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628/5000 Hello all,

I am looking for tools or ways to test router performance. I am not only concerned about WiFi bandwidth, coverage and etc, but also about the performance of the hardware itself in terms of its ability to handle the number of hosts, simulate overwhelming network traffic, so that I can tell how many hosts, DHCP and network traffic the router does not give already cope with the performance of its components.

I have a TP-LINK router which during the operation of 20 users started to hang and I would like to simulate the work of users in the network to determine the limits of its capabilities.

Maybe connecting to a simulator like GNS3 is the solution to generate traffic?

Any ideas?

bulimaster
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You can use iperf or jperf for this. You will need at least two computers for each device you wish to test.

You can also simulate multiple streams of data with different destination port numbers. This is useful when deploying QOS / traffic policies, as you can simulate high priority and low priority data, and make sure it's being queued properly.

+20 devices is really pushing the limits of consumer grade hardware. (Especially if these devices are on WiFi) You didn't mention the TP-Link model number. But my guess is you are probably experiencing co-channel interference, on possibly a channel experiencing neighborhood router interference. Try doing a site survey with wiggle wifi, or wifi analyzer on a Android device. Choose a channel that doesn't have a lot of neighboring routers on it.

If this doesn't work, you may want to check out this answer: Sluggish smart-home wireless devices , adding another router on a separate channel can reduce the load of the first. Also if you have legacy b/g devices, it can be very beneficial to keep them on the older b/g router, as legacy clients will slow down newer 802.11ac/n clients.

Hope this helps you out.

Tim_Stewart
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