ASUS RT-N56U Black Diamond Dual-Band Wireless-N600 Gigabit Router was £55.98 now £39.99
Worlds Fastest Router
The RT-N56U is rated highly by SmallNetBuilder.com, the world's trusted media review website for networking devices. SmallNetBuilder tested the RT-N56U against its competitors, and it came out tops in 5GHz upload/download throughput. In light of this, SmallNetBuilder concluded the RT-N56U was one of the best performance Gigabit and dual-band Wireless routers in the market.
Dual-band for Lag-free Entertainment
Double your wireless performance and bandwidth with simultaneous 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands speed up to 300Mbps concurrently. While basic internet applications like browsing or file downloading can occur in 2.4GHz, wireless HD content streaming takes place in the 5GHz band at the same time, so both achieve optimized speeds and you enjoy smooth, buffer-free HD content streaming.
Gigabit Internet Surfing with Hardware NAT
Equipped with a capable hardware NAT acceleration engine and built-in Gigabit Ethernet, it gives you full Gigabit internet performance, making its WAN to LAN throughput up to 2-5 times that of traditional software-based NAT Gigabit routers.
Top comments
TKDBlackbelt
7 Nov 163#3
Had this router for a couple of years and it's superb. not heard of any large issues and average reviews are excellent
Latest comments (15)
bill888
9 Nov 16#15
fwiw, the RT-N56u was 'updated' in 2015. This newer cheaper 'B1' variant is made by Edimax for Asus. It is not the same model originally reviewed by smallnetbuilder in 2011. The original model had 4 internal aerials, the revised model only has 2 shared internal aerials.
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Recent Asus gear has been shockingly bad; I even had one of their mobos fall apart on me (a SATA port mounting and the cpu mounting both came off in my hand at less than 2 years old).
ShaolinPunk
8 Nov 161#13
Have had this router, ran it with both stock and Padavan firmware - Padavan is really good and has lots of different flavours depending on what you actually want the router to do.. Recent stock firmware is actually pretty decent.. No crashes to report from a trying to configure it perspective
Range is fantastic on 2.4 GHZ, less so on the 5GHZ network but that's to be expected. wired connectivity runs really well .. Currently have around 24-25 devices both wireless and wired into it & it runs fantastically.. I have extended the range with a range extender to so that everyone has fast NetFlix access on 5GHZ.. (we were previously going through some very thick walls ) :smiley: .. handles multiple NetFlix streams as well as gaming with low latency pretty well
No major issues from my side, the only thing i'd say is that during very, very hot days in the summer it did have a few issues with the heat & had to be reset.. but then so did I lol.... The CPU would perhaps need a bit more cooling, to be fair though.. it's really quiet as well..
Overall it's a very good router .. at £39 it's a damn good buy..
Vendee
8 Nov 16#12
I had one of these for almost 3 years. It was fine when it was working but it eventually failed on me. A bit of research showed that lots of people had the same issue. I then bought the RT N 66U which is ok but doesn't seem to have such good wifi coverage.
mepodman
7 Nov 16#11
liked it when it worked. I had two both had issues with wireless. Great shape to look at but mine was on a unit and with all the ethernet cables in it was difficult to get it to stay upright. Good functionality and easy to use.
jfhopkin
7 Nov 16#10
Been using one of these for a few years now, but only really happy with it once Padavan firmware was installed. Prior to that it was crashy - for example, changing a port forwarding crashed the router completely half of the time (but perseverance always paid off), it was tetchy about exactly how you booted it up, and it was commonplace for it to simply crash for no discernible reason.
Once Padavan's installed, it functions perfectly. The range is good, and speed fine for a Wireless-N router.
halster65
7 Nov 16#9
I also have this and been using it for over 2 years..rock solid with no issues! got. got a smart hub..but prefer this..
alexus
7 Nov 161#8
"Worlds Fastest Router" wow really..... (marketing from I guess it's launch......) should be a law against selling where they don't update benchmarks. If that's not true I feel it's miss selling and they should compensate you with the latest and fastest as that's what they claim to be selling.... Pet hates. :man:
Bogroll Warlord
7 Nov 161#7
Rock solid on Padavan firmware for years now. Best router I've had.
brian_lewis67
7 Nov 162#5
Had mine for a couple of years and it hasn't skipped a beat and is so much better than my Virgin router.
Deeco to brian_lewis67
7 Nov 16#6
Virgin requires Superhub to be on modem mode, right? I hate the fact you need to power 2 devices, for one job
Istanbul_Kop
7 Nov 161#4
Had it. Sold it. Major issues. Not worth the money imo.
TKDBlackbelt
7 Nov 163#3
Had this router for a couple of years and it's superb. not heard of any large issues and average reviews are excellent
ShroomHeadToad
7 Nov 161#2
Dated gear (2010/11?), overpriced without integrated adsl/vdsl modem.
Much as I love Asus stuff, this router has had numerous issues since launch, and then it is via Ebuyer, who I wouldnt touch again with a **** stick; after they repeatedly broke UK consumer laws over a DOA I tried to return.
If anyone knows that Asus have finally fixed it, please fell free to correct me.
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Opening post
Worlds Fastest Router
The RT-N56U is rated highly by SmallNetBuilder.com, the world's trusted media review website for networking devices. SmallNetBuilder tested the RT-N56U against its competitors, and it came out tops in 5GHz upload/download throughput. In light of this, SmallNetBuilder concluded the RT-N56U was one of the best performance Gigabit and dual-band Wireless routers in the market.
Dual-band for Lag-free Entertainment
Double your wireless performance and bandwidth with simultaneous 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands speed up to 300Mbps concurrently. While basic internet applications like browsing or file downloading can occur in 2.4GHz, wireless HD content streaming takes place in the 5GHz band at the same time, so both achieve optimized speeds and you enjoy smooth, buffer-free HD content streaming.
Gigabit Internet Surfing with Hardware NAT
Equipped with a capable hardware NAT acceleration engine and built-in Gigabit Ethernet, it gives you full Gigabit internet performance, making its WAN to LAN throughput up to 2-5 times that of traditional software-based NAT Gigabit routers.
Top comments
Latest comments (15)
Link to wikidevi for RT-N56u B1
Recent Asus gear has been shockingly bad; I even had one of their mobos fall apart on me (a SATA port mounting and the cpu mounting both came off in my hand at less than 2 years old).
Range is fantastic on 2.4 GHZ, less so on the 5GHZ network but that's to be expected. wired connectivity runs really well .. Currently have around 24-25 devices both wireless and wired into it & it runs fantastically.. I have extended the range with a range extender to so that everyone has fast NetFlix access on 5GHZ.. (we were previously going through some very thick walls ) :smiley: .. handles multiple NetFlix streams as well as gaming with low latency pretty well
No major issues from my side, the only thing i'd say is that during very, very hot days in the summer it did have a few issues with the heat & had to be reset.. but then so did I lol.... The CPU would perhaps need a bit more cooling, to be fair though.. it's really quiet as well..
Overall it's a very good router .. at £39 it's a damn good buy..
Once Padavan's installed, it functions perfectly. The range is good, and speed fine for a Wireless-N router.
Better value for money despite being only 2.4GHz single band: TP-Link TD-W9970 N300 Wireless VDSL2/ADSL Modem Router
Not voted.
If anyone knows that Asus have finally fixed it, please fell free to correct me.