Are there fake Gigabit routers? Have you ever avoided these manufacturers' pitfalls?

The story of how home networks are as slow as a snail due to router problems has been analyzed many times. With various router tricks emerging one after another today, it is obviously impossible to solve all the problems in one article. What Little Lion wants to talk to you about today are the fake gigabit routers that are flooding the market!

The old view that gigabit routers are "flashy but not practical"

"A 100M router is enough, broadband is only a few dozen Mbps, a 100M router is a waste"; "100M and 100M are the same, there is no need to spend more money on a 100M router"; "If you buy a router, you have to buy one with more antennas so that the signal is better"...

The idea that gigabit routers are wasted has been around for a long time. According to data released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in 2016, the average Internet speed of Chinese netizens has increased from 20.5Mbps at the end of 2015 to 29.5Mbps in 2016. Moreover, this large increase in bandwidth has not shown any signs of slowing down, and has even increased.

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The actual speed of the 100M router's network port is only about 95~97Mbps. Although it is close to 100M, you may never see your computer download speed reach the theoretical maximum value of 12.5MB/s. The 100M router is operating at full capacity when processing information transmission of 100M optical fiber. The result of long-term high-load operation is like a two-lane road that is always full of cars, and everyone is blocking the main road and making it impossible to pass.

Even if a Gigabit router handles the extreme data transmission of 100M optical fiber for a long time, it can still handle it with ease. It can truly make the "full firepower" of optical fiber above 100M, and build a "highway" for smart devices to "gallop" freely.

Obviously, gigabit routing is definitely the definite direction for the future. The persistence of strategies such as "fiber to the home" and "copper out and optical in" over the years has made gigabit routing the first choice for the public when purchasing a new router. After all, no one wants to replace a router worth several hundred yuan after one or two years, right?

Fake Gigabit Routers Are Flooding

Since Gigabit routing is the first choice for future home networks, smart manufacturers will naturally not give up on implanting this selling point. But obviously, there will inevitably be those who take advantage of the profitable market.

There are many Gigabit routers on the market, which can be divided into two categories according to their performance: real Gigabit and fake Gigabit compatible routers. It is easy for ordinary people to be fooled by fake Gigabit routers and buy a fake Gigabit router if they are not careful.

How to identify fake Gigabit routers on the market is the key that Little Lion will share with you today. A true Gigabit router means that the CPU has a Gigabit data processing capability, is equipped with a Gigabit network port and other Gigabit motherboard hardware, and has a Gigabit transmission rate.

Identify the network port of fake gigabit routers: The interface of wireless router is divided into WAN port and LAN port, the so-called input and output interface. A real gigabit router, whether it is the WAN port or the LAN port, should be gigabit, and those "fake" gigabit routers, usually the WAN port is gigabit, but the LAN port is 100M. Such cutting corners can basically be discovered by players at the first time.

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Little Lion's comment: Don't think that the manufacturer has simply saved a few LAN ports with this approach. Rather, the router manufacturer has reduced the number of gigabit switching chips in order to cut corners. This way of making money is still quite good for high-volume router products.

Identify fake Gigabit router CPU: The router WAN port, LAN port and wireless speed are all Gigabit, but once more users access, the network speed will immediately drop to less than 100M for several terminals combined. This problem confuses many players, and the actual problem lies with the CPU. In order to save costs, the low-end CPU used has held back the router and is not enough to support high-speed access of multiple devices at the same time.

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Currently, the true gigabit routers in the mainstream market usually use Broadcom (Qualcomm) solutions. The most cost-effective ones, such as MW4530R, cost nearly 300 yuan. However, many Internet brands are obsessed with solutions such as MTK MT 7620 (n/A and other secondary numbers). The main chip only supports 4/5 fast Ethernet channels, which are often called 100M Ethernet channels. Of course, it is impossible to support gigabit Ethernet.

Little Lion's comment: Chips account for a very high proportion of the cost of a router. To put it simply, it means "people don't know the value of a property, but money does." Friends who buy gigabit routers for around 100 yuan probably didn't plan to actually buy a gigabit router from the beginning, right?

Identify fake Gigabit routers’ memory: Gigabit routers usually need to deal with huge data processing requirements, and memory is the guarantee to ensure stable data processing. Almost all industry professionals agree that a Gigabit router should have at least 512M memory.

What are the benefits of Gigabit Network?

Gigabit wireless is very helpful in improving the quality of wireless use, although the focus is not on "gigabit". Simply put, under common modulation/bandwidth, a 2.4G frequency band/antenna can provide 150M bandwidth (11n), and a 5G frequency band/antenna can provide 433M bandwidth (11ac). Using multiple receive and multiple transmit (MIMO), the bandwidth of multiple antennas can be combined.

For home and small business users with an increasing number of terminal devices, Gigabit routing can obviously improve network quality and allow more devices to run at high speed and stability. At the same time, Gigabit processing power means that the possibility of freezing, delays, and jamming caused by high-load operation of the router is greatly reduced, and Gigabit can also allow users to retain more expansion space for the network, making it easier for users to expand in the next few years.

Especially with the emergence of 802.11AC dual-band routers, dual-band gigabit routers have two frequency bands, 2.4GHz and 5GHz. In the era of gigabit fiber, if you want to really push the speed to the limit, you must choose 11AC routing, and this is also an inevitable trend.

If you think the story ends here, then you are obviously underestimating the determination of the chicken leg. Do you think that upgrading your home network to optical fiber and your router to Gigabit will really allow you to experience ultra-fast Internet? NONONO, too naive. Think about what is missing?

PC! Yes, whether it is a laptop or a desktop computer, do you really think that Gigabit network is available? If the PC cannot support it, then it is all nonsense. But if the PC does not support Gigabit network by nature, how can it be solved? Can I bury a pit here? Please give me a thumbs up! Last week's Double Eleven was indeed ahem, so please support us!