I read the FAQ and some similar forum posts, but I'm a total newbie about routers and networking, and I want to buy a router that perfectly suits me.
My ISP provides me with a 6 mbps connection. It's a bit shitty but it's for the most part stable, so I'm not complaining. Plus, other ISP provide almost same result where I live.
It's stable but I have some issues with some games. In particular Path of Exile. I have 30ms most of the time, but I have to make sure I'm the only one using internet in the house. Even more I have to make sure POE is the only thing using internet on my computer. Which is not great since I love playing this game listening to music or a streamer.
I'm fully aware that 6mbps isn't enought to download and watch a stream and listen to music and play a video game. That's why when I do it I lower the quality to the minimum. And I have great result, only the start of the music provokes lags.
I have to add that I already ask the support of POE for help about this, they made me do a WinMTR but they couldn't help me further than tell me to power cycle my modem. I don't blame them. But having horrible lags when my room mate check his mailbox is a bit frustrating !
So 2 years ago I bought an Asus RT-AC 1200g+ to have access to QoS and may be limit this initial lag at the start of every music. I had some good results, I have to say. But it wasnt near perfect and the QoS seemed a bit poor on that device. And since I can't find any custom firware for this one, I wanted your help to buy one that works well with OpenWrt and most of all that suits my purpose.
I don't care about a powerful Wifi and I need 3 to 4 Gigabit Ethernet. Most of the time there will be only me on the connection but it can raise to 4 or 5 devices at the same time. I'm not sure I need other services like VPN. And finally I have no budget, I willing to pay 400 euros if that provides me with a good router, with good QoS and again suits my case.
I hope that I provided you with all the informations you need. If not I'll gladly answer them.
If there is no limitation with your budget, consider a router from the top shelf and install SQM to make the most of your connection with fair sharing of the limited bandwidth. https://openwrt.org/faq/which_router_should_i_buy
For 6 MBit/s (and assuming no hope for that improving anytime soon) and SQM, any of the semi-recent supported ath79 (up to 750 MHz single core mips) or mt7621 (2*880 MHz mips) devices should do easily; WLAN is better on the ath79 side, performance in the mt7621 camp.
Yes, but considering your actual needs (6 MBit/s WAN throughput with an expectation of running SQM), it's just way over-priced. It doesn't make sense to buy a 300+ EUR device for these tasks, if a 20-50 EUR device would do. Given that price delta, you can still buy a highend router when/ if a faster internet connection actually materializes.
If you do want to aim a little higher, ipq40xx (4*716 MHz ARMv7/ cortex a7, good wifi) starting around 80 EUR might be a decent middle ground - but even that is more than you'd need for your stated requirements (well, multi-core is never a bad idea for latency). Also check the used market, with a little patience you might score a bargain.
You can configure up your existing router (with stock firmware) to serve as a wifi AP. It wouldn't route or anything, just convert wired to wireless. Also you can use it as a 4 port gigabit switch (uplink and 3 wired users-- the WAN port won't be usable since it always routes.) Then set up a wired router. In this situation definitely MT7621 (unless you want to spring for an X86, which would be way way overkill and likely more energy consumption.) The RB750Gr3 and Edgerouter-X at about $50 are typical examples.
Hi, saw Your topic and decided to wait for more replays, Your connection is nothing for nowdays routers. You can buy cheapest device with openwrt/tomato/dd-wrt or even cheapest thin client pc and this will do the work. personaly i wuold choose a x86 thin client becauce they are dirt cheap and have plenty of packet processing power . my home network run fine on igel h820c ( ud5) with pfsense and some ip filtering plus suricata ids , 500/20 megs pppoe . for wifi few ap's ac. bought this tc for like 20$ with intel i340-t2 quad gigabit nic best price/performance deal for me
But tbh I don't understand all the terms you are using so I was wondering is there good SQM/QOS routers for newbies, I mean with a decent firmware already installed which gives good resul ?
It's sweet of you trying to save me money but I'd rather take something more expensive which allows an 'extra easy setup'.
I'm really trying to understand but with no knowledge at all I'm afraid I won't be doing the right things
So I went to the installation guide on OpenWrt and I looked at 'easy to install' devices. I found the Linksys WRT 1600ACS. Is that a good one ? again really look easy to install OpenWrt on this one, but maybe I should be more worried about the setup after the installation.
The Linksys WRT 1600ACS-EU is at a bit less than 200euros, its probably overkill like you said but if it's easy to install at least I will be using it. Do you know what the '-EU' means ? I search already but couldn't find anything, I'm wondering if OpenWrt supports the '-EU' cause I can't find it on the list of supported devices.
WRT1900ACS I think you mean. This is a popular model. The main issue is that the wifi chips aren't well supported-- yes wifi works but if you need high performance or mesh operation it isn't good. For you since the gaming machines are wired, this would not be an issue. Most compatible models have a page in the OpenWrt wiki such as this one: https://openwrt.org/toh/linksys/linksys_wrt1900acs
-EU means that it was intended for sale in the European Union because the stock firmware meets the wifi regulations there. There is also -US. Either one works with OpenWrt and with OpenWrt you can configure for any country regardless of the original setting.
As for what stock firmware has better SQM that is not for this forum.
OpenWrt SQM has the same features on any hardware. It is just a matter of needing more CPU performance for high ISP speeds. I would not buy new low-end hardware that is not gigabit Ethernet and dual band wifi though, those features are rapidly becoming essential for the future.
Ok that's what I thought at first glance, -EU means europe, I saw a -EJ version so I got a little bit confused. About the Wifi tbh I couldn't care less, I just use it on my phone to check the weather x)
Thanks again for your time, I think i'll buy this one and maybe come back to this forum if I need help installing OpenWrt.
Just wanted to give you a quick update ! So I bought the WRT 1600ACS like I said earlier. I received it already. I tried the default firmware and the default QoS. But I knew there were a chance it suck. And oh boy it's terrible. At least the QoS. Really basic.
But then I sucessfully installed OpenWrt. With one or two tutorial videos I did something pretty good. But the bandwith was halved. The lag was gone though. So I checked, double checked and then I learned how to use a converter properly (mbps to kbps). x)
Now everything works perfectly, its a breeze. If I wanted I could watch a video in max quality and I would still experience no lag in game. To me at this point it's basically Magic, and I wanted to thank each one of you for helping me with my issue !
After years of lag finally ended, and from the bottom of my heart thank you guys ! <3
best price/performance deal for me 
