Region : UnitedKingdom

Model : Archer C7

Hardware Version : Not Clear

Firmware Version : 3.13.33 Build 130729 Rel.56122n

ISP : Virgin Media UK

Archer C7: iPhone, mixed N, features missing, update issues - what a pain!

I've had this router for less than 48 hours now and feeling very disappointed so far but I want to give this sorry excuse for a router a second chance before sending it back. my previous solution was an ASUS RT-N66U.

First thing I did when I turned it on was to check for firmware version, I noticed that there was a new one. I wanted to know what it was supposed to fix so I had an idea of what kind of problems I could run into with the installed version. the reason why I didn't upgrade straight away was because I had problems with "latest" firmwares before. I wanted to see if I'd really need it.

First impression was bad. Interface is ugly. I've seen 2001 routers with better interfaces but as long as it's easy to use and fast that's tolerable. well it's easy to use, it's fast but it's buggy on Firefox and Chrome. buttons appear and when you move the mouse pointer over them they move! thankfully they only move once, imagine having to chase the button all over the page? :D

and I was there naively looking for torrent downloader, traffic priority, built-in VPN server, support for 4G dongles... ha! silly me! £110 for a router with nothing but AC (that I don't desperately need) and 3 antennas. and what's up with the DHCP IP range between 100 and 199?!?

so I set it all up and tested the things I need more: file transfers from a machine used solely for that. file transfers between my desktop PC and the server through wired LAN on the ASUS would oscillate between 60 and 80 megabytes per second with rare peaks of 90. Archer doesn't get anywhere close. the highest I got was 49 megabytes per sec. time to try wifi with the tabletop: with the 2.4ghz I've tried all possible configurations. auto, 20mhz only, 40mhz only, auto channel, manual channel, several channels... maximum speed I got was 6MBps and surprisingly with the internal wifi adapter. with 5G (N) the adapter can handle up to 450mbps but it wouldn't get anywhere above the 216mbps. file transfer was around 12, 13MBps which is acceptable but I could get twice as much. I was sitting just 9 feet away from the router.

and what's wrong with this router's UPnP that it takes forever for devices to find one another? on Windows (7) Explorer I click on a share and wait, wait, wait... shares set up with fixed IP instead of machine names. don't even get me started on the X360 finding the Mezzmo media server. oh and before I forget: disabled PIN and it will still give machines running Windows 7 to connect with PIN. pathetic!

during firmware download, another blow. the download would slow down to 0bps and I would have to keep pausing and resume to finish the download. now seriously, if these guys can't take care of their own servers how are they going to provide us decent network products. activation email for this forum also arrived about 5 hours after registration!
hoping that things would get better I updated the firmware. but nah, they didn't. now my partner's laptop will either get a slow 2.4 or a choppy 5G. in my bedroom upstairs the iPhone, poor iPhone, won't even see any wifi - the router is physically only 5 metres away with just the wooden floor in between.

and with the new firmware you can't have N only. it's either BG or BGN mixed. gosh! it's just awful. the reason I decided to try TP-Link is that I have three 8-port TP-Link switches and they're so reliable I even forget they exist. unfortunately not the router.

Address Reservation: that's a joke, right? can't edit entries, it's either enable or disable all? but what the H... it doesn't work anyway. I've reserved addresses for 8 devices, only 3 were given the addresses they were supposed to have. no matter how many times I rebooted them and the router. I went as far as switching them all off including the router, waiting 5 minutes and then turning the router on, waiting and go turning each one on one by one. still.

and before you ask: the reason why I got rid of my RT-N66U was that its wifi was unreliable and the thing wouldn't stop overheating and freezing.

I know it's kind of hopeless at this point but... any suggestions?