A router that "requires" a certain internet speed to function???

[harshness]

The only reason to have a broadband minimum speed is if the system depends heavily on moving volumes of data to or from the Internet to function (overhead). Such dependency is surely not a good thing in a residential application.

Car analogy: A supercharger can add significant power to a normally aspirated internal combustion engine but if it takes upwards of 60hp to drive the supercharger, is it the win that you thought it was?

 

[mattv]

I can't think of a single (technical) reason for such a requirement or feature.

Disclaimer: my dayjob is systems engineering at Cisco.

 

[Juan]

Actually the fiber stops at a ONT ( optical network terminal)on the side of the house...converts the light to electricity..and then connects to modem....cable has their fiber ont on a telephone pole somewhere in the neighborhood and runs coax from there to a bunch of customers house...there is no special fiber modem but cable and fiber use different protocols...both proprietary

Sure you do, copper wire or fiber optic, it's still cable and they all require a modem except the fiber modem is specific to fiber. Copper wire cable modems and fiber modems are not interchangeable. I would suggest that you ask the provider exactly what the spec is they're asking for.

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[harshness]

I can't think of a single (technical) reason for such a requirement or feature.

The Meraki division might offer some exceptions.

 

[StanDarsh]

This thread is like a guessing game. The O.P. tells us what it "isn't" and witholds info necessary to answer his question.

Reminds me of the game "20 questions". I have better things to do. Buh bye.....

Oh geez. This is the equivalent of victim-shaming. I stated what i knew, which is that it's a router (only)...and it's some sort of mesh system. If I knew anything further i would have said so. It's not like I'm asking for people to guess and win a prize for the correct answer, I asked for ideas on what or why that speed requirement could be needed for a router.

 

[Radioguy41]

Actually the fiber stops at a ONT ( optical network terminal)on the side of the house...converts the light to electricity..and then connects to modem....cable has their fiber ont on a telephone pole somewhere in the neighborhood and runs coax from there to a bunch of customers house...there is no special fiber modem but cable and fiber use different protocols...both proprietary

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That's just not accurate. If fiber had no modem what, exactly, would the protocol communicate with? Coax is not run from the pole, fiber is run directly to the house and terminates at an ONT, either inside or outside of the house. That ONT functions as a modem and converts the fiber to Cat5 that can then be connected to your router (gee, just like a modem). I would suggest that you spend some time actually researching prior to posting.

 

[harshness]

Suffice it to say that fiber doesn't use DOCSIS protocol.

Fiber uses a media converter that converts from FX (fiber Ethernet) to TX (twisted pair Ethernet). The other part is a telco-style router than splits out TV, voice and data. It quite similar in function to a cable gateway but there nothing analog in the system that would require conversion by a modem.

 

[Juan]

You dont understand....the ONT has the laser...thats where light is converted to electricity...the modem connects to the ont..all fiber has to be converted to electricity...there is no modem that has a laser in it...cable also uses fiber..but the dont run it to your house...uverse also uses fiber but they convert in a terminal and run copper telco lines

That's just not accurate. If fiber had no modem what, exactly, would the protocol communicate with? Coax is not run from the pole, fiber is run directly to the house and terminates at an ONT, either inside or outside of the house. That ONT functions as a modem and converts the fiber to Cat5 that can then be connected to your router (gee, just like a modem). I would suggest that you spend some time actually researching prior to posting.

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[Juan]

I am talking in the house...tv has to have an electrical signal...I am not disagreeing with you...fios uses a digital cable box but it won't receive light...it has to have an electrical signal

Suffice it to say that fiber doesn't use DOCSIS protocol.

Fiber uses a media converter that converts from FX (fiber Ethernet) to TX (twisted pair Ethernet). The other part is a telco-style router than splits out TV, voice and data. It quite similar in function to a cable gateway but there nothing analog in the system that would require conversion by a modem.

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[EarDemon]

This smells of NetGear. They do stuff like this from time to time.

 

[harshness]

Cisco lofts dozens of trial balloons each year too. The like to have their name on everything.

 

[mattv]

The Meraki division might offer some exceptions.

There are no bandwidth requirements for meraki hardware or meraki management traffic. Management traffic is extremely minimal. (source)

Cisco lofts dozens of trial balloons each year too. The like to have their name on everything.

Cisco does idiotic things from time to time, but a router with a minimum internet connection to function would be ridiculous.

Now -- One thing this could be is a form of software-defined WAN service tied to a hardware device to delivery enterprise-class services to home-users or as a way to connect different branches of a business "securely" via internet without use of leased lines/fiber/MPLS/whatever . I could for sure see a use-case for a minimum speed requirement to be able to use SDWan connectivity.

 

[harshness]

Cisco does idiotic things from time to time, but a router with a minimum internet connection to function would be ridiculous.

This is why I find the TS's interest in such a product confounding other that on a "I know about something that you don't" basis.

Now -- One thing this could be is a form of software-defined WAN service tied to a hardware device to delivery enterprise-class services to home-users or as a way to connect different branches of a business "securely" via internet without use of leased lines/fiber/MPLS/whatever . I could for sure see a use-case for a minimum speed requirement to be able to use SDWan connectivity.

Who would want enterprise-class controls imposed upon their residential (or even small business) service?

Anything that begs for that kind of overhead is likely to suffer when broadband traffic is high and that's the polar opposite of what I want.

 

[StanDarsh]

This is why I find the TS's interest in such a product confounding other that on a "I know about something that you don't" basis.

It was a simple question. No need to add to it.

 

[EarDemon]

This is why I find the TS's interest in such a product confounding other that on a "I know about something that you don't" basis.Who would want enterprise-class controls imposed upon their residential (or even small business) service?

Me.

Having a SMB router gives me some of the advanced functionality that I take advantage of not found in normal consumer routers. Dual WAN, SSL VPN, G2G VPN, VLAN, Access Rules. If I had kids, I would get a lower end or used ASA and pay the yearly licensing just for enterprise grade content filtering. Facebook, blocked! Twitter, blocked! YouTube, blocked! All other social media filth, blocked!

Looking around the internet, there are many enthusiasts who buy off lease enterprise hardware, or pickup old stuff from their jobs and give it a new life at home. Someone who I used to work with is involved with their parents home-based business, they have six employees last I knew. Three of which being his parents and his wife. In the Spring after their new shop is built, I’m helping them redo their network. I got permission to take our decommissioned SonicWall NSA2600 from work. It will sit in their home office where the cable modems is, and feed a switch which will connect to another switch in their shop via fiber. They frequently go to trade shows , swap meets and other events, they’ll be able to use SSL VPN Client software to connect to their server back at home for their financial database and run the software from their laptops to enter transactions real time instead of keeping paper copies and doing it when they get back home. Also, his wife just had a baby not too long ago, there will be a small nursery in the house, with an IP enabled CCTV camera so she can keep on eye on the baby from out in the shop on her second monitor. I plan to create an access rule so that only the MAC of her PC can view the live stream.

I’m done with consumer level products and services where I can help it. These companies are being way too controlling and restrictive and make it a pain in the ass to customize and do things yourself. All of my networking hardware is Cisco Small Business, moved over to SEP for AV, next will be replacing PC hardware. My laptop will be replaced next year with an HP ZBook 17, the following year the desktop will be replaced with a ZStation Z6. If it was legally possible, I’d run Windows 10 LTSC.

 

[harshness]

Dual WAN, SSL VPN, G2G VPN, VLAN, Access Rules.

You can get that and more using Tomato or DDWRT (or even OpenWRT if you're a masochist) with most consumer routers. Of course needing Dual WAN and G2G is truly hardcore for a residence.

 

[EarDemon]

I ran third party firmware on routers before it was cool to do so. I ran Sveasoft (I think DDWRT was a spin off) on my 54G and 54GS back in 2004/2005. Yeah some of the additional features were cool, but I would rather have firmware that was developed by a team of paid professionals, then what I assume are just a bunch of open source volunteers. My router probably has more features stock than third party solutions have, features that I don't use or can even begin to understand. With third party, non factory supported solutions there is no expectation of things to work.

I don't consider dual WAN or tunnels hardcore for home use. Niche? Yes, for sure, it's stuff your average bear won't touch, but it's not totally unheard of to use in a home setting. Before gigabit fiber and cable became as widespread as they are today, enthusiasts were bringing in two fiber or cable subscriptions into their home and using dual WAN routers to bond them. I can load balance or fail over between four WAN sources, two Ethernet and two USB for cellular if I desire. If I had cellular reception I'd have a USB air card instead of HughesNet. Since my cable node is not backed up by battery I lose internet, landline phone and cell phone (on wifi calling) when the power goes out With dual WAN, as crappy as HughesNet is, at least I have internet and phone for as long as my battery backups last. I've seen enthusiasts who have two homes, who are snow birds or who have weekend cabins use G2G VPN tunnels to share files and media from one location to another.

What I consider hardcore is those that have dedicated full blown PCs that act as routers, have 10 Gb NICs in them, and use LAG on cable modems to achieve 1 Gb+ speeds. I've read online of people on gigabit tiers from Charter and Cox who do this, just so they can achieve the full overprovisioned 1200 Mbps as opposed to 950 Mbps

 

[harshness]

What I consider hardcore is those that have dedicated full blown PCs that act as routers, have 10 Gb NICs in them, and use LAG on cable modems to achieve 1 Gb+ speeds.

The options and flexibility of pfSense are pretty enticing relative to spending hundreds on a business router.

I dispute the value of in-house software designers vs engaged open source people. Having hundreds of eyes looking at something is valuable.

Some of the best commercial router software is based wholly or in part on open source code and the difference is that they've applied graphic design to the menus as opposed to the latest in networking technology.

 

[EarDemon]

The options and flexibility of pfSense are pretty enticing relative to spending hundreds on a business router.

I dispute the value of in-house software designers vs engaged open source people. Having hundreds of eyes looking at something is valuable.

Some of the best commercial router software is based wholly or in part on open source code and the difference is that they've applied graphic design to the menus as opposed to the latest in networking technology.

Depends on what you value more, time or money.

I personally have no desire to spend hours researching and experimenting with home grown DIY solutions. My router was $200, my access point was $250, and my two managed switches were $100 each. Not really bank breaking all things considered.

You can always make more money, but you can never make more time and I simply do not want nor need the aggravation when a $200 router can give me everything I currently want and more.

 

[harshness]

I personally have no desire to spend hours researching and experimenting with home grown DIY solutions.

Seem like you've set yourself up with the equipment necessary to micromanage your residential network ad infinitum so I wonder if you've just back-loaded your time expenditure with myriad options to control each packet where that control doesn't materially enhance the user experience.