How Old Is Your Main Router?

[QuarterSwede]

4 year old eero 6 Pro (as the gateway) and 2 eero Pros for 2 different floors. 1 less than year old eero 6 refurb to extend into a room that didn’t have great coverage. Main computer (Mac mini M4) and server (hp elitedesk 800 g2) are plugged into ethernet. I don’t care about lot about wifi speeds on mobile devices and I don’t need WiFi 7 for game streaming.

If I were to update now I’d go with unifi’s gear. It just wasn’t as good as it is now nor nearly as cost effective 4 years ago. It’s great stuff these days and affordable.

 

[Loyalizer]

In the recent thread US bans foreign routers - reason enough for a new Airport? we've been discussing various aspects of router security, and that discussion turned up some interesting tangents - things like how long (and if) a given brand commits to offer firmware updates after a given model goes off sale, and a PC Magazine article today reported on Spectrum e-mailing users of 23 older TP-Link routers deemed vulnerable to exploitation by Russian hackers (all end-of-service models), with the recommendation that if your router is over 5 years old (I'm guessing they're just referring to those 23? Not sure), 'consider replacing it.'

I'm not suggesting that should generalize to all routers. And there are other factors to consider; does the more recent router get automatic firmware updates, if you model still sold, when does it reach End-Of-Service, does the maker commit to support it how many years afterward, etc.

But it might be interesting to get some idea what range of router pages MacRumors members willing to participate in those poll use. For now I'll skip the issue of brand or EOS status, year released, which version of WiFi, etc., and just ask roughly how old your main home router is. If enough people find this interesting, maybe a poll about another factor can be done. I'll set the poll to run 8 weeks.

I bought my TP-Link AXE75 in July, 2023, so I'm 3.).

This might interest you;

We still use the last version of the Time Capsule (2TB) Tower and the corresponding AirPort Extreme Base Station, which would place us beyond the EIGHT year mark…

At an elderly relatives home, their internet is running off the prior version of the Time Capsule (2TB) Flat version. All of them seem to be able to stream 4K TV, NetFlix, Disney+, etc. without any hiccups…

There are at least THREE televisions, TWO of which typically run simultaneously at some point, plus a Macbook Air, Pro, TWO iPad Pros, and occasionally a Vision Pro, and at least one or two iPhones at any given time…

Since all are running flawlessly, we wont consider changing anytime soon. However, will, if APPLE ever decides to produce newer versions of the Time Capsule and Airport Stations…

Also, forgot we recently acquired a Sony PlayStation 5 too…

🙂

 

[jetsam]

I'm interested in this configuration....what kind of slowdown are you seeing? In other words, what are you getting as far as wired speed on the UDR7 versus wifi speed on the UX7 mesh?

Officially my wired speed from Comcast is 1 Gbps/35 Mbps, measured as 1.18 and 42 (since Comcast over-provisions by 20%). I do see that on my wired devices connected to the UDR7.

My UDR7 is in a corner room on the second floor of my house (since that's where my cable modem is). The UX7 is on the first floor, and about 40 feet laterally. At the UX7, I'm seeing about 350 Mbps on a laptop four feet away.

 

[VineRider]

Officially my wired speed from Comcast is 1 Gbps/35 Mbps, measured as 1.18 and 42 (since Comcast over-provisions by 20%). I do see that on my wired devices connected to the UDR7.

My UDR7 is in a corner room on the second floor of my house (since that's where my cable modem is). The UX7 is on the first floor, and about 40 feet laterally. At the UX7, I'm seeing about 350 Mbps on a laptop four feet away.

Thanks! I have 500/500 fiber so if I could get similar it might be workable. Thanks for the info!

 

[wanha]

We have an eero mesh at the house, and it's been easy and reliable. It updates itself periodically in the middle of the night, which is about all I can hope for on the security front.

perhaps you already know this, but Eero is owned by Amazon and the Eero routers are a privacy nightmare. From Eero's privacy policy:

"The Personal Information that we collect includes: network and device information (such as hardware model and serial number of every eero device and other devices connected to the eero WiFi System, eero and connected device settings and usage information, domain name and Internet service provider ("ISP") details, network speed, bandwidth use and other network activity details, and approximate location of every eero device and other devices connected to the eero WiFi System based on the device‘s signal strength)…"

In other words, eero is able to monitor nearly all the activity that occurs on your home network. This includes not just general information about connected devices, but granular details about your online behavior. You also cannot fully opt out of the data collection on Eero, which means that as an Eero user, you're essentially a personal data provider for Amazon to train its machines and algorithms and to help it make more targeted advertising.

Not a judgement, more a heads up in case this stuff matters to you. It might not, and that's cool too.

 

[chadamorrill]

I just upgraded to Ubiquiti (Cloud Gateway Ultra) late last year after several years running Gryphon routers for the kiddos in the house. They're (the kids) older now, so the Gryphons weren't truly necessary AND I was able to pretty much replicate what we had in the UniFi OS. Definitely took some time to get right and some networking knowledge is definitely necessary, but it's been rock solid now for a good bit.

 

[ronincse]

I work in IT (IT Manager now, previously a senior sys admin) but I generally want my actual home network as simple as possible, so I don't need to do IT work at home, while still having enough switches to tinker with.

With that in mind I recently upgraded to a Ubiquiti Dream Router 7 and so far, I'm really liking it. Rock solid so far and has all the network settings you could want but also allows you to just auto set everything. Recently expanded that with a few basic Ubiquiti switches and again that was an easy process.

 

[4sallypat]

Ubiquiti Dream machine 3 years old and works fantastic.
Running the Ubiquiti Extender for upstairs works fine.

Love the interface, control, monitoring and WiFi adjustments I can make.

Looking at the new UDR 7 to replace but the cost is huge !

 

[danano]

Another vote for for the Ubiquiti Dream Router 7. I upgraded to the UDR7 and a few switches to manage an ethernet wired system in a house moved to a year ago. This was good when I got it a year ago. Constant frequent upgrades to all hardware and software components mean the system has progressed from very good to even better, and continues improving.

The Ubiquiti AmpliFi Alien , a less to tinker with home user system with amazing WiFi, is also very good.

 

[IvyKing]

perhaps you already know this, but Eero is owned by Amazon and the Eero routers are a privacy nightmare. From Eero's privacy policy:

"The Personal Information that we collect includes: network and device information (such as hardware model and serial number of every eero device and other devices connected to the eero WiFi System, eero and connected device settings and usage information, domain name and Internet service provider ("ISP") details, network speed, bandwidth use and other network activity details, and approximate location of every eero device and other devices connected to the eero WiFi System based on the device‘s signal strength)…"

In other words, eero is able to monitor nearly all the activity that occurs on your home network. This includes not just general information about connected devices, but granular details about your online behavior. You also cannot fully opt out of the data collection on Eero, which means that as an Eero user, you're essentially a personal data provider for Amazon to train its machines and algorithms and to help it make more targeted advertising.

That's why eero is on my Do Not Consider list.

 

[splifingate]

other factors to consider

It's been well over a decade since I used a Consumer router, and I must say: the blissful days of not having to regularly be-aware of Currency with modem/router updates is a forgotten memory.

I barely remember what it means to have just one device between my usage and the interwebs.

Ran-through the gamut, Saturday, updating my 'infrastructure':

I have two, independent PiHole instances: one on a dedicated rPi-5, and one in a VM on my baby Proxmox server. I had to a) remember how to SSH into the instances, b) update the base OS, then c) update the PiHole installations. I use a custom 4096bit EdDSA key for all my authentication.

Since I was in The Mode™, I decided to update everything I had in the house.

I'm not going to publicly state what version of EdgeOS (née 'Debian') I'm running; suffice it to say that this Edge is dull-enough that I never have to worry about ever bleeding 😉

All the Ubiquity stuff is on auto-update.

Since Proxmox is Debian-based (and Proxmox Peeps are really good about documentation), I was able to manually do an in-place update of Prox8 -> Prox9 . . . this was the most arduous of all the steps, and it took me about an hour to get everything updated (primarily because of how long the package scripts needed time to process).

Next-up: hack a GPON SFP+ to drop the AT and T-supplied ONT, and move to using OPN/pF-sense on dedicated hardware.

While I am very happy with my setup, once a person steps-foot off the Apporved Infrastructure Reservation (AIR)©, it's an all-bets-are-off situation.

I now understand why Cartographers wrote "HIC SVNT DRACONES"!

 

[josehill]

We still use the last version of the Time Capsule (2TB) Tower and the corresponding AirPort Extreme Base Station, which would place us beyond the EIGHT year mark…

At an elderly relatives home, their internet is running off the prior version of the Time Capsule (2TB) Flat version. All of them seem to be able to stream 4K TV, NetFlix, Disney+, etc. without any hiccups…

That's great, and I loved my Airport/Time Capsule equipment. I've had several Time Capsules and AirPorts Express and Extreme over the years. I think they were some of Apple's strongest products.

However, I highly recommend that you start planning how to replace them before it becomes an emergency.

The first matter is the age of the hardware. Apple has added them to their list of obsolete products, meaning that they provide no further hardware service or support for them. The power supply on my last Time Capsule died a couple of years ago.

The second matter is security. AirPorts and Time Capsules used BSD networking stacks, and those have not seen updates in years. While these devices no doubt are low priority targets for hackers, the cost of developing and executing attacks on older systems is rapidly decreasing, thanks in large part to A.I., so some caution using older, unsupported devices is merited.

I decided that AirPorts and Time Capsules no longer fit my personal risk profile, so I've moved on.

I'm not saying that you should switch immediately to something new that arguably is not as easy or elegant as the older Apple hardware, but you really should be considering your options for the future.

 

[Che Castro]

I have a Wyze pro WiFi 6 router from a few years ago but this router barely got one update in the last 2 years
But I’m tempted to go back to the last AirPort Extreme router , I have 2 of them
But using old obsolete tech specially networking scares me
I wish Apple made a newer one
Yes I know about unifi

 

[Subarctic5216]

I've been mulling over getting either Firewalla or Netgate to replace the Asus router/wireless access point. The Asus has been working fairly well, but the DNS response time seems to get slower with increasing time between restarts. My preference with with a router/firewall is that its only purpose is to act as a router/firewall and not have extra functions such as managing wireless access. The extra configurability of pfSense and Firewalla is also appealing, specifically being able to dedicate an Ethernet port for the guest/IoT network.

Having a web or ssh interface is a big plus, and prefer not to need to use an app on a phone to set up the router.

On a somewhat related topic, I'd like to know if any of the UPS manufacturers have a UPS designed to keep a router and modem/GPON running for a few hours? This would be helpful in keeping internet access up during a power outage.

I also considered Netgate and Ubiquiti. Went with Firewalla for the versatility in creating rules, groups and VLANs/VqLANs for segmentation of IoT stuff and guests. Replaced 3 eero 6e's with 2 Firewalla’s AP7's because of the mentioned Amazon-eero mess and seamless integration. Firewalla has very good ad blocking and a robust ingress firewall. I don't ssh into the Firewalla box but that is an option. DNS cashing is local on the Firewalla box and super fast. (NextDNS and Quad9 for DoH). I setup a Wireguard vpn profile to automatically 'surf' through the box when not at home. The Firewalla app works on any m-series mac. If the internet goes down the Firewalla switches WAN over to my phone as an hotspot. (The Firewalla WiFi SD)
Regarding a UPS backup I have an APC for NAS, Router, switch & Macmini/monitor but it's only good for about 1/2 hr. Something for a few hrs is likely a big UPS used in server settings. Good luck in your searching.

 

[IvyKing]

I also considered Netgate and Ubiquiti. Went with Firewalla for the versatility in creating rules, groups and VLANs/VqLANs for segmentation of IoT stuff and guests. Replaced 3 eero 6e's with 2 Firewalla’s AP7's because of the mentioned Amazon-eero mess and seamless integration. Firewalla has very good ad blocking and a robust ingress firewall. I don't ssh into the Firewalla box but that is an option. DNS cashing is local on the Firewalla box and super fast. (NextDNS and Quad9 for DoH). I setup a Wireguard vpn profile to automatically 'surf' through the box when not at home. The Firewalla app works on any m-series mac. If the internet goes down the Firewalla switches WAN over to my phone as an hotspot. (The Firewalla WiFi SD)
Regarding a UPS backup I have an APC for NAS, Router, switch & Macmini/monitor but it's only good for about 1/2 hr. Something for a few hrs is likely a big UPS used in server settings. Good luck in your searching.

The 3 to 6 hour desired hold-up time was for powering just the GPON and router, which would be on the order of 25 to 50 watts. 50 watts for 6 hours is 300 watt hours, which would be equivalent to 5 - 6 pounds of LFP batteries. There is a battery backup option for the Calix GPON, but I would still need power for the router and wireless access points.

OTOH, maybe the way to go is getting a solar installation with a hefty battery for load shifting which could act like a whole house UPS.

 

[josehill]

If the internet goes down the Firewalla switches WAN over to my phone as an hotspot.

That's a really solid idea, at least as long as you don't deplete your phone's hotspot bandwidth or otherwise don't run into unanticipated issues. I don't use one at the moment, but I did use a multi-WAN router that would failover from my cable connection to my old DSL connection when I worked from home more extensively.

 

[cubbie5150]

I bought my TP-Link AX6000 in late June 2023. I don't have the varied needs of so many others here; it's been a good device for me. I take pretty much no note of it, which for me, is a big time win. Just don't make me notice you!!! 😂

 

[lixuelai]

Have a RT-AC86U, not using it for WiFi anymore but just as a router it works great still. Haven't found any reason to upgrade (other than maybe time machine no longer working, but newer routers seem to have the same issue).

 

[Apathist]

I have the last of the flat, candy box-shaped AirPort Time Capsules (4th gen), a classic design that I've always found appealing.

I hadn't thought about it before, but I guess it's been running without interruption now for almost 15 years. I still use it daily for CCC backups, and if macOS 27 eliminates AFP entirely, and all access to the internal disk with it -- not simply access support for Time Machine purposes -- I'll obviously have to move on.

In the meantime, TC diehards might be interested in this hopeful development:

macOS 27 threatens to bury Time Capsule, FOSS brings a shovel

Apple's old backup boxes only speak AFP and SMB1, but NetBSD under the hood gives them one last shot

www.theregister.com

 

[xpxp2002]

I have the last of the flat, candy box-shaped AirPort Time Capsules (4th gen), a classic design that I've always found appealing.

I hadn't thought about it before, but I guess it's been running without interruption now for almost 15 years. I still use it daily for CCC backups, and if macOS 27 eliminates AFP entirely, and all access to the internal disk with it -- not simply access support for Time Machine purposes -- I'll obviously have to move on.

In the meantime, TC diehards might be interested in this hopeful development:

macOS 27 threatens to bury Time Capsule, FOSS brings a shovel

Apple's old backup boxes only speak AFP and SMB1, but NetBSD under the hood gives them one last shot

www.theregister.com

Interesting. I've been running Samba on a Linux VM for years in order to provide a network backup destination for the MacBooks in my household. It's not that difficult to set up and since it's running on my own hardware, I can throw as much storage at it as I need.

 

[sublunar]

I have the last of the flat, candy box-shaped AirPort Time Capsules (4th gen), a classic design that I've always found appealing.

I hadn't thought about it before, but I guess it's been running without interruption now for almost 15 years. I still use it daily for CCC backups, and if macOS 27 eliminates AFP entirely, and all access to the internal disk with it -- not simply access support for Time Machine purposes -- I'll obviously have to move on.

In the meantime, TC diehards might be interested in this hopeful development:

macOS 27 threatens to bury Time Capsule, FOSS brings a shovel

Apple's old backup boxes only speak AFP and SMB1, but NetBSD under the hood gives them one last shot

www.theregister.com

Wouldn’t it still work for out of date macs that can’t (or don’t) upgrade to macos27?

Either way I’ll be disappointed if Apple can’t see an opening in the market for a new router now that ADSL and VDSL is going by the wayside and more people are on Ethernet based full fibre setups but want something better than the basic routers that ISPs send out and balk at the prices of some of the ‘big name’ upgrades on the market. Some will still be using WiFi 6 at best or even older - hardly the best showcase for Apple devices which are now migrating to WiFi 7.

 

[Apathist]

Wouldn’t it still work for out of date macs that can’t (or don’t) upgrade to macos27?

Yes.

 

[josehill]

In the meantime, TC diehards might be interested in this hopeful development:

It's a very clever approach, and kudos to the originator, but unless I had no alternative, I'd be hesitant to trust backups to what is basically a hack of an old system. I'd much rather see a way to replace the original NetBSD installation with one that is fully up to date, but that may not be possible. It also demonstrates how easily Time Capsules and other AirPorts can be hacked with local access. Still, a very interesting development.

 

[ronincse]

Another vote for for the Ubiquiti Dream Router 7. I upgraded to the UDR7 and a few switches to manage an ethernet wired system in a house moved to a year ago. This was good when I got it a year ago. Constant frequent upgrades to all hardware and software components mean the system has progressed from very good to even better, and continues improving.

The Ubiquiti AmpliFi Alien , a less to tinker with home user system with amazing WiFi, is also very good.

Sorry for the week later response. Somehow I hadn't heard of their AmpliFi stuff before and it looks awesome, I might have even gone with this instead of the Dream Router.

 

[jetsam]

Sorry for the week later response. Somehow I hadn't heard of their AmpliFi stuff before and it looks awesome, I might have even gone with this instead of the Dream Router.

The AmpliFi stuff is nice, but it's essentially EOL (no updates since 2023). The Wi-Fi 5 AmplFi is a good deal direct from Ubiquiti at $139, if your needs are modest. (I suspect the $139 is a clearance price.)

You're probably better off with the UDR7.