I’m a total noob to Mikrotik, but fairly familiar with networking in general. I’m looking for a Mikrotik device to enhance my home network which currently consists of Synology 5 bay NAS, 4 media players (WD TV Live x 2, Popcorn Hour A-210 and and older Egreat), 3 wired computers (2 PCs, an iMac), 2 iPads and 3 iPhones which connect over wifi. All the wires are connected to an18 port unmanaged gigabit switch (Cisco, consumer model from 2011). The router is Cisco/Linksys E4200 and is connected to ADSL modem (20/4 Mbit connection, shoulg go optical in a year ot two) on WAN side and switch on the LAN side. It also provides Wifi for the ground floor (so the new device must have wifi too).
Since I was using my old router (Asus RT-N15) as an access point and it died, I would like to either buy a more capable router (like RB2011) and use the current E4200 as AP instead of Asus, or buy a router/switch combo (like the CRS125) to replace my unmanaged switch at the same time as router (switch does not support link aggregation for NAS, but otherwise works OK).
I’m expecting my network to grow and evolve in the future, the first chang being to replace PH A-210 with a Minix Android player capable of 4K resolution, and the number of computers will also increase.
What do you think? Is there much to gain if I replace the switch too?
P.S. I just remembered one more thing - Synology NAS (1511+) is used to download torrents a lot, so it would be perfect if the new device would have a good QoS so I could prioritize other traffic (web browsing, YouTube, FB etc.)over torrents (if it can be done on the base of IP address, MAC address, type of traffic etc.)…
After reading (quickly) your request, I would say : hAP ac.
And you keep your switch.
This device fills your current need, has very good wifi (2.4 and 5Ghz), and will support an “optical” connection (100-300 Mbits) in the future, for ~120$.
hAP AC will probably run short of horsepower if you use it for gigabit wifi AND as a gigabit-speeds router.
I would personally use a dedicated router and a dedicated AP. The reason is that for WiFi, gigabit speeds can matter right now even if your internet isn’t optical yet. You have in-house media services, and if you have AC-capable wireless clients, you’ll benefit from that right now - and the CPU of the hAP AC will handle a gigabit of bridging between the wireless and the wired worlds, but if you throw routing on top of that, it will fall short.
Get a router that can handle the routing you require, and get the hAP AC to be a very very nice access point that will enhance your network.
Router-wise, I’d look to the 3011 (although it’s still giving people some strange bugginess, as the ARM platform is new to Mikrotik) or maybe the HEX (not lite) would suffice if you’re looking to keep costs to a minimum. I’d say the RB850Gx2 would probably be the best value home router for routing capacity, but you’d also need to get a case for it.
The CRS you mention would be fine as a switch/access point only. You’ll find lots of threads on these forums where people cannot get good performance from their CRS as a router. It’s intended to be a switch, and if you only use it as a switch, then you’ll be satisfied with it, but don’t look at it like a router with a gajillion interfaces - because it’s not.
Thank you very much for explanation. Do you think just replacing the router with RB2011 would be OK (I can get one almost new for a really good price of 70 EUR, and I’m sure it should be much better than the Cisco/Linksys E4200)? I do not have ac clients at the moment, but I could address that with hAP ac at a later time when I get them…
RB3011 is relatively new and you should ask local Mikrotik distributors about availability. In the US some distributors just got their first stock this week I think.
hAP AC is brand new and is pretty much only available in Latvia so far… still looking at a 2+ week wait here in the US, not sure about availability in other countries.
Just one more question - as I mentioned, I can get an almost new RB2011 for 70 EUR… Maybe I should just replace my E4200 with RB2011 for now, get some experience with RouterOS, and upgrade to RB3011 when the bugs are ironed out?
Your connectivity 20/4 Mbits can be easily managed even by hap lite for 20 bucks together with whatever dumb gigabit switch for local network. If you want to spare money and learn how to manage ros device. When you will need speed over its possibilities you will know what router is right for you so you will swap them and use hap lite as additional Ap somewhere in the house.
So, if I get the RB2011UiAS-2HnD-IN as my main router, and connect it between ADSL modem and a dumb switch, it should work like a charm (providing I configure it right)? And I can use the E4200 as AC for 2nd floor, while RB2011UiAS-2HnD-IN covers the ground floor… Is my thinking correct?
You could just use the 2011 as your switch as well, and yes, you can connect another AP behind it for expanded coverage. The best thing in that scenario would be to use the LAN side of the other AP, with DHCP disabled, so that way it’s just a bridging access point, and if your devices decide to roam to the other AP, they won’t lose their IP address, etc.
Thank you - unfortunately, RB2011 just has 10 ports, not enough for me, so the dumb gigabit switch stays. I decided a few years ago to install wires around the whole house and use wireless just for phones and tablets. So my current netork consists of ADSL modem connected to E4200 router, which then connects to dumb gigabit switch to which all the rest of the gear is connected, including two old routers serving as access points (Buffalo WHR 54G and Asus RT-N15 which died on me and started this whole process). So right now I do not really need more than 802.11n router, although it would not hurt to be future proof. Will probably go for RB2011 and later upgrade with 802.11ac access points as needed.
Definitelly avoid RB3011 or at least wait, let’s say, 6 months to know the reality of this device:
Yes, it works but…
Partition does not work.
Performance is still under question.
It’s not cheap: aprox. 170€ in Europe with taxes but without shipping costs.
New porting: ARM architecture, so no experience at all.
Misterious problems with ethernet ports: if you have software bridge, if you use master port in a group misterious errors reported
I suspect that this is a 2nd try of multiCPU on small devices that remembers too much RB850x2 “roadmap” of events.
Some of these bugs are solved without formal comunication from Mikrotik: update and test, update and test,…
I’m owner of both RB2011 and RB3011, with RB2011 more or less confortable if I miss the first 6.X releases.
About the RB3011…I still feel a real beta tester of an unfinsihed product: my idea about MIkrotik is to avoid this perception from consumer devices (ASUS and similars…), but it seems that Mikrotik entered definitelly in this segment.
You want to look at the CRS125’s. They have the same CPU as the 2011, but only 1 switch chip. That is more than enough for routing a 500/50 connection at a home if you use fasttrack and LAN switching. By the time you get 1000, you can upgrade to something current then.
If there’s no suitable 18-port switch chip, a 14G would be fine in my case, although I don’t think I will be upgrading until I get 1000 Mbps, so a more powerful version would be needed (I would be looking for at least 2000/200 capability for the expenditure to feel right).