Our old wireless router is quickly going kaput and I need to get a new one. Basic setup – want a few ethernet ports and wireless.
In my experience, the features on consumer-level versions of these things are pretty uniform, but the build quality/lifespan is quite variable. Does anyone have any recommendations/discommendations on brands to get?
There are some questions to think about.
How big is your home? Do you need to reach multiple floors, or outside to a patio? How many devices might need wireless at the some time – like, several kids in the house doing homework or surfing porn. You know, the usual. 
I don’t have any concerns about coverage or features. My entire apartment is well within the coverage range of all but the crappiest routers, and I don’t have enough devices going at the same time to suck up all the bandwidth. I’m just worried about buying a piece of crap that only lasts a couple of months and then fails, since I’ve been burned by that a couple of times before on routers.
I’ve used a Billion 7800N for the past two years, although I prefer a wired connection. Quality is excellent — it’s been knocked to the floor several times and didn’t miss a beat.
Very popular in Australia; not that I’ve ever been to Australia.
I just bought the cheapest one WalMart had. Plugged and played and ignored it. Reaches a room 20 paces away. Ethernet and wireless, both at the same time. Belkin N150
The ASUS brand router has been getting lots of positive reviews for their wireless performance. The RT-N66U and RT-AC66U are the current models getting the good press. I have an earlier model of this router and am very pleased.
I also have a Netgear WNR3500U router that I’m going to replace with one of these. The wireless signal on the Netgear is very unstable. When I look at the signal on my ASUS router using a program the graphs the output, the signal is smooth and steady. The output from my Netgear router looks like the Rocky Mountains.