Linksys Smart WiFi Router Review: A Worthy Upgrade?
Most people pay little to no attention to the router their ISP installs at their house, and for the most part, that’s fine. However, if your internet isn’t working nearly as fast as expected, your router may be at blame too. Most generic routers don’t have advanced features such as dual band, MU-MIMO support, along with a lot of additional features you get with Smart WiFi routers like the Linksys EA7300 ($129.96). We recently got our hands on the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router, and I’ve been using it for quite some time now. So,here is my review of the Linksys Smart WiFi Router:
Design, Ports, and Build Quality
The Linksys EA7300 is by no means “beautiful”, or “gorgeous”, or “low-profile” at all. But what it is, is a well-built, nicely designed router that will try its best to keep your network running better than you’d ever see with one of those basic routers. It hascooling vents on almost the entire surface, because thanks to the dual core processor, and all the hardware this thing is packing, it does need quite a bit of air to keep cool.
The router also has3 beam-forming antennae, which means that you can point them in the direction of the devices, so those devices will receive the best signal strength. This can come in handy if you’re looking for a higher signal strength on your devices. For the most part, however, I left the antennae pointing straight up, and the network coverage was more than just great.
One thing that really bugs me about the design choices made by Linksys with the EA7300, is thepanel of glossy plastic that runs all the way through the center of the router. This looks like an amazing place to have some useful information to be displayed. But, all it does, is show a Linksys logo. Kind of feels like a wasted opportunity.
Ports
The Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router has all the ports and connections you’d see in a basic router, and one port that you’d not find in most low-end routers. On the back of the router, you’ll finda power button, a 12V DCinput for the power adapter. You’ll also find4 ethernet LAN ports, to connect devices to the router using ethernet cables. There’s also a WAN port where you’ll plug in the internet cable. On the WAN port’s side, there’s a reset button, and the WPS button for quick connection with devices that support WPS.
Then, on the extreme end of the router, there’s aUSB 3.0 port, which is awesome. You can connect external storage devices to the router through this port, and share all your files over the network; kind of like your own personal cloud storage.
I tried connecting a 1 TB Seagate external hard disk, and it worked flawlessly. You can also connect printers to the USB port, to allow every computer on the network to share the printer over WiFi. It’s pretty neat.
Build Quality
As far as routers go, the Linksys Smart WiFi Router doesn’t offer anything great in terms of build quality. It isdecently well built, and looks a lot more hefty than most other routers out there, but itdoesn’t quite feel as strongas a device that bulky should. To it’s credit, the router does manage tolook like one beast of a device. However, if you’re expecting it to blend in with the ambience over at your house, it’ll probably not.
Router Features and Options
Where the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Routerreally shows off its smarts is in the softwarethat comes with the router. First off, the dashboard that shows up as soon as you log into the admin panel for the router is just really great. It gives aquick overviewabout everything of importance. Things like the number of devices connected to the router, both in the2.4GHz, and the 5GHz bandsof the router. Users can click here toview the network map, something that can also be viewed by clicking on the “Network Map” option in the menu on the left.
Guest Network
The router alsosupports a guest network, in both the bands, so you can allow temporary users to access the internet,without letting them into your private network, and potentially accessing any shared files. You can quickly change the SSID for the guest network, and view/edit the password. The dashboard also shows the number of devices connected to the guest network, and you can click here to see information about the devices connected to the guest network.
Parental Controls
For households with kids, the router also offers great parental controls, which can let yourestrict websitesthat particular devices (belonging to your children) can visit. You can alsoblock out timeswhen the router will simply not allow those devices to access the internet at all. While this may seem a tad drastic, it’s definitely a handy feature to have. Grounding kids would work way better if you took away their internet rights like this.. just saying.
Speed Test
Most people use Speedtest to check their network speeds, and the EA7300 takes this one step further. Linksys actuallyincludes an Ookla Speedtest widgetembedded right inside the software. So, you can easily check the network speeds your router is getting. This may not be a big deal, but it’s a handy thing to have when you need it.
Connectivity Settings
Moving on to the “Router Settings” section of the Linksys EA7300’s web-interface, you’ll find “Connectivity Settings”. Here, you can find things like theLAN settings for your router, as well as the internet settings. For advanced users, this section also provides options tochoose between NAT, and RIPto decide on how to route packets. Also, for local management,users can choose between using HTTP, and HTTPSprotocols. Obviously, HTTPS is more secure, as it is encrypted.
Wireless Settings
For the more casual user, there are still plenty of settings for you to tinker with, and figure out the perfect settings for you. You can tinker with a whole lot of settings here, including the SSID for the WiFi network, and the password. You can also enableMAC filtering, and canset either a whitelist, or a blacklistof devices on the MAC address filtering list. This can come in exceptionally handy in preventing unknown users from connecting to your network, even if they know your password.
Yet another cool feature that is offered in Wireless Settings, isWireless Scheduling. This feature allows you to set your router to automatically disallow wireless network access during certain times on certain days of the week. This method of restricting access isn’t perfect, and can be fooled bychanging the MAC addressof the device trying to connect to the network.
Security
The Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Routerdoes not lag behind on the security front, either. You can set up therouter firewallinside the security menu, and use any of the three supported protocols, which includesIPSec.
The EA7300 alsocomes with Internet Filters, which can automatically filter anonymous requests, and a lot more to keep you protected. This is where you can set upPort Forwardingas well, and the EA7300 supports single port forwarding, as well as range forwarding, so you can choose according to your needs.
Smart Features
Device Prioritization
While all the features discussed above are certainly great, the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router does come with some special features that genuinely make it a smart router. For starters, the router includes Device Prioritisation, so you can justassign devices to a higher priorityand set the bandwidth that you want the router to reserve for them.
This can come in handy when you’re trying to play an online game that requires a constantly high bandwidth, or when you’re streaming 4K content.
External Storage Sharing
The router’s USB 3.0 port comes in handy if you want toshare an external drive over the entire network. You can simply connect an external hard disk to the USB 3.0 port on the back of the router, andset up file sharingon the network. Users connected to the network can then easily access the files inside the external shared drive viaFTP, SMB, and other protocols. You can evenset up users to give specific rightsto different users on your network. This is definitely a great feature. The USB 3.0 port can be used to share a printer over the network as well.
Linksys Mobile App
What truly makes the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router “smart”, is the Linksys app (available onAndroidandiOS). With this app, you canview every detail about your router, and the network of devices that are connected to it. You canreserve DHCP addressesfor specific devices, adjust Parental Control settings, adjust the router settings including things like the WiFi SSID and password. You can alsoenable, or disable the guest network, or view the devices connected to the guest network. Basically, anything that you can do in the web admin panel of the Linksys EA7300, you can do in the Linksys app as well.
Performance
When it comes to performance, the Linksys Smart WiFi Router is no slouch. Thanks toMU-MIMO (multi user-multiple input multiple output)support, it can easily connect to multiple devices at once, and provide them all the same WiFi bandwidth and speed. Plus, simultaneous dual band support means that the router cansupport a total WiFi bandwidth of 1.7Gbps, with the 2.4GHz network topping out at 450Mbps, and the 5GHz band reaching speeds up to 1300Mbps. This means that file transfer using the shared external storage connected to the router will definitely be blazing fast.
Also, thanks to thebeam forming antennaethat are used by the Linksys EA7300, you can rest assured that even if one of your devices is getting a poor signal, you can try and orient the antenna towards that device, and it’ll definitely see an improvement in the signal strength, which is yet another factor for performance.
Competition
While I like the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router, there are some other really great smart WiFi Routers you can consider as well, such as theNetgear Nighthawk AC1750($109.66) which brings similar features and speeds. Also, for a more affordable option with similar features, you can check out Linksys’ very ownEA6350($79.97), which sacrifices a little bit of speed in the 5GHz band, but brings the price to almost half. Also, if you want to get one of the best Smart WiFi Routers, you should definitely check out theLinksys WRT AC3200($228.87), which packs in a 1.8GHz dual core processor, along with 256MB flash storage, and 512MB RAM. It supports speeds up to 600Mbps in the 2.4GHz band, and a blazing fast 2.6Gbps in the 5GHz band.
SEE ALSO:How to Setup Linksys Smart WiFi Router
Verdict: Upgrade Your Network with Linksys Smart WiFi Router
While there is no doubt that the Linksys EA7300 ($129.96) is an amazing Smart WiFi Router, the point still remains that unless you really need all the features that the router offers, paying almost $130 might be overkill. That said,if you’re looking to future proof your homenetwork, and get it ready for things like the Internet of Things, and smart homes, you should definitely invest in a smart router like the Linksys EA7300. At ~$130, the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router isdefinitely worth the price. It offers an easy set up, a great admin panel, excellent control over the network, and more. Plus, with features like simultaneous dual band support, MU-MIMO, shared external storage, and more, you can rest assured that you’re getting a device that is well worth the price it comes at.
All that said, the Linksys EA7300 isdefinitely a great WiFi router, and will help you upgrade your home network, allowing you to stream 4K content, play online games, and watch videos, all without buffering (if you have a connection that is fast enough). Plus, it’ll let you plug in an external hard disk, and basically use it as yourpersonal cloud storage. So, what do you think about the Linksys EA7300 Smart WiFi Router? Are you planning on upgrading your home network anytime soon? If so, will you consider the Linksys Smart WiFi Router to help you in doing so? Do let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
Akshay Gangwar
Greetings, tech titans and fellow literary time-travelers! I’m Akshay, your tech-whisperer and Harry Potter’s number one stalker – seriously, don’t ask me how many times I’ve read those books; it’s borderline unhealthy.
Working in the tech journalism industry since 2016, I have 7 years of experience covering everything from technology news, to well-researched resource articles. Now the Content Strategist at Beebom, I often pen down op-eds for our website, sharing expert commentary on the latest in technology, AI, and electric cars.
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