I got this router for 123.xx$ + 6.xx$ shipping, so around 130$. This is one freaking amazing piece of hardware. All the stars are only for hardware. The stock firmware is crappy. Almost no settings at all. You can't even disable IPV6 (seriously ?? ). But feed this monster with DD-wrt and this gives out 5 star performance. I use it as a dedicated VPN router. This maxes out my internet connection when connected to VPN (70 mb/s). Shout out to Hardware engineers, Booo to stock firmware (Web UI) developers, for being lazy and not giving some basic settings/configs.
If you've got a killer enabled NIC it's worth grabbing at the $125 or under price point. There's no real options in the router other than the standard port forwarding, dns, and SSID setup and that's where the DD-WRT flash came in. After the flash I got anything you could hope for and more. The hardware on this router is great, the software/firmware side are wonderful after the DD-WRT flash too. Great router, cheaper than the version that comes factory flashed with the ddwrt type firmware and interface.
I was using a Linksys wrt1900ac router that I purchased in 2015. The way my home office is configured it is impractical for me to hardwire my pc. I am also a gamer. I was a split second slower than other competitors online. When I had my new pc, and a new laptop built, I had them both built with killer wifi network cards. I was hesitant at first since my wrt1900ac is still working like the day I purchased it. The improvement in gameplay online is day and night. It's amazingly fast. I am competitive on the most intense games at the highest settings. The router prioritizes killer wifi enabled devices automatically, but you can also manually prioritize your other connected devices in order of importance. I play 4k on my smart tv's, my iphones, ipads, echo's flawlessly. I find it covers my home well, and I have a good size home with multi-levels. I have only been using the wrt 32x for a short period of time, but find it stable and works without a flaw. I have always had a good experience with Linksys routers, and this is the best one yet for my needs
The vendor was also very fast in shipping the router, brand new at and at an amazing price.
I highly recommend the Linksys wrt32x if you are a gamer and have killer enabled computers or devices.
edit: (from my edit below) OEM “Venom” firmware from Linksys, which comes preinstalled on the router, is just fine for the average user. There are no remaining bugs or issues. It really is fine now. Don’t put too much stock in old reviews, because the firmware was not great when it first came out, but they’ve now worked out all the kinks. Great router!!!!!
This thing is ridiculously cheap compared to the WRT3200 which is HARDWARE IDENTICAL to it!
They are the same router with different firmware. The Linksys firmware on the WRT32X is a bit lacking in features, but all the issues that people complained about in the past have been fixed.
Install DD-Wrt and you will have yourself one awesome router. If you don’t plan on flashing open source firmware to it, you may need to find a different router since the OEM Linksys firmware on this WRT32X router may be missing features you need.
But DD-Wrt is extremely easy to install and works flawlessly. Follow the WRT32X DD-Wrt installation instructions on the DD-Wrt forums. Just google search it, and do your homework. Read and make sure you understand the instructions, but know that this process is pretty polished at this point and unlikely to go wrong.
If you screw up somehow and brick the router, it can be unbricked by power cycling 3 times with the switch on the back, which will swap you over to the OEM firmware partition.
That’s right, this router has two partitions for firmware, allowing you to flash custom open source firmwares like DD-Wrt or OpenWRT without risk of bricking. As long as you don’t overwrite the OEM partition, switching back is as easy as flipping the power switch 3 times.
Once you are sure of what you are doing, you can overwrite the OEM firmware partition with whatever you like and swap back and forth as needed between any two firmwares.
Trust me, this thing is an amazing deal at $120.
edit: I bricked my WRT32X by disabling telnet and ssh, then rebooting with invalid network configuration. After screwing up the wrong settings, the router booted up fine, and wifi SSIDs show up, but no device would connect because of invalid settings. Couldn’t even get back to web GUI at 192.168.1.1, but I fixed it with a USB to TTL serial cable, which I bought for ~$8 on Amazon. I followed a YouTube guide for recovering a WRT3200 (hardware identical router, can pretty much use any WRT3200 guide for stuff you need to do on WRT32X, so use these model numbers interchangably when you are Googling issues or troubleshooting on DD-WRT forums). This requires partial disassembly of router by removing just the front piece of the plastic case. This whole process to figure out how to re-flash the OEM “Venom” firmware from Linksys took me about a day of work. Have to use the “flat” firmware, which you can find via DD-WRT forums, because regular OEM firmware is not flashable via serial cable. The firmware has to be modified somehow, and it is this “flat” Venom firmware that I was able to flash using PuTTy and an FTP server program (it’s all in the YouTube tutorial I followed). Took longer for serial cable to arrive via 2-day shipping than it took me to fix the issue. It’s really easy, and I could just about do it all again from memory, but it’s not for the faint of heart or folks who are uncomfortable with Command Line Interfaces. I figured all this stuff out on my own, with some difficulty and much effort, but having that knowledge now, I would say it’s all pretty easy if you have the time and aptitude to figure it out. Do not expect to be able to flash custom router firmware and configure it without being decently computer literate. It’s easy for me simply because I’m into this sort of thing. If that describes you, this is a great purchase. Or if you don’t care about custom router firmware or the missing features from the Linksys OEM firmware, this router is an —ABSOLUTE STEAL— for the price. OEM “Venom” firmware from Linksys, which comes preinstalled on the router, is just fine for the average user. There are no remaining bugs or issues. It really is fine now. Don’t put too much stock in old reviews, because the firmware was not great when it first came out, but they’ve now worked out all the kinks. Great router!!!!!
What can i say about this router other than... AWESOME!! The opportunity of purchasing this router even to begin with is great to start off with. I've had other routers that support what this router does, but this router just screams excellence. The things I like about this router are, first off when you go into the router interface you have a bunch of difference selections to choose from. (It even has a VPN option where if you download the ovpn file and upload it, you can connect your router straight to whatever VPN provider you have, sign in and viola!!) The other things I like about this router is underneath the device tab you can see what devices are connected to your router as well as you can also see what GHz frequency they are connected to. (ex... 2.4GHz or 5Ghz) The one thing I know about Networking is that the 2.4GHz frequency while it is slow, it has further range. While the 5GHz might not have much range it does have faster speeds. Being that I have a 400mbps Internet speed, on my other router I wasnt getting close to that. Wired of course but not through Wireless. The router always made the choices as to what devices that were connected would actually be connected to. If they were connected to the 2.4GHz frequency I would get between 65mbps to 80mbps on the 5GHz frequency I would get 250mbps to 300mbps. On this Linksys router on the 2.4Ghz frequency I get 60mbps to 70mbps and on the 5Ghz frequency I get 350mbps to 400mbps so as you can see there is a significant increase in the router speeds. This is a gaming router, and even though I dont game my main focus for purchasing this router was because I enjoy having the speeds for downloading, YouTube.. ..etc. This is one of the best purchases that i have made so far, the only downfall is there isnt an app for this router as of yet, but you can get to the gui of the router home page and just mark it as a favorite or add it to your Home Screen of your Smartphone or Tablet device. I've only used it a couple of days now and I'm excited about the possibilities. Thanks Linksys, this is one terrific Router. Did I mention it screams excellence? Oh wait... Yes I did!!
Feature Product
- The first router purpose-built to prioritize gaming
- The Killer Prioritization Engine identifies, prioritizes and accelerates gaming network traffic above all else, to reduce peak ping by up to 77%*
- Synchronizes with Killer-enabled PCs--from brands such as Alienware, Gigabyte, MSI and Razer
- Promotes simultaneous high-speed data processing
- The WRT32X gives you dominating Next-Gen AC Wi-Fi speeds up to 3.2 Gbps that keep you at the top of your game
- Each connected client device receives its own dedicated data stream, so multiple users won't have to compete with one another for bandwidth
- The WRT32X gaming router also features a pro-grade Gigabit Ethernet switch with four ports, making it ideal for connecting multiple gaming rigs or consoles at your next LAN party
- Dynamic frequency selection (DFS) certification from the FCC not only allows operation at 160MHz enabling Tri-Stream160, but it also triples the channels available at 80MHz so the WRT32X can operate in the clearest airspace that other routers aren't allowed
Description
Engineered purely for gaming, the Linksys WRT32X Gaming Router with Killer Prioritization Engine provides a dominating home network. This high-performance gaming router synchronizes with Killer-enabled PCs--from brands such as Alienware, Gigabyte, MSI and Razer--to reduce peak ping times by 77% and deliver smooth, lag-free gaming. You gain an unrivaled advantage over your competition in MOBAs, shooters, and other games where a single millisecond can mean victory or defeat.
Very nice router! I am disappointed in Linksys though. This router does not have an app for remote management. It also won't connect to the Linksys Smart account, because it is not compatible. This is still a really nice router for the price. I really enjoy being able to see my up and down stream live through the web management. I also like that it has Killer wireless optimization. I really love this router, and would buy it again.
I am a software developer. my first purchase WRT32X was from a local store, i wish i had bought it from here. was half price, it's truely a ping killer!
I had an 80$ router didnt realize how much upload time i saved from single upload of a large file. it literally reduced my upload time from 2min to 10 seconds. same spectrum internet provider, tested on the same large file before and after WRT32X.
Got one for my family too.
Most of the complaints you read here have been taken care of as far as Linksys is involved the UI has improved and if you like more customizability you can use third party firmware. The router handles everything I throw at it without a signal drop. I have 8 devices constantly connected to wifi and one hard wired in via lan cable, with no noticeable speed drop either. If you have the option for gigabit bandwidth from your ISP and are looking for something that can handle that this router is for you. I recommend buying new as chances are you're going to have to return your used unit a few times before you finally get one that works consistently. I bought a new unit due to the issues I personally experienced trying to save a few bucks with a used router. The trouble I went through before deciding to pay extra to have a new unit shipped was not worth the money I was saving. As for 19th hole deals who I purchased from through Amazon. They were quick with shipping and it arrived a day earlier than the earliest estimate. I did pay $8.00 for the expedited shipping which still isnt the most expensive option or the quickest. It was due to arrive in eight days at the latest and 5 at the earliest it arrived in three days.
This router has excellent Wi-Fi coverage. I use the build in VPN client and it works exceptionally well. I don't use the Killer Prioritizing because the MSI motherboard I have has really terrible driver compatibility, but all other features appear to work fine without ever experiencing any of the problems listed in other reviews. I'm very pleased with this product.
Router has not dropped any connections with the most recent firmware update. Prioritization options are easy to configure. There is no way through the Linksys software to disable SSID.
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