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94 MAXIMUMPC HOL 2021
↘ submit your questions to: [email protected]Router Review
Improvements
Hello, I noticed in your
review of the Asus ROG
GS-AX 5400 router that
your ping times and upload
speeds in wired mode were
not so good. It seems as
though the internet uplink
with which it was tested is
limited. It might have been
better if you'd tested it in
a corporate setting with
faster upload speeds and
better latency. That way, we
could see what the limits
are on the router.
I had to replace a
Netgear router that was
surprisingly bad with Wi-
Fi speeds, even though
its wired performance
was good. By having your
internet upload as the
bottleneck, we’ll never
know whether the Wi-Fi has
a decent performance both
up and down.
Thanks as always
for an informative and
entertaining magazine. It
was nice to see your article
about quiet builds; that’s
one of my main areas of
interest. The DDR 5 article
was great, too. I love to see
this kind of stuff because it
helps me at work. Believe it
or not, on our Dell servers,
850GiB/s NVME’s are state-of-the-art—and those
are the latest R640s!
So the stuff you present
is definitely a look into
the future for me. The
gaming gear is always
leading edge. – M. SchwagerEDITOR-IN-CHIEF, ZAK
STOREY, RESPONDS: You
raise some interesting
points there, and I have
to agree with you. It’s
one of the reasons why
we’ve shied away from
networking reviews
over the years. Future
is, understandably,
wary about letting us
plug routers into its
networks directly. At our
main offices, we have a
separate “review” network
upon which most of the
Maximum PC machines
are situated. Last time I
checked, we still weren’t
allowed to pop routers on
it for any length of time,
due to potentially opening
up security holes. Our IT
department has always
been strict on that.
The second reason is
simply that we haven’t
been in the offices for any
length of time. That said,
as I’m departing, I’m going
to hand the trusty Asus
RT-AX88U over to the teamand advise that they test it
in the office. It hasn't got
the best line, but you’re 100
percent right, it will show
whether there are any
weak points in the router’s
configuration or hardware.
On the silent PC angle, I
couldn’t agree more. It has
been a big driver behind
my liquid-cooling pursuits
over the years. I’m also
glad you’re enjoying the
content. It’s always difficult
writing about things that
haven’t quite launched yet
and trying to predict what’s
coming, but Christian did a
great job with that piece.
Next issue is also our
Tech Preview 2022 edition,
where the team will be
going into detail about what
they expect to see in the
future. Jarred is covering
CPUs and GPUs, while
Jeremy will be sorting out
the storage and monitors,
so that should be good!Network Topics
Hi there! I love the
magazine, and I'm a long-
time subscriber. A reader
recently requested reviews
of Wi-Fi routers, and the
response was, basically,
“it’s difficult”. Things
such as the home layout,
construction materials,local interference, make
results very user-specific.
So my suggestion is
why not write a how-to on
the methodology to test
your Wi-Fi network for
coverage, signal strength,
or throughput? I have been
thinning out my Maximum
PC archives and stumbled
across some good network
articles from early 2013 ,
called “Monitor your home
network with NetWorx”
and “Three steps to better
broadband connection”.
In the past, I’ve used
NetStumbler to drive
around searching for
open Wi-Fi when it was
not so prevalent. It also
did decent bar graphs on
signal strength as I roam
about my own house. So,
I would love to see an
article that covers how to
measure your bandwidth,
signal strength, and
coverage with tools such as
NetStumbler/NetWorx or
something more current;
and also the steps you’d
use to try and optimize
coverage and throughput
using these tools to adjust
router positioning, antenna
positioning, and whatever
else you think would help.
Cleaning out more back
issues in my library, I found