ASUS AC5300 and AC88U Router Review

RT-AC88U

If the RC5300 focuses on a ultra strong Wireless network the RT-AC88U has the same attention placed on it’s wired connectivity, offering 8 Gigabit LAN port and support for link aggregation.

What this router provides you is a great deal of control, giving you full control over your wired and wireless networks with AiProtection which will automatically prevent users accessing known malicious websites and and allows you to set parental controls for specific IP addresses, restricting the viewing of adult content for defined PCs/ connections. 

 

 

 

The ASUS AC88U is the only ASUS router to have 8 Gagabit LAN ports, which is double that of most traditional routers, allowing you to connect more devices with Ethernet simultaneously, making this a strong center for your home wired network.

On the wireless side this router uses Broadcom NitroQAM technology which can boost your 5 GHz data rates up to 2167 Mbps and your 2.4 GHz up to 1000 Mbps. This allows you to achieve a dual-band data rate of up to 3167Mb/s, which is a extremely fast connection. 

  

 If you are a heavy gamer you can use ASUS’ “Game Boost” Function to prioritize your gaming traffic, allowing you to reduce your Ping time, variation and have the best experience that is possible on your internet connection. What this router can also do is find the optimal way of routing your internet traffic around the world in order to get you data to take the quickest and most efficient route, giving you consistently lower ping and minimal packet loss, though this can only be applied to a single device at a time. 

When buying your own router one of the key reasons to do so is to give yourself full control of your own home network, which can be done through traditional means or through the ASUS Router App, which allows you to monitor your network traffic in real time, share your WiFi with your family or guests easily or even update your router’s firmware with ease. 

 

  

 

What the AC88U is designed to be is an exceptionally strong core to your home network, allowing you to connect more devices to it using Gigabit Ethernet than pretty much all other consumer routers. With it’s gaming oriented features this router is able to fully optimize your gaming experience and provide you with the most stable connection with the lowest ping possible. 

With support for Link aggregation this router is ideal for use with your home server or Network attached storage device, allowing your data to be easily transferred all over your household. 

 

Specifications Rundown

There is a lot of hardware that differentiates this router from the norm, and even from the AC5300.

While most routers use a single CPU to handle all traffic, but the AC5300 is made with heavy workloads in mind so it is instead uses a powerful Broadcom BCM4709C0 1.4GHz dual core processor to handle general processing and a separate Broadcom BCM4366 processor to handle WiFi traffic. 

In order to handle this router’s 4 additional Gigabit LAN ports it also includes an extra realtek controller chip in order to handle the extra load. 

To put it into basic terms with everything that ASUS has added to the router there has been a significant hardware upgrade to back it up, meaning that this router will be able to withstand the high pressures that an enthusiast user can place on the device.