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Hello,

I’ve been searching for awhile but am still not confident in the path I should take for our situation, so I was hoping someone could help me (and learn/document at the same time). Most searches bring up results for businesses that need at least 1 of the features that come with small business routers.

Currently an old router has been going down nightly, requiring a reboot every morning. They asked me to replace the router (I wear many different hats for small businesses <10 users). I told them I’d try my best but I am not a networking engineer/admin.

Despite not having tons of networking knowledge (I do web development & digital marketing consulting), the network doesnt seem to be complicated (at first look). We have a modem connected to some ancient consumer linksys router. The router is the issue it seems. Rebooting the router every morning to keep the network up. This router is consumer grade, worked fine for 5+ years (I didnt install the network) and is connected to small business Cisco switches to the computers.

We have no need for VPN, DMZ, content filters, VLANs, firewall (though if it is recommended, I’d pick one up, learn it, and integrate it) etc…We have zero servers, no need for them in this situation.

99.9% is web based with a larger organization. They login into their computers, but everything is browser based, including uploading/storing documents through the larger organization.

The router settings seem very basic, DHCP, not really anything other than plug and play it seems. Then again, this is coming from someone who has limited home networking knowledge. IMO, it doesnt look much different from a home network just looking at the router settings (and how the computers in the office are connected).

Can anyone recommend a router for this situation? Something that can be setup to replace the old router by someone with limited networking knowledge? I’d love to be able to learn some Cisco CLIs or other devices with extensive knowledge, but we are limited here (both knowledge and money). What info would I need to gather from the old router to transfer, or would I need to know, to make the new router act like the old one (without the hiccups)?

Thank you

@Cisco

6 Spice ups
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Based on what you’ve said, the only info you’ll need from the old router is the ISP assigned IP (static or Auto) and the IP range you are assigning to your network (DHCP server).

As for what to use, what kind of price range are you looking to stay in? Most of the basic business routers are fully GUI driven so are pretty simple to setup.

5 Spice ups
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Many options here. What speed up/down is your internet connection?

2 Spice ups
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I would probably start by taking screen shots of each configuration page on the router. This will make things easier if you hit a snag while installing the replacement router. As Larry mentioned, you’ll want to write down your WAN and LAN settings also. While your at it and if your old router supports it, create a backup of the configuration so it can be loaded later on just in case the router defaults it’s settings.

3 Spice ups
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I haven’t personally used them yet, but I’ve heard a lot of people recommend the Ubiquiti EdgeRouter lite and do want to try it myself. Apparently the EdgeOS on it is pretty easy to use and pretty powerful. Might check that out.

http://www.amazon.com/EdgeRouter-ERLite-3-512MB-Ethernet-Router/dp/B00CPRVF5K

https://www.ubnt.com/edgemax/edgerouter-lite/

3 Spice ups
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Thanks for responding,

I was hoping to stay within $200. From my research on Spiceworks and Google, it seems I can be within this range for our particular situation.

Some of the routers, based on my searches, seem so overkill and complicated for this network. This business will not go over 12 users (without ANY servers) anytime soon.

As far as GUI routers, can I just replicate the info from the current router to the new router? Is there any other info I would need to gather to ensure things work like they did before?

I know there is tons more to networking, but I guess, my main question would be based on the info I provided above, could I just replicate the info from the old router to the new router and then switch them out?

The end goal is to replace the router with a new router to work exactly the same.

Thanks,

T

1 Spice up
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If you want something modern and business class that is dead simple to setup and manage and has awesome phone support look at Cisco Meraki MX64.

And yes as DialJC said take screenshots before the old router dies and look at things like DHCP on the LAN side and Internet settings such as public IP and port forwarding that you may need to replicate on a new router/firewall.

4 Spice ups
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You can’t backup from one and restore to another, but you can certainly enter the same information. If it’s just straight Internet access, the IP info is all you’ll need. The PCs will never know anything changed.

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They are under the business services for our local ISP, think it is 30 Mbs/6Mbs.

We have a monopoly of an ISP here.

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Ive looked into the Ubiquiti routers based on my searches with Spiceworks. Definitely seem to be what we are looking for, just dont want to get into a situation where you need to be a network admin to set it up.

Thanks

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Thanks, that provides a big answer (and one I was most worried about) to my numerous questions.

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To be honest, for that kind of money, off the shelf Netgear is going to be as good as anything else. As mentioned above, just make note of your settings. A qualified tech could set one of these up in 10 minutes.

1 Spice up
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When I was a field tech, I ran into a lot of businesses with “Home” routers. Without a need for VPN, filtering or any other bells and whistles, then a $200 router should be enough. I would recommend anything but the Linksys brand for the most part though. We stopped using them a year or two ago because they would fail on a regular basis. The brand has tanked in our minds, (or our luck was extremely poor at the time).

If you’re looking to get into a little bit of networking, or just want more control over what is happening, you could try using a router with DD-WRT, (you might even be able to put it on your current router, but that thing is old and it may not be worth it). The free version of Smoothwall also comes to mind, (need an old/spare PC for it though).

Good luck.

2 Spice ups
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Go with a Cisco Small Business RV-042 or RV-121 router. It will be straight-forward to configure, economical, reliable, have excellent performance, and most importantly superior support directly from Cisco. With Ubiquiti, you are on your own, they don’t offer formal product support, only a community blog and email support that they might return messages in a day or so.

3 Spice ups
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With all of the recent vulnerabilities in the last couple of years that have been widely reported for consumer routers, I would be wary of installing a consumer router in a business environment.

Many manufacturers didn’t even bother providing updated firmware to fix these vulnerabilities:

  1. In a timely manner.
  2. Many older router models will never have an update released.

Any of the business class routers will have a learning curve to get setup, some better than others. You could probably work your way through setting up a consumer router, but if you’re not somewhat learned with networking, routers, and such, you may have a little difficulty with a business router and may require some help getting it setup.

While a consumer router may be easier, may be cheaper, but also may not provide proper security and updates to keep the network as secure as it should be.

The network already has Cisco switches, so why reduce performance and security by going consumer for the router?

Some business routers include an option to have wireless built in with some models, while others require that you get a separate Access Point for wireless. You didn’t specifically mention if anyone even used Wireless at all or what the office layout would need to be for coverage.

Cisco RV line or Cisco Meraki would probably be what I would recommend for your network from what I’ve researched and read on Spiceworks from similar posts. I can’t specifically say anything about ease of installation, setup and configuration on this equipment, though. The Cisco Meraki routers do have yearly licensing costs. I don’t remember if Cisco RV does, but I didn’t think they did.

I have personally setup a Ubiquiti ERLite-3 and one of their Access Points (AP-AC for me). If no one uses wireless, you don’t need to add an Access Point. If you do, you can probably get away with a cheaper Access Point. Initial install and configuration for me had a couple of glitches, but I was able to get it sorted out. Ubiquiti doesn’t have any extra licensing costs and equipment cost was reasonable, but what you give up for maybe a little cheaper equipment can be higher-level support for any issues that may arise during setup or help troubleshooting anything that may arise in the future.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help or even hire someone to install and properly configure the equipment. You don’t want improper configuration to cause sporadic problems, issues and especially insecurity for your network.

2 Spice ups
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Years ago when we had a much smaller set up we had similar problems with a consumer grade router and I recall the problem was the number of concurrent connections. The quick and dirty solution was to fit a cheap time switch to reboot it at night, but we soon upgraded.

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Old + Linksys + Consumer = Root cause of problem.

I’m running a RV220W at my school although I have it set up to just route (DHCP and DNS are handled by the server) I run a RV-042 at home which replaced a similarly cranky Linksys consumer unit. In both cases, the re-booting issues pretty much went away.

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Thanks to your responses, I got the router switched out and up and running. Unfortunately it is a Linksys N600 that was previously bought to provide wireless, to save costs. I am guessing I will need to replace the router soon for a router recommended here. I already recommended a better router.

2 Spice ups
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At least you are up and operating now, giving you time to research and recommend the proper solution without being under the pressure of a “IT’S NOT WORKING, FIX IT NOW!” situation.

For proper security and peace of mind, consumer equipment really doesn’t belong in a business setting.

From what I’ve read and heard reported in even the last 2 years, I’d almost go to the extent of saying it doesn’t belong in home/consumer settings either. The manufacturers of consumer devices are not stepping-up to properly notify, address, and fix security vulnerabilities in reasonable time-frames (if they even address them at all).

Now you can relax, take a breath, take your time, do some research, even get some test/trial equipment and find the equipment that meets the needs of the company.

Preparing for it like this, feel free tell the powers-that-be to start putting side some funds to provide a proper budget for it when the time comes and you decide on a solution.

If applicable, feel free to mark any additional answers that helped you with Helpful Post, and decide if there is a Best Answer to your question/situation.