The Sitecom Greyhound is a high-end router with good performance for everyday tasks and a very comprehensive features. The question is of course what all these features add and for whom the high cost is worth it.
Pros
- Quick and clear interface
- Fast Wi-Fi network with good range
- Many multimediafeatures
Cons
- No documentation/manual
- OpenWRT seems to be boarded up
- Low WAN speed
- “Software bugs?
- Wall mount awkward
- Duration
Final conclusion
Score: 3Per criterion
Reliability
Score: 3
Table of contents:
- Introduction
- OpenWRT
- Features
- Performance
- Speed wired
- Speed and range wireless
- 2.4 GHz
- 5GHz
- Reliability and stability
- Manageability
- Support
- Appearance
- Conclusion: worth the price?
InleidingEnkele weeks ago I was Tweakers chosen to be the Sitecom Greyhound review. After I the router had received, I started working on all aspects of this very versatile router.OpenWRTSitecom praises this router as the first router, which by default comes with OpenWRT. This offers many advantages in the field of extra packages that the community be made, but because I have no functionalities have missed, I have not made use of.
However, I have tried to discover in what extent it is now really just a usable Linux machine, but this was disappointing. The router is not accessible via SSH or telnet and the GUI is no functionality to find this. Also here are no packages for it to find. On the website is the source code of the firmware found (to do this, they are required because of the GPL of OpenWRT), but there is no documentation included on how to compile and upload to the router, and I don’t have enough knowledge of OpenWRT for this.
Further, the GUI (Luci), as adjusted compared to stock OpenWRT the documentation of OpenWRT almost not to be useful in adjusting settings.
In practice, you have not very much to the fact that the router is on OpenWRT is running, because lwa cht customization is very difficult and there is no documentation about what to customize.FeaturesetDe Greyhound is by Sitecom portrayed as a very versatile router. The router has two USB 3.0 ports and an SD card slot that allows direct audio, video and photos can be shared with the network via DLNA and the files can be downloaded via torrents. Also there is a optical and analog audio input that allows audio can be played over the network.
I have a USB port tested by putting a USB stick in to stitches. The data on it was easy via SMB and FTP. Movies and music playback via DLNA and went directly well.
In daily practice, however, I never had the need these USB and audio ports to really use it. Perhaps I’m old fashioned, but for me, a router is a device purely for my network, and not for what I do with that network wants to do (such as media streaming or downloading torrents).PrestatiesHet measure of performance of a router can be done in different ways. If you only speeds of a router in. safety n environment (a combination of test software, testhardware and Wi-Fi-distances), you can make no meaningful comparison with that of a different router in a different environment. In order to give a good impression of the speeds compared to other high-end router, I have the test both with the Greyhound, as with my Netgear R7500 done.
All tests are done with the program iperf3. The advantage of doing all the tests with this program compared to, for example, Speedtest.net is that you’re not dependent on fluctuations in the speed of your internet connection because all speeds are measured between the two computers that you manage it yourself. Compared to simply copying a file, the advantage is that you are not limited by the speed of your hard drive – there is only the data from the RAM is sent. I have all the default settings are used, so I have not fiddled with TCP options. The displayed speeds are the averages after the removal of the 3 slowest and 3 fastest seconds of the tests of 10 seconds.Speed bedraadOm a baseline to put down the maximum speed that I was going to get, I first need the speed between my PC (Asus P8Z68-V PRO motherboard) and my laptop (HP Elitebook 8570W) without any routers or switches between them measured. Then I on LAN <-> LAN speed is measured and then the LAN <-> WAN, where the PC in the WAN port and the laptop into the LAN port. In all cases, there were no other switches in between.
Hereby, I came to the following speeds.
Sample rate (Mbps)Directly to the Desktop <-> Laptop930Greyhound LAN <-> LAN930Greyhound LAN <-> WAN180Netgear LAN <-> LAN910Netgear LAN <-> WAN800
What of course is immediately noticeable is that the Greyhound hard through the basket with the LAN <-> WAN test. This speed is explained by the fact that in the LAN <-> LAN only switch functionality is measured while here really the router getting started. Since almost no one is a connection of more than 200Mbps has this speed is not in a simple speedtest.net test, but given the fact that various providers all 500Mbps offer and internet performance in the future will only increase, this is still a major downside. Because the hardware of the router is not slow, it seems to me this can be solved with a firmware update but here you can, of course, not assume. According to hardware.info this is due to OpenWRT and this is difficult to solve but I can not confirm this.
The LAN <-> LAN speed is of course fine.Speed and range draadloosDe speed of the wireless network decreases as the distance and amount of obstacles between the router and the mobile device increases. Therefore, I have at various points in the house the speeds of the Wi-Fi network tested, again with the Greyhound and the Netgear. All the tests I have done from my mobile phone (HTC One M8) to my desktop PC (wired connected).
I have the 2.4 GHz and the 5GHz network is tested separately.2.4 GHzToen I this test for the first time, wanted to do, and there were strange results. The Greyhound came in the house at speeds of around 1Mbps, as if in the router to something not going well. The signal strength was through the whole house well, but in the router, the speed is somewhere blocked. A hard reset which I later needed for a different problem appeared to correct this problem, but this is of course not nice. It seems a software problem to be gone but I have not been able to find where he was.
The 2.4 Ghz test resulted in the following results.
Sample Rate Greyhound (Mbps)Speed Netgear (Mbps)Hal6040Woonkamer4026Keuken3325Slaapkamer4525kelder74zolder912
These results are very similar, but the Greyhound is still clearly the winner. Only in the attic was the range a little less, but this may have been situated to the orientation of the antennas.
In many other reviews, you will get a lot higher speeds to encounter. The fact that these speeds are so much lower will be my test conditions. This is also the reason that I compare it with another router.5GHzEen problem with the tests is that 802.11 AC (5GHz Wi-Fi) not working properly in our home due to the thickness of walls, doors and floors. If the router is in the cupboard state you have actually nowhere range with the 5GHz network. Therefore, I have for the 5GHz network is just a test from a few meters away with line-of-sight done to the maximum speed.
Sample Rate (Mbps)Greyhound120Netgear70
This is the Greyhound so significantly faster.Reliability and stabiliteitIk have more than a week, and the stability of the Wi-Fi network (when the network is very slow, see test 2.4 GHz) tested. At the end of this week, I came no more into the web interface – the router did its thing, but port 80 was not open, as if the web server in the router crashed. I don’t know if this has anything with the problem of the Wi-Fi speed was, but it required a reset to reset the router again to get it to work.BeheerbaarheidIk have literally all of the functionality itself need to figure out how it works, because there is no manual available (not included and is not on the website). Fortunately, the interface is very quick and logical, so I could easily find. Everyday tasks such as Wi-Fi, change settings or ports to forward to go fast. Settings for the various linux filesystems on the router are also able to see and adjust, but since you’re here, nothing can change without SSH access, I wonder what the added value of this is. The same applies to the inspect and adapt processes on the router, run: without documentation or possibilities to make your own linux software to install, you have here not so much.
Sitecom provides the MyWifi app, which allows you router easily from your phone can operate. This works fine, although it was a bit tricky to Wi-Fi settings from a Wi-Fi network.OndersteuningUiteraard is the lack of documentation very much, for allowing me the support needed. When I am not in the web interface could come and I the router wanted to reset this was not obvious (apparently, you had the reset button pressed until the light went out but until the light began to blink, what a few seconds longer), there was a Dutch employee online me smooth has helped.UiterlijkDe router has a sleek appearance and is clearly meant to be in the view to put down. There are, however, concessions are made with regard to the ease of him on the wall to pin. Because the network ports on the back panel, you can get him not just against the wall, but you have the legs that it can also be used on the ground can put as a kind of afstandsbusjes use. Because of this, it’s not as stable against the wall, what a pity. That looks like this.
Used in combination with:
- HTC One (M8) 16GB Grey
- Netgear X4 AC2350 WiFi Router R7500
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