Linksys E4200 with >100mbps UFB makes me sad.

Forums › New Zealand Broadband › Linksys E4200 with >100mbps UFB makes me sad.

1 | 2 | 3

3240 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#1079692 3-Jul-2014 23:48

kimxk:
insane:
Inphinity: Is it the v1 or v2 E4200? The v1 will max out at about 120Mbps unless someone has come up with some seriously efficient third party firmware for it. Haven't tried the v2 but I hear they are better...

It is the v1 as I don't believe v2 supports TomatoUSB, I bought it a few years ago. Reading other forums etc it seems to be a common problem with this router and 3rd party firmware which don't support FastNAT, everyone seems to be OK on stock firmware as it does.

Actually, I believe Tomato does support FastNat, at least in Shibby builds through the bcm_nat module.

You lose QOS, iptraffic etc of course.

See http://tomato.groov.pl/?p=450

Mate! nice find, that's helped it a fair bit, but does prove I do have v1 hardware. If I run 'top' I can see sirq reaches 99% so it's maxing out. Tomorrow the plan change to an untagged port will go through, so I'll be able to test stock firmware and see if that's somehow even more efficient, although I'm probably dreaming if I think it'll get another 80mbps. Believe a website someone linked to earlier showed that v1 hardware tops out around 135mbps WAN to LAN.

Guess I'll be getting another router, have heard the Asus AC66U packs some serious grunt, although there's probably a better bang for buck option?

kimxk

74 posts

Master Geek

#1079767 4-Jul-2014 09:20

insane:

Guess I'll be getting another router, have heard the Asus AC66U packs some serious grunt, although there's probably a better bang for buck option?

As an aside, you definitely have a E4200V1 as Tomato doesn't work on a v2 as it uses a Marvell chip.

Tomato has always been for Broadcom CPUs, but Shibby has Tomato running on a new dual core ARM CPU based Netgear R7000.

See:
http://tomato.groov.pl/?p=618
http://www.linksysinfo.org/index.php?threads/tomato-for-arm-routers.69719/

It's still in the "test" stage at this point.

Disclaimer: I don't have one, only going by what's in the forums and on Shibbys page.

Edit: Shibby posts WAN to LAN benchmarks here:

http://www.linksysinfo.org/index.php?threads/typical-cpu-usage-for-wan-lan-throughput.70151/

Zeon

3916 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1080809 4-Jul-2014 11:22

Does NAT have much of an effect on CPU?

Speedtest 2019-10-14

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#1080816 4-Jul-2014 11:30

Zeon: Does NAT have much of an effect on CPU?

Yes.

The biggest factor though is packet size - you can have a router easily capable of routing 1Gbps with 1500 byte packets that might drop to ~40Mbps with 64 byte packets.

Aredwood

3885 posts

Uber Geek

#1081269 5-Jul-2014 00:27

Another possible option: The Edge Router Lite http://www.gowifi.co.nz/coming-soon-new-products/ubiquiti-edgerouter-lite.html Im using one on Snap 100mbit fibre. (PPPoE) The latest firmware - V1.5 (according to those on the Ubiquity forums) allows the Edge Router to easily do 950+ Mbit on PPPoE connections. And they say that the older firmware will do approx 200Mbit on PPPoE. Note that you will need to do some CLI config to enable hardware acceleration on PPPoE to get Gigabit speeds. Supposedly you no longer need to do CLI config to get an Edge router working with VLAN tagging on PPPoE anymore. Will find out when I upgrade my one. Come on Snap - Bring back the 200Mbit plans. And roll on the Gigabit plans - Im ready.

insane

3240 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#1081274 5-Jul-2014 00:50

That's some good info, guess you guys will be prepared for when we see RSPs launch these plans.

I'm still waiting for Chorus to remove the tagging from my port so I haven't been able to test with the stock firmware. I actually saw the notification from Chorus today regarding the new 200/xxx mbps plans, and with it confirmation I'll have to move to one of the new official plans from my test one. It's looking like our staff plans will be limited to 100/50 and perhaps 100/100, so all this messing around with firmware to get > 100mbps may no longer be relevant for me, unless I'm happy to pay the difference.

chevrolux

4962 posts

Uber Geek
Inactive user

#1081868 6-Jul-2014 15:24

I would of thought that the PPP overhead would play more of a role in your issues than the VLAN tagging?

A RB951G-2HnD would hack 200Mpbs I would of thought even with PPP, NAT firewalll etc. Can't do much better for $100!
Or maybe just go all out and whack a Cloud Core in - 36 CPU cores!!!!

The EdgeRouter is cool (we had one on our office UFB for a while) but very immature compared to Mikrotik/RouterOS.

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Free setup code: R587125ERQ6VE. Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

insane

3240 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#1081890 6-Jul-2014 16:46

chevrolux: I would of thought that the PPP overhead would play more of a role in your issues than the VLAN tagging?

A RB951G-2HnD would hack 200Mpbs I would of thought even with PPP, NAT firewalll etc. Can't do much better for $100!
Or maybe just go all out and whack a Cloud Core in - 36 CPU cores!!!!

The EdgeRouter is cool (we had one on our office UFB for a while) but very immature compared to Mikrotik/RouterOS.

Getting the tagging removed is just so I can run stock firmware, I wouldn't expect it to make much difference at all, maybe give me 2.5mbps as there won't be any realtime CIR.

sorceror

163 posts

Master Geek

#1082472 7-Jul-2014 14:48

surely it would be simpler to just tag VLAN 10 on the PC NIC and use the built in windows PPP dialer?

insane

3240 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#1082487 7-Jul-2014 15:43

sorceror: surely it would be simpler to just tag VLAN 10 on the PC NIC and use the built in windows PPP dialer?

Yes that would work, I don't doubt the port is good for line rate, however I have many many devices at home needing internet access, and while I do leave my PC on and could use it as a router, I don't want to have to.

I work for the RSP so changing the port really isn't any more effort. I'll test tonight and see how it goes...

insane

3240 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#1083802 7-Jul-2014 23:31

OK so got the port untagged, tested with stock Linksys firmware v1.05 which resulted in a MAX throughput 64/48mbps with all non essential router services turned off, rather disappointing.

Re-flashed with TomatoUSB Shibby + modprobe bcm_nat driver, getting 120/48mbps

Then with ONT plugged directly into PC with PPPoE dialer 191/47mbps

At least I know the router will comfortably handle 100/50, and presumably 100/100 too, no good for any other Chorus UFB plan

D1NZ

194 posts

Master Geek

#1083806 7-Jul-2014 23:34

insane: OK so got the port untagged, tested with stock Linksys firmware v1.05 which resulted in a MAX throughput 64/48mbps with all non essential router services turned off, rather disappointing.

Re-flashed with TomatoUSB Shibby + modprobe bcm_nat driver, getting 120/48mbps

Then with ONT plugged directly into PC with PPPoE dialer 191/47mbps

At least I know the router will comfortably handle 100/50, and presumably 100/100 too, no good for any other Chorus UFB plan

time to slap a pfsense behide your ONT maybe

Ragnor

8222 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1083980 8-Jul-2014 11:02

insane:

At least I know the router will comfortably handle 100/50, and presumably 100/100 too, no good for any other Chorus UFB plan

The 4200 is actually pretty old now launched what 4 years ago in 2010/2011, having the Broadcom 480MHz CPU is going to hold it back.

Asus has been pumping out pretty decent models (which Shibby has been supporting) RT-N66U or RT-AC66U having 600MHZ CPU's, RT-AC56U or RT-AC68U having 800MHz CPU's

Ragnor

8222 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#1083981 8-Jul-2014 11:06

D1NZ:

time to slap a pfsense behide your ONT maybe

You need at around a 2Ghz cpu to get 200Mbit throughput with pfsense according to https://www.pfsense.org/hardware/ so you'd be looking at a mATX or mITX build.

sorceror

163 posts

Master Geek

#1083982 8-Jul-2014 11:07

insane:
Then with ONT plugged directly into PC with PPPoE dialer 191/47mbps

tell your techies to up their shapers, the 200/50 plan is a 'right performing' one which means you should expect real world throughput to be above 200/50

1 | 2 | 3