I replaced my old ASUS RT-N12 with a new ASUS RT-AX3000 last week and it 10x my bandwidth!
The previous router was purchased in 2017. It was a time when I was still single, no kid, and still renting a one-room apartment. All I needed at the time was something functional to keep my laptop and phone connected to the internet. But that’s far from the case right now.
Things are different 5 years later. With a family and a few smart gadgets, the number of devices has tripled. The web experience is sluggish; pages takes longer to load, video played at lower resolution, unexpected disconnection, and router RAM usage constantly occupied at 90%. This is an upgrade that’s going to happen sooner or later.
It got me thinking, what’s the line between “still works” and “need to be replaced”? Obviously, the old router still functions and I could live with it most of the time. But it exhausts me, I feel anxious when having to do a webinar at home, I knew the signal risks degrading so I carried a ethernet cable. These tiny incidents, although not often, breaks the purpose of a router. It’s a tool, and a tool needs to be functional and needs to be trusted. It’s functional, but it can’t be trusted, I think that’s what drove me to replace it.
Plus, the old one’s been running for 5 years, so it’s also about time.
