TIPS What's a good router for PIAF?

[Dale Fredrikson]

Hi. I've been using piaf since it was aah, and I love it, but in all that time I've never been able to figure out which router(s) work best with VOIP.

I've searched the NGs, and either I stink at researching or there just isn't much discussion out there about this topic.

If I'm going to use piaf in a SOHO environment, what do I really want in a router? And which router(s) have it?

Here's a list (no particular order) of the features which I've identified as being important:

• Port-forwarding ranges
• Loopback port forwarding
• QoS
• DHCP reservation list
• Just plain VOIP-friendly (obviously, some routers are better than others)
• Stable, reliable
• In addition, I want the router to be wireless-enabled with a good strong radio, because I'm using some wifi phones, as well as some softphones on laptops.

I've used a dLink DIR-655 (hw vA1/A2, fw v1.11) for years in my office, and it's worked (with a few hiccups) pretty well. So I bought another one (hw vA4, fw v3.11) for a new install, and it's been a nightmare. Checked the NGs & found out (too late) that NOBODY is recommending that router for VOIP. But there doesn't seem to be much consensus on what else to use.

I know Ward once recommended the dLink WBR-2310 as being cheap and voip-friendly. I actually have one of those. But it doesn't have QoS. So, how much does that really matter?

Or, how about the new open-source firmwares that are out there now? DD-WRT or MIMO, for instance?

Any comments would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Regards,

Dale

 

[dswartz]

I am using pfsense on an old PC. It has a PCI wifi card in it. Works a treat.

 

[wardmundy]

The dLink Gaming Routers all have QOS. We've never had a problem with them. Refurbs on sale at buy.com for under $90.

 

[Venio]

I use the Linksys WRT54LS. It lets me change the firmware with Thibor 14. The firmware is few years old but it works like a charm. Best features are the build in Dynamic DNS, works with DynDns, and most of all the static DHCP which lets me assign static ip's to specific MAC addressees.

 

[Sacrilego]

I am using pfsense on an old PC. It has a PCI wifi card in it. Works a treat.

Same here, I use pfsense on a via c7 mini-itx board, but I use a foundry IP200 for wireless with diffrent vlans per VAP.


100% stable, tons of feautres and easy to set up.
Doing 1:1 Nat to my PIAF since I have multiple static IPs.

I used to have a wrt-54gs with dd-wrt, but after some tests, I found that the router was limiting my speed throughput and rebooting due to the strain.

 

[cosmicwombat]

I like these routers...

http://www.intertex.se/products/list.asp?iMenuID=110&t=31

They can have FXO/FXS ports for emergency failover.

 

[dad311]

Ive always had good luck with the Buffalo routers running dd-wrt firmware.

Router:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...26&cm_re=buffalo_g300n-_-33-162-026-_-Product

Firmware
http://www.dd-wrt.com/site/index

 

[chris_ontheswitch]

I am using DLINK DIR-655 (hw vA4, fw v1.32NA) at my home/home office, with a few tweaks, I have it working pretty well and stable with my VOIP/IPTV environment, which I think may be some what complicated than your use, as I have one Asterisk 1.4 running on Open-WRT optware, one FreeSWITCH running on Centos Macmini, these two each having its own IP phones/ATA connected, plus I have office VPN for working from home, and one Aastra 9112i connected to company hosted sip server, in the meantime, my family is also watch Chinese TV programs via a special IPTV box. All working well, nobody really complains about quality of service.

 

[nojstevens]

I used to use the dd-wrt on Linksys, but since I tried pfsense I've never looked back. I have it running on an ATOM - has some great extra features too as well as excellent QoS.

Jon

 

[blanchae]

I've used the Linksys WRT54G in the lab with disastrous results. I literally can't believe that Cisco is involved with it. This is with the latest Linksys firmware (one attempt at making it stable).

We were using it for a student lab project where the student's provide a wireless access to their laptops which ran the X-lite softphone. It was hit or miss if it would perform NAT properly and forward the configured routes to their designated destination routers.

Myself, another instructor and three classes of students spent a couple of weeks trying to figure out why sometimes it would work perfectly and other times it would refuse to route. We sniffed the network looking at packets - but nothing made sense. We tried 3 or 4 WRT54G with no consistency.

I would configure it and it ran perfectly. Come back 2 days later, same configuration and it acted like a brick. Also extremely temperamental when changing wireless channels or configs.

I ended up dropping the assignment from the course as the WRT54G was not predictable.

I've used SMC Barricade routers with good results.

 

[kevinfvc]

I've heard great things about DD-WRT and Tomato, but I've never had any luck with consumer wireless routers (hardware).

I've used wireless routers from Netgear, Dlink, and Linksys for my wi-fi access point only. My experience and hearing feedback from others is that they break after 12-24 months.

For me it has been gradual like just needing to reboot the wi-fi router to be able to connect wirelessly to it just stops working (unable to connect).

I'm using the EdgeMarc and it works well. No issues with NAT, good QoS, and cool troubleshooting tools. I am a former employee so I might be considered biased, though.

 

[stucker]

TomatoVPN

I use WRT54GL router flashed w/TomatoVPN link provided. This gives me a solid router with QoS and OpenVPN for remote connectivity.

http://tomatovpn.keithmoyer.com/

 

[invictive]

I've used the Linksys WRT54G/GS/GL/WRT300N for years without problems. I usually use the DD-WRT firmware (either voip or vpn builds).

They enable QOS, OpenVPN, as well as a host of other features (you can control the wlan broadcast strength as well).

Be careful though, some of the newer WRT54G's are not compatible with DD-WRT or Tomato. Always check the version # before buying (you can tell from the bottom of the unit or the serial #)

 

[gwinton]

I like Mikrotik.

http://www.mikrotik.com

I have been using it for the past 5 years. The QOS and firewall rules work great. Plus it will allow multiple public IP's on it.

 

[blanchae]

So the message is quite clear: the WRT54G is a good router just don't use the Linksys firmware... Sort of like saying that this laptop with Vista is a great laptop but you have to install Ubuntu

 

[patrick_elx]

I've used the Linksys WRT54G/GS/GL/WRT300N for years without problems. I usually use the DD-WRT firmware (either voip or vpn builds).

They enable QOS, OpenVPN, as well as a host of other features (you can control the wlan broadcast strength as well).

Are you happy with the QOS management provided by DD-WRT?
I'm ok with the OpenVPN part, but I had many disappointment with the QOS part of this firmware.

 

[dad311]

Its hard to have good Qos with any router, when you cant control both upload and download bandwidth.

 

[bgriff]

Throughput on DD-WRT

I had throughput issues using DD-WRT when I upgraded to Turbo speed on my DSL cable. I think that I was only using the router as an access point. Right now I have a WRT-54GL with Tomato firmware and I get about 16Mbps DL speed, on my D-Link DIR-825 I get 20Mbps. Both are running as access points on a pfSense 1.2.3 rc3 router. If I remember correctly, the throughput with DD-WRT firmware on the same WRT-54GL was about 10Mbps. When my cable was limited to 6Mbps, I never noticed the issue with DD-WRT firmware. All of the speeds listed were over the wireless link.

I have read many good posts about the QOS in the Tomato firmware, but I have not tried it. pfSense works flawlessly on a P II or P III based router using OpenVPN.

I'm interested in getting the WRT-54GL with Tomato firmware configured as an OpenVPN client on my pfSense router.

 

[dswartz]

the only glitch i had with piaf with pfsense is that i had to enable the static port option in outbound NAT, since the port number was being rewritten and confusing my VOIP provider. i do like that i can install squid in transparent mode and have it hook into havp to do transparent virus scanning of http content. i also put in a wifi card and got rid of my old access point.

 

[patrick_elx]

I'm looking at a Mikrotik rb450. They are cheap and seem to be praised in the WISP world. I'm not sure however if they have a proven past in Voip and Qos world.