Router Recommendations

[captainpud]

I currently have a Voyager 2110 which has been very stable and reliable in holding my connection, syncing at 8096 and 832. It goes months and months without dropping. I am having a few problems with my download speeds at the moment, down to 2 or 3MB from a constant 6MB and support have stated there is no problem at BT's end. I have swapped everything but my router and I am being told by support that swapping my modem/router is all I can do now.

So I need suggestions for a fast stable modem/router with wireless. I have been reading about a few, netgear etc but they all seem to have one problem or another. Help please

[DorsetBoy]

DrayTek are excellent, otherwise a Speedtouch 585 would do the job very well.

[Ray]

Having just changed to a Draytek, I would agree with Dorset.

[Steve]

Are we talking 2710 or something more business like?

[Ray]

2710n in my case, Steve.

[esh]

I recommend.... *not* Netgear 

[captainpud]

So are you all finding the Draytek very stable? are they reasonably easy to set up? Do they have a DMZ feature for my Xbox Live gaming?

I had already worked out how rubbish the new Netgear stuff is 

Thank you for all the replies

[DorsetBoy]

Draytek are fully configurable and mine ( Vigor 2820 ) has been consistently stable ,   http://www.draytek.co.uk/   is the UK site and  http://www.forum.draytek.co.uk/ is the UK support forum.

[Lona]

I recommend.... *not* Netgear 

I love Netgear.

[pctech]

The DG834G v4 (which uses the Broadcom chip and I have) has always received excellent reviews but sadly they are no longer produced and the v5 is not supposed to be as good though cant comment as never used one.

Speedtouch are used by a lot of ISPs but not used one of the routers but used to have the USB modem which seemed to do the job ok.

Steer clear of Zyxel as have had one of their one port routers and it ran so hot you could fry an egg on it and it was very unstable, probably because it was cooking its insides.

[Tacitus]

Steer clear of Zyxel as have had one of their one port routers and it ran so hot you could fry an egg on it and it was very unstable, probably because it was cooking its insides.

FWIW I've had several Zyxel routers pass through my hands both for myself and others.  I've not had a problem with any of them, ranging from a couple of single port 660s, via the 661H/662H range.  Most use the AR7 and tend to sync a little lower than others, but all have been very stable.

[klipp]

I just ordered a DrayTek Vigor 2710n which has PC Advisor Gold Award.  It should be arriving in the post tomorrow or the day after.

Info here: http://www.draytek.com/user/PdInfoDetail.php?Id=82

It is kinda pricey though, but hopefully worth it.  I'll post a review here if you want in a week or so.

Now, the easy part.  What I DON'T recommend.  Keep clear of anything that has the Belkin logo on it!!!  Also after recent experiences I am reluctant to recommend netgear.

[Rik]

I agree with you on Belkin, we've seen a lot of failures from them.

[klipp]

The DG834G v4 (which uses the Broadcom chip and I have) has always received excellent reviews but sadly they are no longer produced and the v5 is not supposed to be as good though cant comment as never used one.

My experience with v5 was disasterous.  Actually to be precise, my experience with v5 is currently sat in my green wheelie bin awaiting collection next monday morning.

Previously I'd had a v4 which served me faithfully for 2 years before it finally gave up the will to live.

On the assumption that v4's cannot be bought anymore, I would struggle to recommend netgear now.  Shame really...

[pctech]

FWIW I've had several Zyxel routers pass through my hands both for myself and others.  I've not had a problem with any of them, ranging from a couple of single port 660s, via the 661H/662H range.  Most use the AR7 and tend to sync a little lower than others, but all have been very stable.

The one I had could have been faulty I suppose but the design of it did concern me a little.

I also had a netgear DG834N v1 for a while which I believe was based on the AR7 too and found it a bit unstable and so someone recommended the 834G because it had DMT which did seem to stabilise it a bit.

[Steve]

The DG834Nv1 was a broadcom chipset and DMT compatible the later firmwares were pretty good for me apart from wireless connection problems on auto.

[pctech]

Ah I stand corrected but it lost sync quite a bit which is why I replaced it.

[Steve]

It was a faster version of the chipset used in the dg834g series can't recall the speed difference,I think by the time they stopped selling it they had finally managed to get some decent firmware and indeed DMT lead the way for the earlier versions. It worked well on my short line and didn't have any issues heat related or otherwise. 

[pctech]

I have a very long line and would lose sync often which was a right pain.

[Rik]

Which is why I like my 2700.

[Ray]

I just ordered a DrayTek Vigor 2710n which has PC Advisor Gold Award.  It should be arriving in the post tomorrow or the day after.

Info here: http://www.draytek.com/user/PdInfoDetail.php?Id=82

It is kinda pricey though, but hopefully worth it.  I'll post a review here if you want in a week or so.

Now, the easy part.  What I DON'T recommend.  Keep clear of anything that has the Belkin logo on it!!!  Also after recent experiences I am reluctant to recommend netgear.

Good luck with the Draytek, I've been using my 7210n for nearly 3 days, so far it is looking good with no problems at all, seems to be a good well designed router and it certainly runs very cool compared to Netgear and Speedtouch models I've used previously.

[klipp]

Thanks Ray.  Do you have a long line?  My typical Line Attenuation is 53db, and I know through experience that certain routers do not like the longer lines.

[Ray]

My line would appear to be fairly short, my loop attenuation is showing as 28db.

[esh]

I love Netgear.

I'm just bitter, don't mind me. I bought a £120 high end Netgear ADSL VPN router and had nightmares with it. Support then told me it wasn't compatible with BT lines. For the record it still doesn't work properly a year after and 6 support cases later.

[Lona]

I have a Netgear 834PN and it has never let me down.  Had it a few years now.