I’m gonna be moving into a new place soon and I’ll be setting up the Internet there. I want to experiment with setting up a local network with static IPs just for learning and fun, so I want my own router. I don’t want something hard to use because other people will be using the internet from it too. I don’t really know what the router market looks like, and I don’t want to support Reddit, so I’m asking here.

Ideally, this router would:

  • Be under $150 (but I might be willing to go a bit higher)
  • Be easily purchasable (no AliExpress specials)
  • Not sell data to corporations
  • Have a long life, ideally through easily set-up open source firmware but reputable proprietary is fine
  • Have good enough antennas to propagate signal across a small house
  • Support up to 500Mb/s sustained speeds

What do you think? Thank you for your help!

  • SayCyberOnceMore@feddit.ukEnglish
    0·
    3 days ago

    You’ll probably need 2 devices: one actually connected to the external line (ie the modem part) and then your actual router / wifi access point(s).

    Personally, I have a Fritzbox router configured into bridge mode so it just deals with the line signal and passes all the PPPoE / internet comms to a pfSense box I built (ie anything… an old thin client, new microATX, etc…)

    I then have separate POE WAPs for wifi around the house, but pfSense can deal with radio drivers too if separate WAPs are too much today.

    This way, if something goes wrong I can always go back to a single domestic router, keep the family happy, download anything I need to fix my setup and then move forwards again.

    I like having separate components with an up/downgrade path