Choosing a Router to Maximize Your Home Entertainment
Choosing a router to enjoy streaming media and other forms of digital entertainment from the comforts of your home is an essential step in making sure that your Internet connection is running at the speed of which it is capable.
You might have the fastest Internet connection from your provider, but if your router is not able to handle the speed, then you are wasting it. Doing the proper research prior to selecting the router for your home will ensure that you will maximize your home digital entertainment experience.
It’s recommended that you go with a trusted, high-performance router. Check out the Western Digital (WD) My Net HD series of routers (N600, N750, N900 & N900 Central). They each feature FasTrack technology, which allows families and households with multiple content demands to stream and prioritize high-quality HD entertainment across devices when and how they need it.
Another important thing to keep in mind when researching and purchasing a router is to consider the number of devices that you are going to connect to your network. It’s typically more than what you think when you consider all wired and wireless connections your family uses simultaneously–televisions, computers, gaming consoles, tablets, e-readers and smartphones.
The number of ports in a router does matter, especially in cases where you want to connect devices through the LAN ports. Entry-level routers usually come with 4 ports which are typically sufficient for home use, but if your family’s devices count is steadily climbing and it’s starting to feel more like a small office (or army) of connected computers, televisions and gaming consoles, you will need a heavy duty router to handle the quantity of devices along with the network traffic to achieve optimum performance.
Different routers offer different speeds. Some may offer you speeds up to 300 Mbps, but these speeds are usually never required especially when your Internet is running at a few Mbps. These speeds are viable only for commercial use and home networks require speeds of around 54 Mbps or more.
Lastly, while researching routers, you will probably come across the term "bands." The 2.4 and 5 GHz bands are the frequencies in which wireless communications operate. 802.11 B and G devices use the 2.4 GHz band, while 802.11N can use either the 2.4 GHz or 5 GHz band. Select which is right for your home and get your digital entertainment fix on!
What features are you looking for in a router for your home?
Learn more about WD’s My Net HD Routers with FasTrack Technology.
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