Previous Wi-Fi routers are susceptible to safety exploits and lack the quality-of-life upgrades present in fashionable routers. Even for those who do not want the bandwidth enchancment, upgrading is useful.
If your own home web is fairly gradual, you would possibly assume it doesn’t matter in case you have a dusty outdated router with out the newest bells and whistles. Right here’s why it is best to give severe consideration to upgrading.
First, Let’s Outline Previous and Sluggish
Speaking a few router being outdated or new, or an web connection being gradual or quick requires us to outline how we’re utilizing these phrases throughout the context of this text.
Most routers are normally a minimum of a Wi-Fi technology generation old-fashioned about 5 years or so after their launch date. When you purchased your router 5 years in the past, and it was already an outdated mannequin on the time of buy, you’re even additional faraway from present Wi-Fi know-how. New, within the context of routers, refers to router fashions launched in the previous few years—inside three years is even higher.
And so far as “quick” and “gradual” web goes, that’s fairly subjective relating to opinions on broadband adoption and private choice. Nonetheless, we’re quick and gradual right here as a relationship between the Wi-Fi router {hardware} and the web connection pace.
Folks have requested us, does it matter if I’ve an outdated router if I’ve gradual web? And that’s a wonderfully legitimate query. What does it matter in case you have an early 2010s-era 802.11n router with solely a 50 Mbps or 100 Mbps broadband connection that may by no means saturate the router absolutely? It issues greater than you assume as a result of the Wi-Fi expertise is extra than simply pace check outcomes however an entire host of router features. Let’s take a look at why.
Previous Wi-Fi Routers Don’t Get Safety Updates
Speaking about safety isn’t attractive, however safety is necessary. Even for those who don’t really feel like all of the pace or high quality of life enhancements we’ll be speaking about in a second matter to you, the safety of your own home community ought to matter.
The times of turning on the household pc every now and then to ship an occasional e-mail or play an offline recreation are lengthy gone for many of us. Our households are on-line on a regular basis in some capability, our televisions are related to the web, and folks use their house web connection and the gadgets on it for issues like banking, securely logging into the medical information, and different necessary issues.
With that in thoughts, it’s lower than very best to have an excellent outdated router that doesn’t get safety updates anymore. No matter vulnerabilities are found after the final spherical of updates your router acquired, you’re caught with. And also you gained’t be capable to use the most advanced Wi-Fi encryption together with your gadgets.
You don’t want a model new cutting-edge router to ensure you get security updates, however you do need a newer mannequin that also receives updates (and can for a minimum of a couple of extra years). Router safety updates is a subject we really feel strongly sufficient about that we recommend you throw out your router when it not will get them.
Previous Wi-Fi Routers Have Weaker {Hardware}
You won’t give a lot thought to the quantity of processing energy your Wi-Fi router has or what sort of {hardware} is inside, so earlier than we discuss routers particularly, let’s discuss in regards to the situation by evaluating it to computer systems.
Almost everybody has had the expertise of upgrading their pc after which being blown away by how a lot nicer the expertise of utilizing the pc was after the improve. We’re not even speaking about players having fun with improved efficiency in AAA recreation titles or different demanding actions. We’re speaking about primary day-to-day stuff like opening information, shopping the online, and so on.
It’s not that writing emails or watching a YouTube video on a 2013-era laptop computer versus a 2023-era laptop is a basically completely different exercise. It’s {that a} decade of {hardware} enhancements and optimizations makes doing so really feel snappier and extra gratifying.
Your outdated router possible has a a lot weaker CPU. It additionally has much less highly effective radios utilizing older Wi-Fi know-how. Even the bodily ports on older routers could be anemic. Gigabit Ethernet is commonplace now, however even into the mid-2010s, many price range routers nonetheless had primary 10/100 Ethernet ports. Pair that form of router with sooner broadband, and also you’re hobbling your self proper out of the gate.
So positive, you’ll be able to join your new iPhone to a ten-year-old router simply high quality, however that outdated router gained’t be optimized for Wi-Fi know-how enhancements that didn’t even exist when it was created.
Whenever you leap from an outdated router to a brand new router, you’ll be shocked to see stuff you didn’t understand have been associated to the router—akin to how briskly an internet web page masses after you ship the request or how nicely social media posts load in your telephone—are enormously improved. It seems you didn’t want a brand new sensible TV, you wanted a Wi-Fi router that would type a extra dependable connection to it.
Previous Wi-Fi Routers Weren’t Made for Excessive-Density Environments
After I put in my first Wi-Fi router again within the 802.11b/g days, I had a handful of Wi-Fi gadgets in my house—most of which have been by no means on concurrently, not to mention doing demanding issues in tandem.
Now, nonetheless, I’ve round 100 gadgets related to my Wi-Fi community at any given time. Whereas a lot of these gadgets are issues like sensible plugs, fairly a couple of are high-demand gadgets like sensible TVs, telephones, and different gadgets that require dependable high-bandwidth connections.
The community panorama of the house has modified, and newer routers are designed with that landscape in mind. Whether you have a basic 100 Mbps connection through your local cable company or a 2 Gbps fiber connection, your router’s ability to juggle dozens and dozens of connections on the Wi-Fi network is crucial.
It’s not just about supplying any given device with the maximum amount of bandwidth possible it’s about stability and connection management. Take streaming video bandwidth demands, for instance. You only need about 5 Mbps of speed for HD video and about 15 Mbps for 4K video.
It’s more important to have a reliable router that can reach the location of your smart TV or phone with a stable signal than anything else—and newer hardware is better suited for delivering that stability to multiple devices simultaneously.
Old Wi-Fi Routers Lack Quality of Life Improvements
We like to encourage people to think about their router purchases like they are shopping for a car. When you’re shopping for a car, you rarely shop for the fastest possible car you can buy. Outside of buying a performance car for racing purposes, the maximum speed a car can go is almost entirely irrelevant, and most people never drive their car as fast as it can possibly go.
What matters is comfort and ease of use. Most of us don’t want a car than can go 200 MPH. We want a car with comfortable seats, lane-assist semi-autonomous driving, room for the stuff we want to haul around, and so on.
In that regard, most people don’t need to buy a bleeding-edge performance router with a theoretical throughput capacity 20 times higher than their broadband connection. But they should buy a newer router that includes all the quality-of-life improvements we’ve seen in Wi-Fi and router technology over the years.
Newer routers include automatic security updates, so you’ll never have to worry about manually downloading and applying a firmware fix again. Speaking of automation, many older Wi-Fi routers don’t even have Quality of Service (QoS) rules. Or, if they do, you have to configure them manually. Newer Wi-Fi routers include automatic QoS adjusts that can intelligently identify and adapt network allocation based on activities without you even knowing what a QoS rule even is.
Wi-Fi optimizations in newer Wi-Fi generations benefit not just the newer devices that can take advantage of specific features like fast roaming but also older devices on the same network.
If you want to upgrade and you’re not sure where to start, you can consider buying a budget Wi-Fi router. But we also recommend buying a single mesh router. You get a perfectly good modern Wi-Fi router all by itself (with great automated features) for around the same price as a stand-alone budget router. And if you need more coverage extending your network with mesh nodes is dead simple.
However you approach the problem, though, it’s worth replacing that old router with an awesome router with modern features and current security updates.
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