Top 5 Affordable Wireless AC1200 Routers
You don’t need to spend hundreds of dollar for high end router to build wifi network for small to medium homes should the network is to support your work something like email and internet browsing and activities in media social including twitter, Facebook, Instagram; as well as streaming video and online gaming in a certain level.
AC1200 Lower budget router
Spending wireless AC1200 router for under $70, or even under $50 is appropriate to support work and play in small to medium home. It is just wasting money to invest expensive high end router such as Linksys EA9500 or Netgear AC5400 router or new mesh wifi Linksys Velop unless you demand high speed and high bandwidth router for uninterruptable high intensive online gaming and 4K video streaming.
To support couple of Laptops and wired desktop as well as multiple mobile devices either Android or iOS based, installing a one of popular wireless AC1200 routers is enough.
Top Models
There are various models of wireless AC1200 router available in the market today from different vendors including from new comers in networking products you might not know them before. Wireless AC1200 router typically delivers speeds of up to 867Mbps @5GHz and up to 300Mbps @2.4GHz band.
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Wise Tiger WT-RT8501
Wise Tiger is one of Chinese vendors in mobile accessories and networking. One of its product in networking is Wise Tiger WT-RT8501 wireless ac1200 router.
The model is stylist, it is designed with white shiny color with desktop form factor and comes with four high power and low noise amplifier Omni-antennas that broadcast signal to any direction.
With high power and low noise amplifier antennas, the router delivers signal trough walls covering long distance area up to further corner of the house.
Wise Tiger AC1200 Router
Highlights
- Simultaneous dual band AC1200 speeds up to 866Mbps @5Ghz and up to 300Mbps @2.4Ghz
- 4x 5dBi high power and low noise amplifier antennas
- 4x Fast Ethernet LAN ports and 1x Fast Ethernet WAN port
- Comes with mobile parental control app for either Android or iOS app
- 2-year warranty
Cons
- No USB port
- Ethernet ports are fast Ethernet, not gigabit ports
Currently the product is tagged with the price under $50, actually the MSRP is $80.
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Wavlink AC1200 router
Generally you can find that the wireless routers are designed with square or oval shape or even like a round cube. Wavelink AC1200 router is designed with a flat round shape with four external antennas like TP-link Archer C60 and Wise Tiger as shown above.
Wavlink AC1200 is like other wireless AC1200 routers, a simultaneous dual band router delivering total bandwidth up to 1200Mbps, ideal not just for work but it is also good for play.
What makes it different with Wise Tiger is that Wavlink comes with only two LAN ports compared with Wise Tiger with four LAN ports. However, Wavlink is equipped with a USB 2.0 port for sharing storage or printer.
Wavlink AC1200 router
Highlights
- Based on simultaneous dual band AC1200 network segment
- Speeds up to 866Mbps @5Ghz and up to 300Mbps @2.4Ghz
- 4x 5dBi high gain foldable antennas
- 2x Fast Ethernet LAN ports and 1x WAN port
- 1x USB 2.0 port for sharing storage or printer/scanner etc
- Supports WPS
Cons
- Two LAN ports instead of four
Wavlink AC1200 is tagged with the price under $50 similar as Wise Tiger, an addition of 1x USB 2.0 port is beneficial for either storage or printer.
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Medialink MLWR-AC1200
Remember that Medialink N150? It was very popular cheap wireless N150 router and you know the customer rating was above 4 out of 5 star rating all the time, and then it was followed by the faster one N300 router. And today you see Medialink wireless AC1200 router, it was released Jan 2017.
What this router does? The same as the other wireless AC1200 routers delivering dual band with total bandwidth of up to 1200Mbps like the other two products above Wavlink and Wise Tiger AC1200 routers.
Medialink AC1200 router
Highlights
- Based on wireless AC1200 network segment
- Dual band speeds up to 867Mbps @5GHz and up to 300Mbps @2.4GHz
- 2x high power external antennas
- Ready with Beamforming technology
- Network management including parental control and schedule
- Wireless router or range extender modes
- 4x Gigabit LAN and 1x Gigabit WAN Ports
- 1x USB 2.0 port
See that this Medialink AC1200 router has richer features compared with the other two products as shown above including Beamforming technology and Gigabit ports.
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Tenda AC9
Tenda AC9 is one of the best wireless AC1200 routers in the market following its success with Tenda AC15 wireless AC1900 router, affordable AC1900 router in the market. You can compare with Medialink as discussed above, see that the antenna design is the same – two high powered amplifier antennas. And this router is also ready with Beamforming antenna technology.
Today you can find lots of Chinese products in the market including Tenda, Wavlink and Wise Tiger, and they are all tagged with much lower price than any branded non-Chinese products.
Tenda AC9 wireless AC1200 router
Highlights
- Based on 802.11AC with AC1200 network segment
- Dual band speeds of up to 867Mbps @5Ghz and up to 300Mbps @2.4Ghz
- Beamforming technology ready
- 2x High powered amplifier antennas
- 4x Gigabit LAN and 1x WAN ports
- 1x USB 2.0 port for storage or printer
- Powered by 900Mhz Broadcom ARM Cortex-A7 processor with 128MB DDDR3 flash
- Smart wifi schedule
Designed nicely with stylist model, this Tenda AC9 wireless AC1200 router becomes one of best and affordable wireless AC1200 routers in the market.
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Asus RT-ACRH13
Asus RT-ACRH13 is one of Asus wireless AC1200 routers that is designed differently with high performance feature of Multi-User MIMO technology like those high end AC2400/AC2600 wireless dual band routers such as TP-link Archer C2600 router, or Netgear Nighthawk X4S or Linksys EA8500 AC2600 router. And even high end three band routers today come with MU-MIMO technology, as well as few models of mesh home wifi system such as Orbi by Netgear or Linksys Velop.
MU-MIMO technology is high end feature that delivers streams of data to multiple devices at the same time. Non MU-MIMO routers deliver data to multiple clients one device to another device in series that contributes network latency.
Asus RT-ACRH13
Highlights
- Designed based on 802.11ac AC1300 network segment
- Dual band with speeds up to 867Mbps @5Ghz and up to 400Mbps @2.4Ghz
- Comes with 4x external 5dBi antennas
- Comes with high performance MU-MIMO technology
- Powered by high speed Quad core processor with 128Mb Flash and 128Mb RAM
- Gigabit Ethernet Ports (4x LAN and 1x WAN)
- 1x USB 3.0 port
Cons
- More expensive than others in its class
This is one of most powerful wireless AC1200 router, actually it is AC1300 with a bit faster speed @2.4GHz band. And what makes this router is different with other routers in its class is the MU-MIMO technology feature. no wonder that the router is tagged with higher price around $70, but it is worth of purchase.
Click here for more spec details (Asus ACRH13)
Asus RT-ACRH13 is the best Wireless AC1200 network segment in the market with MU-MIMO high performance feature you may consider for your home.
