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Comment by binaryturtle | Hacker News Reader

If it's a "router" and you can't install a OpenWRT on it, then it's an absolute no-brainer to not to buy it.

To whom? How many people who have bought these things ever heard of OpenWRT? How many of those are capable of installing it?

Have you ever considered upgrading your refrigerator? Washing machine? Kettle? A router is a transparent appliance to most people.

The point is somewhat less that you will do it, as being able to do it implies a certain level of sanity to what you're buying + the ability to use the hardware even if the software goes away in some undefined-yet-predictable fashion.

It's sorta like checking if spare parts are available for your refrigerator or washing machine.

And that's why we educate others and let them know about their options. You have to start somewhere.

Buying a router, as opposed to connecting whatever your Internet provider gives you, is a very high technical bar.

You need to know why you want to spend money, which implies evaluating features, needs and possibilities, virtually guaranteeing that the user learns that OS or firmware updates and OpenWRT exist and are important.

checks domain

For most non-technical people this is irrelevant. Even if the router supported OpenWRT, they wouldn't know how to install it, let alone how to configure it.

Luckily, many (but certainly not all) continental West-European ISPs allow you to lease a Fritz!Box or you can buy one in a store and hook it up [1]. Perfect router/modem for consumers (not too complicated), can be configured through a web interface, and the hardware and software is developed by a German company.

[1] Many European countries have router/modem freedom, so an ISP cannot block you if you want to hook up your own gear. E.g. quite some tech people here use their own XGS-PON fiber ONT or at least their own router + modem.

The British ISP I tend to recommend gives you a Frtizbox (included with monthly package with 12 month contract, but becomes your property), but most will include a router with their package, usually a rubbish one, and most people do not care about having a good router.

And who do you recommend?

Zen for most people. Reasonable pricing, good customer service, reasonable latency and a good router.

I was reluctant to recommend them by name because I know there are other good ISPs, some are cheaper, some are more expensive, some operate only in certain areas (if they do not use Openreach local loops).

While the Fritz!Boxen do indeed work for dummies, they are rather noisy, with no option to stop that noise.

Jun 08 00:23:10 zalgor kernel: [UFW BLOCK] IN=enp0s31f6 OUT= MAC=01:02:03:04:05:06:07:08:09:10:11:12:13:14 SRC=192.168.178.1 DST=224.0.0.1 LEN=36 TOS=0x00 PREC=0x00 TTL=1 ID=53621 DF PROTO=2 ... from my German residence right now.

Just the last one, out of gazillions. It's a proprietary protocol for finding their other proprietary stuff in the LAN for home automation, meshing (also proprietary).

It's also almost useless for more complex internal setups.

Rather logspammy if you ask me.

One doesn't have that with other, more technical options. There is also less and less need for the "DSL- (or cable-) modem part, since fibre tends to be plain old ethernet.

Also the ownership of AVM recently changed. I fully excpect ensuing enshittification.

I got a new lease on life for a bunch of old/slow MyBook WD Live NAS devices -- OpenWRT installs onto these PowerPC devices, rather easily.

I'd suggest buying the OpenWRT One. I've bought a bunch, and I think it's terrific.

I'm waiting for the second version (supposedly has a better number of RJ45; that's where the "One" was a bit limited and an extra switch would have been required in the setup)

I was just looking at the One recently and lamenting it only has two network ports. I would have bought one if it had three.

Instead I went with a Gl.inet device with three interfaces.

I think the cost is good too? Decent amount of ports, kinda like a boxless mikrotik.

I've considered it, if I can get fiber here I will definitely get one for my segment, and maybe my resell segment too.

The One is nice if you want to support the OpenWrt project, but if you want raw power, the GL.iNet Flint 2 (MT6000) is a much better choice. Faster SoC, 1GB RAM, 8GB storage, one more 2.5 GBe port, twice as fast WiFi 6, and also supports vanilla OpenWrt.

I've put OpenWRT on the Flint 2, and I've had issues with connectivity that I don't have with OpenWRT on a Linksys router. I need to disconnect and reconnect every so often. I'd read that this is due to the Mediatek modem not being as well supported, but I'm not sure how to diagnose.

Have the same router (Flint 2), and had a similar issue in the past. After I configured SSIDs with different names on the radios (i.e. the SSID is either configured on radio0 or radio1, not both), I didn't encounter this anymore. YMMV, but this helped me - perhaps it'll prove useful to you as well.

And besides this issue, overall it works great. I recommend this to anyone who asks me about it.

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