I have the Netgear Nighthawk AC1900 (with the CM500 modem) - it gets good coverage throughout the house, speed is good. I'm happy with it. Beats the crap out of the combo unit they original gave me.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Based upon the recommendation of my personal shopper, Aeteocles, I purchased an Asus RT-AC68U

I'll second Para's thought. He posted a question a few months back and came back with the Asus. A short time after, my router crapped out and I bought the same one. It's been flawless since then. Good coverage throughout our house and plenty fast.

quote:

Originally posted by frayedends:

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:
Why not get another Airport??? Refurbished are plenty cheap.
I am still rocking an Extreme I bought refurbished going on almost 10 years now. I can count on 1 hand how many times it has had to be reset where I did not start a new configuration.
When we got a bigger house and I needed some better coverage in the basement I added an refurbed Express and use it as a bridge and it works great.

They are simple to setup very powerful and just flat work.

But since Apple is no longer making them or supporting them I'd rather something that is supported.

Where did you hear that??
Still alive and well on their site and in the stores.
https://www.apple.com/airport-extreme/

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:

quote:

Originally posted by frayedends:

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:
Why not get another Airport??? Refurbished are plenty cheap.
I am still rocking an Extreme I bought refurbished going on almost 10 years now. I can count on 1 hand how many times it has had to be reset where I did not start a new configuration.
When we got a bigger house and I needed some better coverage in the basement I added an refurbed Express and use it as a bridge and it works great.

They are simple to setup very powerful and just flat work.

But since Apple is no longer making them or supporting them I'd rather something that is supported.

Where did you hear that??
Still alive and well on their site and in the stores.
https://www.apple.com/airport-extreme/

Mac Rumors has that rumor in yellow highlight in this article (Nov 21, 2016, engineer reassigned). I'm a big fan of Mac Rumors' buy / wait recommendations.

Asus rocks too - I still have an Asus RT-N66R works great

quote:

Originally posted by bigdeal:
Didn't know you were in an apartment, or I'd have never recommended the WAP I did. Given your configuration, buy and install one of these in the kids bedroom and call it a day. Netgear Nighthawk AC1750. It should cover your entire apartment in fast WiFi (assuming there is no issue with the signal you're feeding it).

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Based upon the recommendation of my personal shopper, Aeteocles, I purchased an Asus RT-AC68U

Just on the off chance you have your cellular service through T-Mobile, they have a program where you can get one of these Asus routers for 'free'.

I just picked up one of the refurb T-mobile versions for $60 from Amazon. It doubled my signal strength on the far side of my house and is literally 10 times faster than my isp router. The firmware is dumbed down, but you can reflash them to the standard asus firmware if you are tech savy and need the extra functions.

If you like simple, I would go with a refurbed airport extreme or if you don't need anything fancy even a refurbed airport express. I'm not even an apple guy, but damn their routers are easy to set up and just seem to work.

I also wouldn't get too caught up in all the speeds as most of your stuff probably won't be able to utilize it anyway.

quote:

Originally posted by onegeek:

ETA: so do you have a WiFi router in the bedroom and a Airport Express in the living room acting as an unwired access point? That could slow your WiFi down even as it increases coverage.

I'll reiterate this question since the description of this problem makes it seems more likely to be an overloaded extended network rather than a flaky WiFi router.

Also and anyway, if the OP's intention is to create an extended network using an Apple WiFI router with any other brand of router, I've never gotten that to work. That's just been my experience, but Apple WiFi routers do not play well with other WiFi routers.

There is also the question of do you really need an extended network in your apartment? If you can use 802.11ac on some or most of your devices, an Airport Extreme should be quite sufficient.

My Netgreat AC1900 has been trouble-free since I bought it probably two years ago (that's just a guess though). It is the ONLY router to have done that, and I've had many (from NetGear, Linksys, ASUS, and TP-Link).

I put in a TP-Link Archer C7 AC1750 to augment the crappy router Uverse supplies. I get good coverage and speed throughout my single story 2700 sq ft house.

If you were in a large multi level home, I would suggest one of the newfangled Mesh routers like the Eero, Plume or Netgear Orbi. A little pricey (A little over $300 for three units) but they are said to be very stable and provide excellent coverage.

I am currently using the newest AirPort Extreme AC. The range on this thing is terrible and don't recommend it. I do have an older house with lots of walls, but my previous Lynksys Wireless G router covered my entire house easily. I had to get an extender for upstairs as well as my office which is just 30 ft away.

This is actually my third one. It was so bad at first I couldn't believe it, thought I had a lemon. Same problems persists with all of them.

From J.D. Power 2016

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Based upon the recommendation of my personal shopper, Aeteocles, I purchased an Asus RT-AC68U

I wish I could afford a personal shopper. I could barely afford a router.

Anyway mine is Linksys WRT1900AC. You can flash OpenWRT and other open firmware on it, however, if you have real high speed internet connection, you might have to keep stock firmware since it has hardware hooks to fully take advantage. My internet is AT&T Fiber, 1000 Mbps symmetric and only stock firmware gives me around 920 Mbps up and down.

Thanks for all the tips. The story about my current setup is this. When I first got divorced and an apartment I used an airport express that I already had. A friend gave me the old Edtreme that I have now. When I moved the extreme alone didn’t do so well when my kids were here so I moved it to their bedroom. But that caused my tv streaming issues as it was apparently too far from my tv. I added the express as an extender. Apple sites said this wouldn’t slow it down since they could be setup to do this. Speed test showed it was working fine this way. No problems for 1.5 years. Now things are getting glitchy. My streaming is cutting out a lot. Thought it could be my Roku but 2 different Rokus are doing it.

Anyhow when I moved originally I planned to buy a new extreme and amazon no longer had them. That’s when I read that Apple was discontinuing. I couldn’t find them anywhere. I’m surprised they are available now.

ETA: I'm a bit confused now. I see the Airport Extreme on the Apple site. It is also on the Amazon site but the last reviews are from 2015. I wonder if the Amazon issue goes back to their problems with Apple TV and they just stopped selling Apple stuff. Really no idea what's up with that. I may stay away from them just in case.

I have an AirPort Extreme circa 2013, when they went to the tall square foot print from the short square footprint. No problems at all, have it in the upstairs master bedroom closet, about center of the 2100 sq ft two-story house.

Connect Apple TV in the downstairs at one extreme end, iPads, iPhoenes, and MacBook Pro all wireless with no issues at all. Even connect to it when I am over at the neighbors about 120’ away, but signal does drop a bit when I am in their house.

quote:

Originally posted by 911Boss:
I have an AirPort Extreme circa 2013, when they went to the tall square foot print from the short square footprint. No problems at all, have it in the upstairs master bedroom closet, about center of the 2100 sq ft two-story house.

Connect Apple TV in the downstairs at one extreme end, iPads, iPhoenes, and MacBook Pro all wireless with no issues at all. Even connect to it when I am over at the neighbors about 120’ away, but signal does drop a bit when I am in their house.

Yeah, that's the version that is at my ex-wife's house. It's 3600 square feet and they have gaming, MacBooks, streaming, etc all the time and no issues. I'd have no problem getting one but I do hesitate if they are not supported anymore. On the Apple site you can find them but you have to search for it. No menu tab like they have for their other products.

“Apple.com”

Click on “Mac”

Click on “Accessories”

Click on “Networking”

Or... https://www.apple.com/shop/pro...ort-extreme?fnode=58


Granted I don’t keep up on the “rumors” but it is a long standing Apple staple. Don’t see them stopping it anytime soon.


Or if you wanna go on the cheap, I have my old flat square AirPort Extreme that still works I can put in a box and send you for $75 American dollars...

It is just sitting in the closet...

Have you ever read ANYTHING from Apple about them dropping support or sales of the Airport?
They are still widely available online, on the Apple Store, and IN the physical Apple stores. And as far I can remember the Airport has never had it's own tab on the website and was always hurried in the accessories tab under networking.

I've got a six year old Lynksys I bought re-furbished off Amazon for under a hundred bucks. That has worked flawlessly and I can get good coverage sitting out on my patio. That would be around 100 feet going through three walls.

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:
Have you ever read ANYTHING from Apple about them dropping support or sales of the Airport?
They are still widely available online, on the Apple Store, and IN the physical Apple stores. And as far I can remember the Airport has never had it's own tab on the website and was always hurried in the accessories tab under networking.

I guess not. But there are tons of articles stating they dropped development. For a while I couldn’t find them available.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
Based upon the recommendation of my personal shopper, Aeteocles, I purchased an Asus RT-AC68U

We have come to the same conclusion from differing paths. Great router and not too expensive.