DrayTekVigor 2763ac Wireless Router, VDSL2/ADSL2+, 4 x GbE LAN Port, Built-In VDSL Modem, Mesh WLAN, Ideal For Small Business

I bought this router to replace an older DrayTek model that will not be getting any firmware security updates in the near future. Once set up, the connection to my FTTC broadband has been rock solid, with good speeds to all my equipment.The only issue I did have was that, initially, none of my computers were able to connect to my all-in-one printer/scanner. I eventually found an "Isolate 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands" option in the router's WiFi settings which was set to "Enable". When I changed it "Disable" the printer/scanner was detected by all my computers and I was able to successfully print and scan documents.

Product does not provide Internet connection out of the box. The ADSL2+ connection is fine when configured with the right settings (other brands default these automatically) and the wide range of LAN settings are fine. The big problem is that, as supplied, there is a rule enabled that blocks Internet DNS traffic so preventing normal Internet use! Crazy. With this turned off, it did connect to the Internet... sometimes. It looks like its firmware is randomly dropping the UDP traffic necessary for secure DNS over SSL. Ridiculous! Upgraded firmware to the latest version... if anything that was worse and dropped traffic more frequently. And there are many recent reports of DrayTek modems being hacked, so their security looks very poor and using the latest version of the firmware essential for safety... just it doesn't work properly. Tried turning off every security feature that could block traffic as a test (could not risk that live)... it still randomly blocked DNS traffic. Diabolical! Noticed that the MTU value it had defaulted to was different from that found by using its test, so amended that. Set it to pass fragmented packets. Tried setting up specific rules to pass traffic to and from the Cloudflare, Open and Google DNS servers immediately. Any joy? No, it still randomly blocked some DNS traffic although specifically configured in every relevant place not to block. Mad! To test that we weren't going mad and there were no faults with other network elements, we replicated all the settings for traffic, defence and MTU on Billion and TP-Link equipment... guess what, no traffic drop and everything worked (even with mismatched MTU, they just split packets). There were no Internet connection faults. Best guesses, it has very poor firmware that is either (1) dropping not forwarding or re-assembling fragmented UDP SSL DNS packets and it doesn't respond properly to the sender to report this, or (2) there is some element of its defences that can't be disabled which detects fast broadband DNS traffic as a flood attack (oh yes, we disabled that check and also tried a sky high trigger threshold, neither worked). Solution? Sent it for tech recycling and used another manufacturer's much cheaper product, so it is poor value for money too. Worked!

Following a recent, long-running fibre outage (rodents of unusual size, gnawing the cables), I was looking for a router that would support failover to a 4G dongle. I also realised just how many devices I had on my SOHO network, including home automation and a modest test lab for work, I was well over the 64 device limit of the typical consumer brand routers. So my mind turned to Draytek.I'm no stranger to Draytek - this is my 4th Draytek router, and there's a consistency to the brand that makes it easy to get back into. The first pleasant surprise was that I could upload my MAC-to-IP map from a text file, and bring some order onto the chaotic assignment of IP addresses.Next was that there was an affordable range extender/mesh devices, which I purchased a few days later.The only concern was the 4G dongle - a ZTE device with a SMARTY SIM, which didn't work - and which was why I was buying a new router, after all. However, a couple of email exchanges with Draytek support - they were REALLY responsive - sorted that out (it needed a different APN).I've tested the failover, and that works well.Very pleased.