Recommended routers for DDWRT running VPN

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amrogers3

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Hello, I am looking to upgrade my old school WRT54GL to a new DDWRT compatible router. I am seeing some laggy connection to the WRT54GL and think it may be due to running a VPN and using the router as an AP.

I am running DD-WRT v24-sp2 (08/12/10) vpn (SVN revision 14929)

I saw these recommended but I don't trust everything I read on the internet. ;)

Asus RT-N16 ($82.98)
Linksys E1200 ($44.99)
D-Link DIR-632 ($38.80)
Netgear WNDR3700 ($99.00)
Linksys E4200 ($131.64)

I would like to stay under $100 if possible. I really just need a router capable of running DDWRT and a VPN server. Preferably one that is easy to setup.

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks for your time.


I attached a screenshot of memory usage on the WRT54GL.

ScreenShot2014-02-12at102759PM_zps8be41f74.png
 
diizzy said:
I would highly recommend you to look at an OpenWRT compatible router as they tend to have software much more up to date.

Picking that up at Quill is a great deal.
//Danne
Click to expand...

Thanks Danne for the reply. I am familiar with DDWRT but have zero knowledge regarding OpenWRT. What is the difference between them and is OpenWRT more supported than DDWRT? I have had some trouble in the past trying to find help with DDWRT issues.

Is this the most up-to-date website to check openWRT comaptible routers and their specs: http://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=wlanrou...=&dist=&mail=&bl1_id=-1&sort=p&xf=758_OpenWrt
 
No, use http://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/start if you want to look at supported devices.
Anyhow, if you want recent platforms and an Atheros one for best support as they have the best open source support around at least right now.

The ones I mentioned above are pretty easy to find even if you're in the UK.

http://pricespy.co.uk/product.php?p=1351683
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...34&creativeASIN=B0089B4G3Y&smid=AWEJPR3QF07VN

The OpenWRT community is pretty much what drives the 3rd party firmwares overall. Compared to DD-WRT it features open source (which DD-WRT doesn't have), it does acknowledge developers compared to DD-WRT which pretty much took work and rebranded it as their own.

From a user perspective it's a bit more advanced than DD-WRT (haven't used it in years) I guess but you can do pretty much anything DD-WRT and more but it may be a bit different. OpenWRT is much more modular depending on what you want to do, as routers have limited storage you may want to use it differently depending on your usage. Basic configuration (WIFI, Firewall etc) can be done using the WebUI called LuCI, the rest is usually done using CLI (command line). While this may need a bit more knowledge than just clicking around in some GUI you can configure it to do exactly what you want and since its pretty much like any other Linux distribution in this regard you can find a lot of information on the web.

Running OpenVPN or similar will require you to use the CLI but once its done it works very well, in fact I've used it for years now on different platforms including the WDR3600. There are platforms that are faster (quite a bit) such as the TL-WDR4900 but there are some concerns regarding stability of the platform. https://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?id=42062&p=18 - Port 450 and onwards

//Danne
 
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Thanks for the reply and the helpful information.

I read that VPN on openWRT is not as easy to setup due to lack of GUI. I don't mind CLI but is running VPN on openWRT straight forward? Have you installed VPN on openWRT?

Also, I did some research on routers. If I am looking to go with gigabit ports, fast transfer rate/throughput, USB ports, and mainly for VPN speed, is the ASUS RT-N66 a good choice?
 
What do you mean "run VPN"? Tunneling to a VPN or creating a VPN server to?

Just about no consumer router has the computational legs to encrypt more than 10-12megabit/s of throughput in tunneling...and will therefore bottleneck.
 
Hello and thanks for reply. I am wanting to run a openVPN server on the router. I read somewhere that I could get around 25 mb/s, however, of course I can no longer find the article. I am currently VPNing into a WRT54GL router here so anything is going to be better than that. VPN is one of the most important functions I am looking for in a router.

Does the N66 have a encryption chip since it come with VPN functionality out of the box?

I am not going to be doing anything crazy with VPN.
 
I think AC56 is much more powerful when it comes to VPN.
 
OpenVPN isn't hard, you just need a working configuration file just as you would running any kind of Linux/*BSD OS. I haven't used OpenWRT as a VPN server but its not different than running it as a client except for slightly different configuration. I haven't used the easy-rsa package in OpenWRT to generate keys but I would expect it to work fine.

The ones listed above (TP-Link and WD) does about 15mbit/s using OpenVPN, which is pretty good given the price. If you want better (I'd guess around 20-25-ish) the TL-WDR4900 is the way to go.

The Asus platforms uses Ralink and I have no idea how they perform and support in OpenWRT is sparse at best. I would expect similar to the Atheros platforms.

Due to the way OpenVPN is designed (programmed) it pretty much nullifies any kind of performance boost hardware encryption enables, If you're looking to utilize hardware crypto you're better off doing IPSec.

..and for the record, I do run a bunch of boxes with OpenVPN and OpenWRT. I do prefer the EdgeRouter Lite running FreeBSD as a firewall router but its more expensive and doesn't have wifi at all. Performance-wise its about the same as the routers mentioned earlier.

Here's pretty much what a config would look like, http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1040195601&postcount=2

//Danne
 
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Hi Dizzy, openVPN doesn't look too crazy to configure. I am willing to give it a go.

From the specs and the reviews, it looks the WDR4900 is the way to go for throughput, and specs and the reviews are really good. Also, the 4900 appears to work with DDWRT if openWRT doesn't work for me. However, isn't the 4900 based off the Atheros chipset?

Also, any suggestions for finding the 4900 online? Seller on Amazon want $200 for the router. The 4900 doesn't appear to be readily available in the U.S. and I don't want to buy one from China. Any recommendations for a suitable alternative?
 
amrogers3 said:
Linksys E1200 ($44.99)
Click to expand...

I have one of these running DD-WRT v24 sp2 (I don't remember which exact build I tried last) and I have had issues with it for a while. It worked okay in basic operation, but I've tried numerous features on it which have given me stability issues. I haven't configured VPN on it specifically, but in WDS mode, repeater mode, repeater bridge mode, and in access point mode I've had issues where the router 'forgets' it's configuration and I have to re-apply the settings (specifically, I have to turn off wireless security, then turn it back on and reapply my AES key, and that fixes a number of problems) and sometimes it stops responding altogether (even to devices connected to my default gateway trying to access the web console) and the only fix I've found for that is power cycling the router.


I haven't tried VPN on this router so I don't know what your experience will be, but given the problems I've had on the E1200 (and the E900) that I haven't had on some of the other routers I run on my home network, I personally would avoid using an E1200 for DD-WRT.
 
The WDR4900 isn't released in the US so you have to import it and it uses a Freescale PPC SoC but its uses Atheros WLAN-modules.
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/TP-L...enna-Dual-USB-Lsea-Center-Cost/741872805.html

Given its track record by reading thread regarding on OpenWRTs forums it seems to be stable nowdays but it may be a somewhat bumpy ride.

I like the WDR3600, it works fine and have decent overall performance. While the WD MyNet N750 does have slightly older hardware but its a very good alternative and performance should be equal to WDR3600. The feature is that is has 16mbyte of flash but you'll probably do fine with 8mbyte as in TP-Links products.

https://www.google.com/shopping/pro...CoOE4ATo14GICg&ved=0CEYQ8wIwAA&prds=scoring:p

//Danne
 
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