The hidden costs of multi-gigabit fiber Internet: A cautionary tale

Gigabit Internet? Feh, that’s for suckers. At least that’s what I assumed because the technician was driving away after freshly “wiring” our dwelling with multi-gigabit web service.

In my case, I had drained the final little bit of service life from Ma Bell’s twisted pair copper wires at 100Mbps down and 20Mbps up. I traded that relic of the 19th century for Sonic’s new Fiber To The Home service, which rewarded me with “up to 10Gbps down” and “up to 10Gbps down.” While the technician didn’t fairly hit that pace, I used to be joyful to see ~9Gbps from the tech’s ThinkPad laptop utilizing a Thunderbolt 3 10Gbps Ethernet adapter on my modem, err, Optical Network Terminal.

But reasonably than get pleasure from my ultra-fast Internet I spotted I had a significant downside: None of my client networking {hardware} was as much as snuff.

The onerous seek for a worthy router

My Sonic ONT serves up packets through a 10Gb Ethernet port that plugs into my dwelling community. But like 99 % of client routers, meaning plugging a 10Gb connection in to a 1Gb port on my router. That’s a tough bottleneck which suggests I’d by no means get pleasure from something above 1Gb of the web service I used to be paying for. Ugh.

Even worse, my major router—a now-elderly Wi-Fi 5-based Asus RT-AC88U with a further Asus Blue Cove Wi-Fi 5 mesh node related through Gigabit Ethernet—was unable to hit speeds above 500Mbps in my testing. Sure, I may have simply been proud of a 5x enhance in obtain speeds and a 25x enhance in add speeds over my earlier ISP however my “I’m missing out” intuition sparked many sleepless nights making an attempt to determine the most affordable method to squeeze every part I may from my multi-gig Internet. Do I would like it? No, after all not, but when I’m going to have the ability to brag about 10Gig Internet, I wanted to have not less than one PC that might hit these speeds.

Looking for a router that will get me 10Gb in, and 10Gb out, I used to be shocked to discover a dearth of precise consumer-grade (aka consumer-priced) and consumer-styled networking gear that labored. When I imply consumer-styled, I imply one thing that appears prefer it belongs in your house, not a rack mount unit you stole from an information middle. (Yes, I’m taking a look at you, Unifi Dream Machine Pro.)

Netgear’s new Quad-Band Mesh AXE11000 regarded promising however even it has limitations. The new mesh router system encompasses a single 10GbE WAN connection which it will probably use to feed the Wi-Fi 6 mesh purchasers, however wired purchasers are restricted to its single 2.5GbE plus three 1GbE connections. Add in its steep price ticket of $1,500 for a three pack (I solely wanted two however there’s no possibility for that) and I needed to preserve wanting.

Asus’s ROG Rapture GT-AXE1100 and different superior Wi-Fi 6E routers additionally regarded interesting as I may preserve my present Asus AI Mesh community, however curiously, all of Asus’ present Wi-Fi 6E routers max out with 2.5GbE WAN connections.

My reply got here from a viewer of our Full Nerd podcast, who tipped me off to a configuration that will work with out wrecking the financial institution: Asus’s barely older RT-AX89X router.

The RT-AX89X is restricted to Wi-Fi 6 and is “only” twin band, which suggests utilizing it for a mesh community in a wi-fi mode would restrict community speeds. Although I’d miss Wi-Fi 6E, the dual-band didn’t concern me as I’d nonetheless use Gigabit Ethernet to connect with the mesh community. But it was worthwhile for a functionality the RT-AX89X options that makes it pretty distinctive amongst client {hardware}: two 10Gbps port, one utilizing Ethernet and the opposite utilizing SFP+. SFP+ is optical-based know-how and fairly uncommon in consumer-grade networking {hardware}.

The router sells for $400 on Amazon however I cheaped out and purchased a unit off eBay for $329. Although it was listed as used, it was truly a sealed unit and appeared to by no means have been used or opened.

More {hardware} complications

Unfortunately getting 10Gb into the router was simply half the issue. Although many more recent high-end PCs characteristic 2.5 Gb Ethernet ports, mine didn’t and I used to be left with fuddy duddy Gigabit Ethernet. I’ve a spare 10Gb Ethernet community card however that wouldn’t assist me. Why? Remember the Asus router’s remaining 10Gb port makes use of SFP+ over optical, not old style Ethernet.

That despatched me again to the drafting board if I needed my PC to entry that candy multi-gig service (and I did). The reply: Buying a 10G SFP+ network card on Amazon ($99.99) together with a 2-meter 10G SFP+ cable ($16.99). That would lastly get my desktop the multi-gig Internet it deserves when it arrives.

But what about different units on the community? Obviously, everybody else in my household must slum it with 1Gb connections to the Internet, however shifting to the brand new router did unlock a number of actual perks for everybody. While my older router couldn’t break 500Mbps even over Gigabit Ethernet, the newer Asus RT-AX89X had no points getting the entire wired PCs to 1Gbps speeds. Wireless over its Wi-Fi 6 was additionally a lot improved to about 800Mbps versus the 400Mbps-500Mbps of my older Wi-Fi 5 router. Perhaps extra importantly, the entire PCs on the router would additionally share from a a lot bigger 10Gbps pipe reasonably than a 1Gbps pipe as effectively, which suggests a number of PCs may obtain at close to most Gigabit speeds concurrently as an alternative of bogging it down.

Amazon

I did think about taking the 10G SFP+ connection from the router and connecting it to a 10G SFP+ change akin to this NetGear Multi-Gigabit switch. That would give me a further 10Gb port, together with a number of 2.5Gb and 5Gb Ethernet ports to share amongst different wired PCs, and permit me to run a 2.5Gbps run to the Asus AI Mesh node (which itself must be up to date to help 10Gbps too) however at $390, it was getting too wealthy for my blood once more. It’s additionally much more {hardware} to run off of my uninterruptible energy provide which suggests much more restricted run time throughout an influence outage. Yes, I may additionally improve my UPS too, however that will coming into the territory of the youngsters’s story of the King, the Mice and the Cheese.

This, frankly, is the hidden value of multi-gig Internet nobody talks about. We’ve grown accustomed to a single router (or a single mesh router pack) supplying you with every part you want out of the field. With Gigabit Ethernet that’s usually true, however on the planet of multi-gig web, we’re now on the stage the place the uncooked pace out of your Internet supplier can far surpass at this time’s client networking {hardware}.

Obviously when you can dwell with “just” gigabit speeds, your present {hardware} (if pretty new) will largely be nice. But when you bounce onto your ISP’s provide of 2Gig, 5Gig or 10Gig Internet, be ready to throw out most your present community gear to get probably the most out of that high-speed connection you’re paying for.