ASUS 802.11ac Dual-Band Wireless-AC1750 Gigabit Router (RT-AC66R)

I have only been running it for 24 hours, but I wanted to leave a review now to let people know to not install the very latest version of firmware so that they do not waste their time on tech support. The very latest firmware will toast the 5G band and the 5G stops working. If you do install it, go to the ASUS support website and get the very last version prior to the latest one and flash it back to this one, it will fix the 5G issue and everything will work again. Unfortunately it doesn't seem that ASUS has addressed this issue yet, but this is easily fixed by reverting the firmware to the previous version and will save you time on the phone with tech support. Thankfully I simply searched and found a couple of forums that mentioned this firmware issue and I didn't need to call support, and I suspected a firmware issue being that the 5G band was working before the firmware flash. I will post an update later on if anything changes as I generally like to let some time pass before reviewing items, but so far this router is fantastic. I bought this to replace a Netgear WNDR3400 that I have had for a few years now due to needing better coverage range and to remedy some of our devices randomly starting to drop connection to it, and just an increase in connected devices in the home that the Netgear seemed to start having issues in keeping up with, otherwise the Netgear was a good router. We have a 100mbps cable internet connection. I sat on our front porch (the router is on the other side of our house) and ran some before and after tests. The test laptop even maintains a 72mbps connection on the ASUS when it would drop to 5.5mbps on the porch with the Netgear, the connection quality before and after is significant. Even my phone will pick up signal out to the street side now. The 5G band also seems just as strong as the 2.4G band, the Netgear you almost had to be in the same room with it in order to get the 5G band. I pretty much have full signal throughout the house now. The configuration interface is also really well laid out and easy to use, lots of nice features. I have quite a bit of experience with ASUS products and I hope that I have as good of results with this item as I have had in the past. Last night I was installing updates on my laptop, someone was watching Netflix in one room, and I was watching Amazon Prime TV in another room at the same time, nothing skipped a beat. So, as I was saying, very encouraging so far. 5/21/16 Update: It is still running strong, and so far no more firmware update issues that I've seen (I now have the latest one released), of which I do recommend doing, after a couple of months I had to start rebooting the router occasionally, apparently one of the firmware updates they released fixed it (I know, an update actually fixing an issue, right?). It sits on its perch and it just runs and I don't have to think about it. The range is really great on it and the speeds are excellent, I get my full rated internet speed even on wireless (that is, on my better wireless adapters that are newer and support the higher speeds better).

Even though I have had one glaring issue with this router, I want to give it a full review because when it worked, it worked well. Too bad it does not always work. The problem. I have had this router since February 2015, or about 5 months. For the eight weeks, it was great, no problems. Speeds on wifi and wired connections were great. Then 12 weeks ago, it started having problems or one really big problem. The WAN side stops connecting to my Comcast Modem. Everything on LAN still works, everything on the network functions, except I lose my internet connection. This has happens about every three weeks, three times. Each time this happened, I unplugged it, left it unplugged for about 5 hours, and it would work fine for three weeks. The pattern from what I can tell, is that over three weeks it heats up and cannot dissipate the heat correctly. After a couple weeks it's usually warm to the touch, but not excessive. But on or around that third week, it's almost scalding hot. Now, the WAN side won't connect to my modem. Great. Unplug it for a while (hours), starts working again. If I unplug it for only a few minutes, not enough time for the heat to dissipate, it won't connect. If I hard reset it and power cycle after 5 minutes, it still won't connect on the WAN side. My theory is poor components or a poor heat sink leading to an overheating issue. I have searched for similar incidents, but outside of this review, they are not all that common. So maybe it's a problem on one or two ASUS models. In the end, I've probably put about 10 hours dealing with/pulling my hair out over this router. Build Straight-forward. The router has a flat, svelte feel to it. It has 3 antennas, which I use in 45/90/45 degree angles for optimal coverage. I question the build quality of the internal components, as you can imagine. Range The range is very good. Compared to an N router, I get 2 more bars on average. So 4/5 vs 2/5 over the same distance. Speed The speed like the range, is very good. Where I was getting 5 mbps, this gives me 20-25 mbps. This is probably also because 5 ghz devices are limited in my area. Most everyone near me is still using 2.4 ghz devices. So there is no interference. UI The UI is nice and clean. Very easy to use/navigate. I would have liked some more admin stuff, like a way to schedule restarts for example or input commands directly. Maybe that would mitigate my heating problem. Overall This router has good features, range and speed, but in the end because of this heating design flaw/bug/whatever, I can't recommend this router. If you bought one, you might never even see this problem, or you might get it every other day. But why take the chance, especially for $189?