Lantiq/ FritzBox recommendations

Hardware Questions and Recommendations
1

Hi all,

ATM I’m using an o2 Box 6431 in 21.02-rc2. With each iteration of OpenWrt it got better and better, many thanks towards the devs for their relentless work.

On thing that still bothers me is the WiFi performance, and I’m pretty sure not much can be done since it seems to be the Ralink WiFi chip/driver combo that’s the culprit.

So I was looking into alternatives and looking for some advice.

My requirements are quite humble:

  1. DSL-Modem (currently I have a 100/40 line)
  2. WiFi 2.4 (5 is nice to have but not a must)
  3. 4 Ethernet ports (100 is sufficient 1G would be nice but not necessary)
  4. The ports should be accessible from the side when wall mounted, which rules out the HomeHub 5

A brief look at the Hardware-table only gave me some FritzBoxes as an option. Which is fine to me since I already use as 4020 as Access Point.

Before I start buying another router I’d like to hear what your experience with the FritzBoxes are, especially the WiFi throughput.

Thanks allot.

2

I enjoy 25/10 DSL service with BT Home Hub 5A. Wifi is fine for both bands. Shipping costs more than the router. LEDE 17 came preinstalled from the vendor.

3

Why not keep the o2 for the DSL part, then get something else for the Wifi ?

It'd open a lot more possibilities for you, you could use pretty much any router or AP
available out there.

4

I already did this but, since I need to buy a new DSL device anyway, I want an all-in-one solution for this very use case.

5

The wish for an all-in-one device is understandable. Realistically though, the Lantiq XRX200 chipset is getting really long in the tooth now. From own experience, with plain-jane routing and software flow offload it is really just baaaaaarely scraping to manage the 100 mbit downstream, huffing and puffing at the top of its CPU capabilities. Putting Wifi on top is not helping matters, and I'm sure you're already noticing that with your 6431 right now. Switching from one Lantiq to another really will improve hardly anything.

I would very much like to recommend to drop the all-in-one plan, instead use a cheap and reliable bridge modem, and go for at least a tier above the Lantiq chipset for the main router.

And here's the fun part: You already have both of these things. You could demote your 6431 to a bridge modem and promote your 4020 to main router/wifi access point ... and you would immediately have a ~50% performance increase.

Or, with the main router, go for something that really makes a difference. MT7621 and IPQ4019 devices are getting really cheap second hand and come with gigabit ethernet and 5G AC wifi. The difference to a Lantiq really is immediately noticeable.

3 Likes
6

The DSA driver currently in development plus patches apparently offers some improvement.

* 8W burst length also works and with it I can achieve 530 Mb/s[2,3].

However, I read flow offloading is currently broken in the snapshot.

1 Like
7

That sounds pretty great, but since the 21.02 train has already left the station that also means we will be seeing it in a stable OpenWrt release in, hmm, 2023?

Can't wait to see what DSA does for the MT7621 target though.