Answers...

to commonly asked questions.

Alternatives to Airport Routers

For years now Apple has been manufacturing Airport Extremes and Express as a wifi option for your home network. They've been very reliable and the large majority of homes I work in have them, including my own. For years this has been the wifi router I recommend, bar none. It's reliability, ease of use, ability to be extended, made it the best choice in my opinion. Unfortunately word on the street is that Apple will no longer be developing routers going forward. Apple has yet to verify this publicly but all signs point to a change in their business plan which does not include manufacturing routers. The Extreme is based on the currently fastest spec 802.11ac which means that for the foreseeable future, the extreme is still a great choice. The problem is that it's little brother, the express, is not ac. It's 802.11n which means that while as an extender it works very well, it does bottle neck your speeds. In other words, using the express as an extender does slow your network down a little.

This leads us to the inevitable question. What router do I recommend going forward? This is a very difficult question to answer for many reasons. Over the next few months I will be researching which router I feel will best fit my client's needs. The criteria I will be considering is, ease of use, reliability, pricing, ability to extend. But above all, the highest priority in my eyes is range. I work with many homes over 3000 square feet which means that for most homes in my client list, one router will not do.

For now, I still stand by the Airport Extreme and still recommend that as the router to purchase for the next several months. I'm just not sure if Apple will halt production or continue to manufacture them. If you buy an extreme right now, you are going to be fine for the next several years until the next 802.11 standard is adopted and the speed of your ISP goes up. For most of us, Time Warner and ATT have still not pushed speeds over 300 mbps out so even an older 802.11n router is actually fine for our home networks for now.

So in the coming months I will be looking at alternative routers on the market and hopefully come up with a few strong recommendations. In the meantime, here are a few well written reviews on top routers for 2016:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2398080,00.asp
http://10beasts.com/best-wireless-routers/
http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-wi-fi-router/
http://appleinsider.com/articles/16/11/21/with-apple-abandoning-airport-here-are-the-best-alternative-wi-fi-routers-for-mac-users
http://www.techrepublic.com/article/apple-kills-wireless-routers-here-are-the-alternatives-for-professionals-and-smbs/
http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/best-wireless-routers/2/
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