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Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

tijara33
Pro
Posts: 1,360
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Registered: ‎22-06-2012

Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

My old & trusty Asus router is playing up so it's time for a change. You experts on here give glowing reports about the Billion 8800 routers. What I would like to know is if it is really worth my while investing the extra cash for the 8800 AXL? I'm not a gamer, I just require a fast & reliable internet connection throughout a 4 bedroom house.
I have read reports that the GUI isn't too user friendly but I can always use the Billion tech. support to help me there.
All advice will be most welcome & many thanks in advance.
10 REPLIES 10
Oldjim
Resting Legend
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Registered: ‎15-06-2007

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

The 8800NL GUI is very friendly - at least I had no problems other than setting up a guest wifi network with full isolation
Only you can decide whether you want the extra bits with the AXL - mainly the dual wifi bands and the gigabit LAN
tijara33
Pro
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Registered: ‎22-06-2012

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

Quote
mainly the dual wifi bands and the gigabit LAN

Thanks Jim. I understand the dual wifi bands but what is the advantage of the gigabit LAN?
Oldjim
Resting Legend
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Registered: ‎15-06-2007

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

If your other computers etc. have gigabit LAN cards and you move large files between them then it is 10 times faster (unless your hard drives limit you) otherwise there is no advantage
tijara33
Pro
Posts: 1,360
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Registered: ‎22-06-2012

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

Quote
If your other computers etc. have gigabit LAN cards

Huh
I guess that NL will do fine!! Thanks Jim, is the wireless range OK?
Oldjim
Resting Legend
Posts: 38,460
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Registered: ‎15-06-2007

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

I don't know as I didn't have any problems with the Plusnet ones
jafreer
Aspiring Pro
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Registered: ‎13-10-2012

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

Quote from: Oldjim
(unless your hard drives limit you)

And although slightly off-topic, a SSD (solid state drive) is a great investment to speed up your system. Hard drives are often the slowest link in your system, and a SSD is blazing fast. I bought one for my laptop and the difference was amazing. I got rid of that laptop to buy a better one and whilst I wait for it, I put the SSD in an older laptop that I had previously written off because it was slow. The old laptop is actually performing great with the SSD, and if nothing else it proves that the original hard drive was the weakest link in the system.
Apologies for changing the topic, but thought it worth a mention.
tijara33
Pro
Posts: 1,360
Thanks: 50
Fixes: 6
Registered: ‎22-06-2012

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

Thanks jafreer. My Vaio has an SSD, it's the network which needs some tlc.
picbits
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Registered: ‎18-01-2013

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

Watch out with the 8800NL  and guest access.
If you set up the guest under it's own group and activate isolation, it will work fine unless you disable the guest wireless.
When you re-enable it, it puts the guest part of the network back into the main network group and things get a bit confusing as IP address conflicts can occur if you're using a separate DHCP server. You also lost all the isolation between the networks.
Not sure if this is fixed in the latest firmware but I've asked the question on their support forums and been promptly ignored Sad
Oldjim
Resting Legend
Posts: 38,460
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Registered: ‎15-06-2007

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

For the technically challenged - me - can you explain how a DHCP server fits into things
picbits
Rising Star
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Registered: ‎18-01-2013

Re: Billion 8800 NL or AXL.

When you set up a guest network, the router can hand out IP addresses to all of the guests that connect. This is on a different IP range to the main router.
I.e. main router will hand out (via DHCP) an IP address from 192.168.1.2 to 192.168.1.253 while the guest network will be from 192.168.2.2 to 192.168.2.253 etc.
If you have a separate machine on the network which is acting as a DHCP server then strange things happen when the guest network is turned off and on again as the router will also try to hand out an IP address to a guest machine while the machine is actually connected to the main network which is also handing out IP addresses. The router also starts filling up its log with error messages.
The only way to move the guest network back to how it should be is to delete it and create a new guest group.
I only found this out after my Stepson had misbehaved, I removed his internet privileges (he uses a guest network on a timer) then reinstated them the next week - he then had full access to my main network even though previously the guest network had been isolated.
Quite a major bug really but as long as you remember this happens you can keep an eye on it.