TP-Link is the latest brand of routers that TM is giving to UniFi users. Judging from posts here, there's an awful lot of confusion as to which model is better. So far we have the C5v2, C1200v1 & C7. The C7 seems to be quite rare and I haven't seen a C5v1 yet. So if you have one of those, please let us know.

Here's what I have found so far. I have access to the C5v2 and C1200v1 so I'll expand on this as time permits.

Router Bootup Time

Archer C1200 v1
1:21:05 Router Reboot
1:24:15 DynDNS Updated
1:26:45 Webgui Login
Time: 5 mins 40 secs

Archer C5 v2
1:37:00 Router Reboot
1:37:45 PPP Connected
1:37:47 DynDNS Updated
1:38:05 DHCP Responding
1:39:00 Webgui Login
Time: 2 mins 0 secs

Not 100% accurate, I was testing remotely so I had to wait for dyndns TTL of 60 secs. I think the C5v2 is already up at 1 min 5 secs as its DHCP server starts responding to lan/wifi devices at that point in time.

CPU
Maybe this explains it. CPU data from wikidevi.com.

Archer C1200 v2.x (no data for v1.x) uses BCM47189 ARM Cortex A7 900 MHz (2x2 MIMO despite the 3rd antenna)
Other routers which uses this SoC: ASUS RT-AC1200G

Archer C5 v2.x uses BCM47081 ARM Cortex A9 800 MHz (2x2 MIMO)
Other routers which uses this SoC: Linksys EA6350(Time's 500mbps router), D-Link DIR-868L rev A1 & ASUS RT-AC56S

Archer C5 v1 uses QCA9558 720 MHz but only 2 out of 3 possible wlan chains (2x2 MIMO).
Other routers which uses this SoC: Archer C7, Mikrotik hAP AC, TL-WR1043ND, TL-WDR7500.

Archer C7 uses QCA9558 720 MHz and all 3 wlan chains (3x3 MIMO).

Performance
https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...post&p=84658440
Fellow forumer reported here of C1200 hanging during torrents. Possibly running out of ram or memory leak. Looking worse for the C1200.

Quick Summary
C5v1/C7 > C5v2 > C1200

In case you're wondering the D-Link DIR-850L uses the Realtek RTL8197D CPU. Same as the DIR-815. Not great.

This post has been edited by soonwai: Apr 25 2017, 03:01 PM

Reserved for future expansion...

Good to hear! Do you have the C5v1 or v2?

I'm not so much into Asus routers though I'm currently using a RT-N12D1 (was mine but now my neighbours) and I have an old RT-N16. Sorry.

It's dual band, tri stream.
https://routerboard.com/RB962UiGS-5HacT2HnT

Actually all you need to know is in the name.
RB962UiGS-5HacT2HnT
RB - RouterBoard so you know it's a Mikrotik.
9 - Form factor, boring beige box.
6 - 6 physical ports (5 GBe + 1 SFP)
2 - 2 radios 2.4 & 5Ghz
U - has a USB port
i - has PoE out
G - has Gigabit ports
S - has an SFP port
- - breathing space
5HacT - 5Ghz High power AC Triple chain
2HnT - 2.4Ghz High power N Triple chain

There you go.

PoE is Power over Ethernet so you can send power to another device over the same ethernet cable. The 2nd device no need power adaptor. Makes cabling easier.

Mikrotik is quite intimidating because it presents a lot of information. Just need to ignore what you don't need. There's also a quick setup wizard now called QuickSet which makes things easier. You can have a look at my UniFi setup guide to see how easy it is. Link in my sig below.

Here's a demo router that you can play with.
http://demo.mt.lv

You can use ssh/telnet for command line or the web interface or download winbox.exe from https://www.mikrotik.com/download.

Winbox is a Windows app for configuring the routers. It's very fast. It doesn't look pretty though.

Best is 2.4Ghz N, frequency I set to auto and let the AP choose.

I have a DLink 5Ghz AP in my office. The rest of the house is covered by the Mikrotik's 2.4Ghz. No 5Ghz for Mikrotik. Actually I have a hAP AC lite but haven't set it up yet.

Normal setup, for example if you follow my guide, Lan1 is the WAN port. The modem will connect to Lan1 but you can change that.

Let's say you're powering the Mikrotik from a PoE switch then it must go into Lan1 (PoE In). Therefore you cannot use Lan1 for the modem. All you do is setup the Mikrotik so that the WAN port is Lan2, ie: cable from the modem goes into Lan2

I think the price is OK but that's the hAP AC Lite. It's the little brother to the hAP AC. It only has 100mbps ports and single stream for 5Ghz. The WiFi transmission is also not very powerful.

Connect to modem or router?

Assuming hAP AC default configuration where Lan1 is gateway and Lan2-5 are switched.

Case 1: using hAP AC as router
modem --> hAP AC LAN1

Case 2: not using hAP AC as router
modem --> TMRouter --> hAP AC LAN2-5

In this setup the hAP AC Lite is not a functioning as a router but as an AP. And you're right, hAP AC lite Lan2-5 to DIR-850L Lan1-3, assuming Lan4 is used for HyppTV.

Later when you're more comfortable with the Mikrotik, you can reconfigure Lan1 so that you can use all 5 ports on the hAP AC Lite.

Well, if I were you, I'd use the hAP AC Lite as the main router. It'll be a waste just to use it as an access point.

https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...post&p=84658440

A report of C1200 hanging during torrents. Possibly running out of ram or memory leak. Looking worse for the C1200.

Nothing posted here yet. Might take some time for TPLink. Hope they can prioritise cos should be more and more C1200 users in Malaysia.

Fair enough, but my PC is 15km from the C1200 wor. Finally we have a good report about the C1200. What hardware version and firmware is your C1200? Is yours the 2 antenna or 3 antenna version?

This post has been edited by soonwai: Apr 26 2017, 12:16 PM

My bad, was thinking of something else when I typed that. C1200 - 3 antennas, just 1 version.

I have to agree with the badly-coded firmware. The fact that it takes 5 mins to boot-up is a good indication. (TP-Link says that's normal ) The Asus RT-AC1200G+ uses the same CPU as the C1200 and doesn't seem to have that problem.

It seems someone has done it but no link???

No idea, I searched but couldn't find any. Maybe lyt25_1234 can help us.

It is good when it's not rebooting and awesome when it reboots, just the right amount of time to make a cup of coffee and take a pee.

This post has been edited by soonwai: Nov 22 2017, 12:03 AM