.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[raju1kabir]

More and more ISPs are offering consumer connections that would require gigE. Would be a bummer to get a gigabit connection for $25 a month and then have to lay out several hundred dollars to actually get that speed routed around my house.

I'm very happy with my asus wl-500w

[Some1too]

I'm very happy with the unit for the following reasons:

1) crack it open and you can remove the wireless card and replace it with your own.

2) will run with openwrt

3) I'm shocked at the amount of abuse mine took. The wireless card had been glued to the router board using some kind of foam. I think the combination of the glue used and the heat from the device made it stick together strongly. I ended up using a pair of scissors to pry them apart and I thought for certain I had ruined either the card of the router board. Much to my surprise when I unbent the clips for the card it started working fine (I was prepared to trash the router in order to try and get the card out).

4) I've flashed the unit several times between the stock and various other images. The thing always comes back from the dead if you take your time and understand what you're doing. I guess it's firmware has some issue in how it addresses the interfaces which causes a conflict when trying to run something like FON (or so I'm told. Not certain how this applies if you're running openwrt). I bought mine a few years ago now when the N standard wasn't on a lot of hardware at the time. I haven't tested it's functionality in that regard.

I'm planning on buying a decent Atheros based card for it and use it in Sept. Hope this was helpful in some way.

Cheers, S.

Trendnet TEW-652BRP

[psych-major]

http://www.trendnet.com/products/proddetail.asp?prod=185_TEW-652BRP&cat=41
Usually goes for $35
Nearly Identical to the more expensive Dlink DIR-615
Runs incredibly well on DD-WRT firmware

--or--

Compile your own firmware from Trendnet's source code.
http://www.trendnet.com/downloads/list_gpl.asp

Here's Three with USB

[sciurus0]

The ASUS RT-N16, Linksys WRT610N, and Netgear WNR3500L look promising. They're all supported by dd-wrt and in theory could work with openwrt. The Asus is some nice hardware for $90.

guruplug

[macaulay805]

Kinda interesting no one mentioned Guruplug yet. http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-guruplugdetails.aspx

Linksys Refurbished WRT610N-RM

[r6_jason]

The Linksys Refurbished WRT610N-RM for $110 free shipping in the US. The router might not be "open source" but you can and should load dd-wrt onto it. http://homestore.cisco.com/viewproduct.htm?productId=83108078&categoryId=85185 http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Linksys_WRT610N

Re:Linksys Refurbished WRT610N-RM

[Alereon]

This is the best idea, I have a Linksys WRT610Nv1 running the current DD-WRT firmware and it runs great. It has dual-simultaneous-N so you can have 802.11n networks on both the 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz bands, and its routing throughput is excellent as well. You can also use its USB port as a NAS in DD-WRT and I think you can share some USB printers as well, which is cool.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[JWSmythe]

    You're absolutely right. Several years ago, we were looking at firewall solutions for our GigE pipes. Lots of people had GigE copper inputs, but when we pushed for details it always came down to the simple fact that their hardware couldn't push that kind of traffic.

    We looked at building our own PC based boxes to do it. It all came down to the fact that the cards couldn't really push the speeds.

    The only solution for GigE that can achieve full line speed is the proper hardware, and you're going to pay a premium for that. You want to route or switch GigE speeds, you're going to put in something like a Cisco Catalyst 6500 series switch (or better). You can pick up a 6500 fairly cheap these days on eBay. Well, cheap in relative terms. It won't be anywhere near the cost of a Linksys AP. :)

Re:Tomato?

[rotorbudd]

Look here . . . http://www.linksysinfo.org/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=160
It's a Lynksys forum, but the Tomato subforum is what you are looking for.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[icebraining]

Real 100mbps do require gigabit. If a router is rated for 100mbps, that's its theoretical limit. It won't actually support constant 100mbps.

I don't think I've heard of a consumer connection that does over 100mbps let alone 1000mbps. Hell, even the new VDSL2+ that was reported a few days ago maxed out at around 250mbps.

Not everyone is from the US, you insentivide clod. We have fiber to home up to 1Gbps.
200mbps + 116 HD channels + Phone w/ unlimited calls = 100E/month.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[icebraining]

One of my local ISPs in Portugal is offering a home connection of 1gpbs (up and down), plus HD TV for 250E / month. Yes, it's expensive, but it's not a 5 figure, not by a long shot.

ASUS RT-N16

[200_success]

The ASUS RT-N16 is an awesome router that is supported by DD-WRT and has been reported to work with Tomato. The stock firmware is pretty good too. It has some impressive specifications:

• 802.11 b / g / draft-N at 2.4 GHz
• 128 MB RAM
• 32 MB flash
• Broadcom4718A
• 2 USB ports

You should be able to find one for about $100.

Re:Haven't seen free N yet

[kms_one]

Look to the Teddy Bear build of Tomato. It supports USB and N depending on the router. It's what's running on my WL-520GU and my new RT-N16. The RT-N16 has wireless N, 4 gigabit port switch, and 2 USB ports. The wireless is limited to 2.4GHz but that is the only difference between it and the theoretical dream router. The site is being upgraded right now, but this is the guide to use to get tomato working on the N16 http://www.linksysinfo.org/forums/showthread.php?t=63587.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[Algan]

Cablevision's Optimum Ultra is rated at 101mbps. And they recommend a Gig-e router to get close to the rated speed. Docsis 3 standard is good for up to 171/343 mbps depending on the number of allocated channels so it's conceivable that most cable providers will be able to pass the 100 mbps barrier in the near future. So if one buys a router these days, it's a good idea to future proof it and get one that has gig-e ports.

ASUS RT-N16

[MITpianoman]

I was just considering the same question myself not even 2 days ago. I ultimately decided on the ASUS RT-N16 as others here have suggested, as it seemed to have the consensus of several users on the DD-WRT forum: http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=70817&highlight=rtn16 The WNDR3700 would be nice if they manage to get it past what appears to be an alpha-release support

WRT320N

[brutimus]

I just bought a WRT320N a couple weeks ago and promptly installed DD-WRT. It has been solid as a rock. Full N speeds on wifi and full gigabit on wired.

Netgear WNDR 3700

[Fallen Kell]

The netgear WNDR 3700 is running a version of OpenWRT out of the box with a custom interface. OpenWRT has a few builds of their standard distribution which work, with full support being rapidly added. DD-WRT is working hard on adding support for the router as well with at least two test builds being released. Full support should be there within a few months. Again, with it running a customized OpenWRT out of the box, it is only a matter of time for all the router based distributions to have ports which run on it. Add in the fact that it is one of the fastest routers (wan->lan speed, and lan->wan speeds), with some of the best dual band wireless N speeds, a decent amount of RAM, USB ports, gigabit switch/router, and the fastest CPU seen in a consumer class router, you have a very capable device.

DLink DIR-825 rev B

[Eric Smith]

Although not marketed for open-source use the way the Linksys WRT54GL was, the DLink DIR-825 rev B seems like a great choice. It is supported by many of the third-party firmware distributions (I use OpenWRT), has an Atheros MIPS-based CPU that runs at 680 MHz, simultaneous dual-band Atheros WiFi which has good open source support (no binary blob driver needed), detachable antennas, gigabit ethernet, and isn't too expensive.

Much though it pains me (as a former Ubicom employee) to say it, I would recommend avoiding the earlier DIR-825 rev A which uses a Ubicom processor. Although Ubicom now offers some kind of Linux SDK, as far as I know there is currently no third-party firmware that will run on the DIR-825 rev A. The hardware revision is on the label of the package, and also the rev A and rev B look somewhat different, so if you buy a DIR-825 at retail you can easily ensure that you get the rev B. I suspect that most of the major online retailers probably have exhausted their inventory of rev A by now.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[victorhooi]

heya,

As somebody who lives in Australia, I have to say you probably have no idea what you're talking about...haha

That, or you bought into Telstra's reality distortion field. That 100Mbps service they're offering in Melbourne, is available to a very small minority only - it's available to about a million people in total, I believe, but most of those won't get anywhere near those speeds.

http://www.misaustralia.com/viewer.aspx?EDP://1268174866621

Also, the demand for it is terrible, probably because of the abysmal pricing. Basically, you have to get it in a cable bundle (with their c*appy tv offering), on a 24 month contract, which costs $169 for 50 Gb per month, or $269 for 100 Gb per month. And that includes both uploads and downloads. So no, I doubt it's really "available" in any sense for the majority of people.

Cheers, Victor

How about Vyatta?

[Hypoon]

See: their commercial site and their community (read: free!) site

I've been using it for the past few months. I must warn that it's not the most user friendly, but it has a lot of commercial backing. As long as you read the documentation, you'll be fine.

It runs on x86 hardware. I'm running it in a virtual machine running on an Ubuntu box, there's one gigabit NIC in it, but the VM has two virtual NICs. It works incredibly well.

The new version has support for wireless, including N, but I can't vouch for that since I haven't used it. If it's anything like the rest of their stuff, it works flawlessly.

One of my favorite parts about Vyatta is that all its configuration is stored in a single file. If you've put this file on a flash drive, you can boot the livecd and run right off of that if you like. Obviously, if you install extra software or configure things outside of the Vyatta shell, that doesn't go in the config file. Although I don't run off of the livecd, this convenient config file is an easy way to verify the integrity of the system. If you're worried you got hacked, just back up your config and do a clean install. All you have to do is look over the file to make sure everything looks right, and you're good to go.

I'm not fond of Vyatta's commercial aspects, but if you can live with the details listed here then the only thing you have between you and a brilliant setup is the manuals!

I was looking at DD-WRT for a while, but then decided against it because of all the controversy. I honestly don't remember what I didn't like about OpenWRT, but something kept me from trying that too. The big difference between almost everything that's been mentioned so far (DD-WRT, OpenWRT, Tomato, etc...) and Vyatta is that while the former are mostly intended for SOHO users, Vyatta is intended as a Cisco competitor for big business. I actually like pouring hours into reading documentation so I can use "enterprise" stuff like Vyatta at home, but it's up to you to decide which way you want to go.

For the record: like many other posters above, I'm not affiliated with Vyatta in any way, I'm just completely startled by the fact that nobody's mentioned it so far. Does Vyatta have a big black mark that nobody's told me about, or is it just not as well known?

By the way: Vyatta sells their own hardware too, but it's pretty pricey. It starts at ~$800 and reaches up over $10K. Personally, I think it's way overpriced, but I suppose there are appropriate situations for such equipment.

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[Vlado]

It's not that rare in Europe at all.

In Slovenia local ISP, called T-2 is offering Gig FTTH for about two years now, if I'm not mistaken. It's a bit pricey (1000€ per month), but it's there.
Here's price list (in Slovenian, but I think you'll make sense of the prices and speeds).
http://www.t-2.net/?ctxID=000b68&funcID=1

Re:Just for completion...

[Cobron]

I'm running the WRT160N with dd-wrt for more than a year now and it works perfectly (since I put dd-wrt on it that is, the default firmware sucks). The shop where I got it from now only sells the WRT320N, it has gigabit ethernet and is also supported by dd-wrt. Since it's got the same price I guess that's the new successor....

Re:NO gig-e low # ports and pci bus for most of th

[bbn]

I got a gigabit connection at home. So do all my 1650 neighbors that live in this apartment complex.

Download test to a server local to the ISP (it is NOT on my home network):
baldur@pkunk:~$ wget -O /dev/null http://bolignet.farummidtpunkt.dk/1GB
2010-04-25 10:32:37 (111 MB/s) - `/dev/null' saved [1073741824/1073741824]

Download test to a server in a different country and a different ISP:
baldur@pkunk:~$ wget -O /dev/null http://speedtest.tele2.net/1GB.zip
2010-04-25 10:36:42 (13,8 MB/s) - `/dev/null' saved [1073741824/1073741824]

Download test to a server in same country but different ISP:
baldur@pkunk:~$ wget -O /dev/null http://speedtest.it-borger.dk/speedtest/random4000x4000.jpg
2010-04-25 10:38:33 (16,8 MB/s) - `/dev/null' saved [31625365/31625365]

My experience is that many gigabit routers can not actually deliver full line speed. The CPU is too weak to perform NAT at those speeds.

Before anyone asks for it, here is traceroute dumps to document the ISP locations:

baldur@pkunk:~$ traceroute bolignet.farummidtpunkt.dk
traceroute to bolignet.farummidtpunkt.dk (79.98.195.61), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
  1 79.98.193.129.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.193.129) 4.188 ms 4.148 ms 4.138 ms
  2 79.98.195.61.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.195.61) 0.181 ms 0.171 ms 0.160 ms

baldur@pkunk:~$ traceroute speedtest.tele2.net
traceroute to speedtest.tele2.net (90.130.66.198), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
  1 79.98.193.129.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.193.129) 4.555 ms 4.517 ms 4.508 ms
  2 79.98.199.153.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.199.153) 0.744 ms 0.714 ms 0.733 ms
  3 79.98.199.149.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.199.149) 5.577 ms 5.623 ms 5.595 ms
  4 ge-2-3.bgp1.ip.telelet.net (77.75.166.237) 2.259 ms 2.230 ms 2.201 ms
  5 gi9-8.ccr01.cph01.atlas.cogentco.com (149.6.136.57) 2.172 ms 2.176 ms 2.234 ms
  6 te1-1.ccr01.mmx01.atlas.cogentco.com (130.117.0.50) 3.761 ms 3.294 ms 3.261 ms
  7 te1-1.ccr01.sto01.atlas.cogentco.com (130.117.3.10) 11.951 ms 12.268 ms 12.235 ms
  8 avk-core-2.gigabiteth3-18.swip.net (130.244.200.165) 12.430 ms 12.533 ms 12.587 ms
  9 kst-core-1.tengigabiteth5-0-0.swip.net (130.244.39.9) 12.266 ms 12.219 ms 12.189 ms
10 kst-ncore-1.tengigabiteth2-1.swip.net (130.244.52.106) 12.803 ms 12.565 ms 12.373 ms
11 kst-ncore-2.tengigabiteth2-2.swip.net (130.244.52.110) 12.254 ms 12.452 ms 12.427 ms
12 kst-spe-2.tengigabiteth3-4.swip.net (130.244.206.134) 12.964 ms 12.935 ms 12.907 ms
13 warp9.tele2.net (90.130.66.198) 12.856 ms 12.828 ms 12.803 ms

baldur@pkunk:~$ traceroute speedtest.it-borger.dk
traceroute to speedtest.it-borger.dk (130.226.157.50), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
  1 79.98.193.129.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.193.129) 4.334 ms 4.289 ms 4.281 ms
  2 79.98.199.153.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.199.153) 0.974 ms 0.956 ms 0.928 ms
  3 79.98.199.149.customers.telelet.dk (79.98.199.149) 5.765 ms 5.764 ms 5.749 ms
  4 ge-2-3.bgp1.ip.telelet.net (77.75.166.237) 1.759 ms 1.798 ms 2.026 ms
  5 194.19.218.157 (194.19.218.157) 10.441 ms 10.541 ms 12.759 ms
  6 194.255.42.249 (194.255.42.249) 3.467 ms 2.976 ms 3.117 ms
  7 194.255.186.126 (194.255.186.126) 2.870 ms 2.957 ms 2.891 ms
  8 130.226.157.50 (130.226.157.50) 2.718 ms 2.838 ms 2.726 ms

Try Billion Routers

[itr2401]

Have a look at Billion http://www.billion.com/ They may not be Open Source like DD-WRT etc, however for around the same cost as your Belkin, Netgear, Buffalo etc - they totally kick ass, and generally give you a much more feature rich feature set. Some models are 802.11n + gigabit ports + DSL or FTTH + USB for 3G backup path if DSL or FTTH goes down. They have voice integrated models too for VoIP + VPN as well so they are certainly worth looking at.

Re:RouterStation Pro

[Enry]

I got a kit from Netgate that has the board, case, and choice of wireless card for about $300. It's expensive, but so far it's worth it.