Linksys wrt3200acm vs netgear R7800

Hi,

I need new router/, I had the linksys wrt1900acs and now I want a new one, a bit faster maybe and stable. So I hesitate between Netgear Nighthawk R7800 X4S AC2600 vs linksys wrt3200acm. What is your advice?
Thanks

It depends on your needs, environment (WAN speed) and why you think to need another router.

In terms of routing performance, mvebu is unbeaten (aside from x86_64).
In terms of WLAN reliability and interoperability, ipq806x is a clear winner[0], but I wouldn't recommend it beyond 350-400 MBit/s WAN speed.
In terms of pure CPU speed (and encryption performance), both mvebu (at least in form of the wrt3200acm) and ipq8065 should be relatively similar, with ipq8065 only being slightly faster.

In terms of performance, I wouldn't expect a significant difference between the wrt1900ac (v2 at least) and the wrt3200acm.

  • yes, there is a 28% clockspeed increase
  • yes, you're going from AC1300 (3*433) to AC2600 (3*867)

But neither really are large enough to justify the expense of buying a new router, unless you have a very specific reason to upgrade; both should cope with routing at 1 GBit/s linespeed. Obviously the price delta is small enough to disregard the WRT1900AC to buy now/ new, but that doesn't really apply to replacing an existing/ functional router.

The r7800 is a very solid router, which can be highly recommended - as long as you don't expect it to route at 1 GBit/s linespeeds (again, while it might be a bit faster than 350-400 MBit/s, I really wouldn't recommend it beyond that WAN speed).

--
[0] especially now with Marvell having ceased mwlwifi development, despite there still being a number of quite serious interoperability issues with common IoT chipsets like esp8266

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Thanks.
I want to change cause I would give my 1900acs to my father and I would buy one from flashrouters, so both I mentioned are at the same price , so dd wrt + vpn.

I would never choose any WRT-device in future, because there is no further development of the marvel wifi driver. i love my wrt1900acs, but if i had to choose a new router, i would prefer the Netgear R7800 or the Zyxel NBG6817.

Uhh, i love the dualboot feature of my wrt1900acs ... and the Zyxel has this too.

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Flashrouters charges an awful lot of coin for a flash. Amazon and ebay are your friends. Pick up a CP2102 USB to TTL serial converter with patch wires for ~$7 on amazon (not even needed to flash many routers, but good to have), pick up a used router supported by OpenWrt on ebay...and flash away. You might regret it half way in the first time :wink: , but you'll be glad when you're done. You get to keep what you learn, and will be rewarded with a lifetime of bargain high performance routers for you and yours!

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I've been looking at both the WRT3200ACM and the R7800 and sharing my results.

I initially decided to go with the R7800 based on the feedback I've read in the forums. I started with switching from R7000 DD-WRT over to R7800 19.07 stable. My 5GHz wireless results via iperf3 between my laptop and Router or NAS (tested both multiple times) improved from ~50MB/s on R7000 to 60MB/s on R7800 but testing a 2.69GB file transfer from my NAS (plugged directly into the router) which was taking 50-55 seconds on the R7000 DD-WRT went up to 60-75 seconds on the R7800 OpenWRT (it starts faster and slows down as it progresses). I've tried the file transfer dozens of times and ensured no one else was home to impact the tests. On the R7800, I've been using the same Wireless channels as the R7000 DD-WRT and other channels (Channels 36, 40, 100, 149, 153, 161 and few others). I only have 2 weak 5GHz signals around me. I also tried Kongs and hnyman builds with similar results.
After trying many tweaks based on what I've read in the forums, I decided to give the WRT3200ACM a try and WOW. On the WRT3200ACM, iperf3 5GHz wireless tests went from ~60MB/s on R7800 to ~100MB/s on WRT3200ACM and my 2.69GB file transfer from my NAS to my laptop went from 60-75 seconds to 30-35 seconds. I've tried several channels with similar results.
So for my environment the WRT3200ACM is by far the better choice.

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no doubt,perhaps the other slightly better for coverage

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I believe that as an all-in-one wireless device the WRT3200ACM is still unbeaten.

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Nice to read.. but some seem to think that the wrt3200acm is really to use with ethernet connection and not too much wireless vs others

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Yes, there was a lot of people that criticised this device because it did not support MU-MIMO, when no other device supported it using under OpenWrt...

There are some things that do not work in this device, and will probably never ever work, this is a known fact. Perhaps you need those features, perhaps you don't.

i have more problems with my devices ath10k than mwlwifi.

Ive read that mu-mimo anyway is not really supported by the other devices. And on dd wrt they advise to disable the mu mimo option ( beamforming )