Looking for Wireless Router with GREAT QoS

Posts: 12 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jul 24, 2007 Posts: 12

I have a lousy DSL serivce and need all the help I can get to improve the quality of the Vonage service. Can you suggest a wireless router that includes QoS to improve the Vonage as much as possible?
Thanks

Posts: 656 · Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 1:14 pm Post subject:

QOS features on a router will prioritize your LAN traffic for you so that you can give higher priority to the Vonage device via MAC, or by switch port, or by service, or by service port. The purpose of this is to provide a higher priority to pass Vonage packets in real time while queuing the others. This will allow you to run some other apps, web requests, downloads, etc.. without affecting the Voice quality.

I am only telling you this so that you understand that if your actual internet connection is sluggish due to latency or high packet loss, running QOS on your local network will not solve your issues. The QOS only provides priority between the PC's and devices to the router. Anything after the router is at the mercy of the internet.

As for choosing router with, my suggestion is an older model Linksys WRT54G or an older model Buffalo router which you can then run 3rd party firmware on. I recommend DD-WRT firmware. It has really robust features and the QOS works well. Of course your going to get many opinions from everyone who will answer you on here as everyone has a preference and different experiences. Me personally, I cannot use a standard store bought router. For my needs I use a Cisco 871 and its QOS engine works perfectly.

Posts: 323 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Jan 29, 2006 Posts: 323

VonTechMgr hits is right on the head so I won't hash over any of that.

With the routers he mentions there is another option, the Linksys WRT54GL. This is the current model that allows 3rd party firmware to be loaded.

The common firmware versions that people use for better QoS are DD-WRT and Tomato.

Both provide excelent QoS options at a reasonable price.

You can generally find the WRT54GL for around $50 from online retailers.

I like Tomato b/c its was very easy to setup and configure.

Posts: 12 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jul 24, 2007 Posts: 12

Thanks to both of you. I will check those out.

Posts: 81 · Vonage Forum Senior Joined: Sep 26, 2008 Posts: 81

If you want a "Good" QOS capable router you will want to spend a little more money. I would look into the Cisco 800 series wireless routers, or perhaps just the cisco 520 series.
There have been some issues when flashing wrt54g with ddwrt firmware in particular if you have wrt54g ver 5 and newer. It may just become your next favorite paper weight. Eek

Posts: 12 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jul 24, 2007 Posts: 12

I'm going with the WRT54GL.

Is this the correct place for the Tomato firware? http://www.polarcloud.com/tomato/

...and if so, do you have any tips for configuring it with Vonage to have the highest classification for QoS?

Thanks

Posts: 323 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Jan 29, 2006 Posts: 323

Yes, you have the right link to the Tomato site. I know it look like an unassuming site, but that is the correct link.

There is also a Wiki site here that is helpful since Tomato lacks a manual: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Tomato_Firmware

What you should to is to set the Vonage device to the highest priority when you setup QoS. I set it by MAC address since this never changes, but you can set it up by IP address as well.

Also look at this site for how to properly setup QoS in general for Vonage.

http://vonage.nmhoy.net/qos.html

There are also some notes on linksysinfo.org that talk about QoS on Tomato. Just look at the Tomato forum there.

Posts: 12 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jul 24, 2007 Posts: 12

So I entered a QoS rule that says:

From: Mac address, Class:Highest, TCP/UDP, Transferred 0-200kb

Upload speed for me right now is up to 250kb. Does this sound right?

Posts: 323 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Jan 29, 2006 Posts: 323

RedCoat999 wrote:

So I entered a QoS rule that says:

From: Mac address, Class:Highest, TCP/UDP, Transferred 0-200kb

Upload speed for me right now is up to 250kb. Does this sound right?

I would remove the Transferred limit, although given the value I'm not sure it will matter.

This is what I have setup.

From: Mac address, Class:Highest, Any Protocol. No transfer limits

Also make sure that on the Basic Settings you have the Max Bandwidth in the Outbound section set properly. If you were using Nate Hoy's guide this is where you need to put the 90-95% of your upstream bandwidth.

Posts: 12 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jul 24, 2007 Posts: 12

Thank you very much