TP-Link Archer C3200 Tri-Band Gigabit Router Review

There are Wi-Fi routers and then there are Wi-Fi routers. When Wi-Fi first hit the masses, there were only a few select networking brands that were producing them and they were fairly limited in their capabilities. These days, there are a variety of different networking brands who produce everything from low cost Wi-Fi routers for the basic needs of many people to higher end models that cater to those who need faster speeds to support their higher end networking equipment and wireless devices. TP-Link offers a range of Wi-Fi based routers and the Archer C3200 clearly approaches the higher end of the market.

TP-Link Archer C3200 at a Glance

With the steady increase of Ultra High Definition (4K) steaming capabilities of televisions and content to match, alongside high resolution online gaming, networks need to be able to keep up with these high data demands without jittery video quality or dropping your online action.

You will need to dish out a bit more money for a Wi-Fi router that can support multiple wireless 4K streams; the TP-Link Archer C3200 comes at a price of $299. For that though, you will not need to worry about fragging Stormtroopers on Endor while someone watches The Walking Dead in Ultra High Definition in another room. That may not sound like it needs to cost a little extra but when you have three separate wireless connections and each of those separate connections has their own co-processor to handle the data traffic, then you can see why you need to spend a little bit more to ensure you’re as lag-free as possible.

The TP-Link Archer C3200 is a tri-band AC3200 router, meaning on the 2.4GHz frequency you can reach up to 600Mbps and the two 5 GHz frequencies can theoretically get you up to 1300Mpbs each. 600 + 1300 + 1300 = 3200! That should be some pretty good bandwidth to handle 3 separate 4K video steams simultaneously.

What’s in the Box?

With most retail boxes these days, there sure isn’t a whole lot included. With the main unit itself, you also get the AC wall adapter, a short Ethernet cable and a quick start guide. I was quite happy to see that the power adapter has a short 1 foot AC cable to move the transformer away from the powerbar or wall outlet you’ll plug it into. More companies really need to do this.

The More, the Merrier!

There are a couple of things that do stand out about the TP-Link Archer C3200. The main one that is quite noticeable is that it has 6, yes S-I-X antennas.

It definitely has a different look to it than your typical single or dual-frequency routers, which typically have 1 to 3 antennas at most. These 6 antennas only have two positions though: folded in or folded out.

Along the front of the Archer C3200, you have the status LEDs. They are power, 2.4Ghz, 5 GHz-1, 5 GHz-2, Ethernet, Internet (WAN), WPS, USB-1 and USB-2. You then have the Wi-Fi Enable/Disable button, WPS Pairing button and the LEDs On/Off button.

The backside of the Archer C3200 is of course where the connections are made. You have the 4-port Gigabit Ethernet ports alongside the WAN port. You have a USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 port to connect external drives for network attached storage like functionality. A power switch, reset switch and power input round out the back.

The top of the TP-Link Archer C3200 has a mesh type cover that is used to keep the unit cool under full load. Also when folded in, the antennas are neatly out of the way, though why you would keep them folded in is a mystery other than when perhaps putting the unit into a box for shipping?

The Browser-Based Setup

Most people want to be able to turn things on and just go out of the gate. Unfortunately, you cannot do that with this particular router, but you do need to log in at least once to do the Wizard setup. You just need to log in once!

You point your favourite browser to http://tplinkwifi.net or http://192.168.0.1 and it will find the router. After going through the simple 6-step process you are golden.

If you want to dive into the details, the TP-Link UI easily allows you to do so. Even the advanced options are laid out in an easy to use manner.

TP-Link Tether Smartphone App

TP-Link has an Android and iOS friendly app that allows you to connect to your Archer C3200 to maintain it without forcing you to sit in front of a computer.

Unfortunately, after a router firmware upgrade and an iOS app upgrade, I still have not been able to log in with it. It keeps coming up with “Failed to connect to your device. You may be in an unstable network or in Guest Network.” Neither of those are true. My iPhone is about 10 feet away from the router with great signal.

It would be nice to login from my phone from time to time to tweak settings or check on things, but I guess I’ll just have to wait for another Tether update.

Throwing Data at the Archer C3200

So, you have this 6-antenna beast with support for 3 frequencies that can deliver up to 3200Mbps total. How does it handle real world traffic? Of course, you won’t actually see the combined total of 3200Mbpsas that’s the combined theoretical throughput. Will we be able to come close to the theoretical 600Mbps on the 2.4GHz frequency and then the 1300Mbps on each of the 5GHz channels?

At best, I’ve read that you should be able to do at least half of those speeds. It also depends on what hardware you are using to talk to the router itself, among other factors. How will it handle streaming video on one channel while another channel is playing some online games? We’ll just have to jump right in and see for ourselves!

For the testing of local data speeds, we’ll employ a couple of different devices. Some devices handle 802.11n whereas other devices can support 80211ac.

Macbook Air to Archer C3200

This test involves a Macbook Air connected to the Archer C3200 router which has a 1TB USB3.0 drive connected to it. The goal is to transfer a file roughly 1.8GB between the Macbook Air and the 1TB drive using rsync to help show the average speed. The file transfer was done multiple times, and yes we forced rsync to rewrite the file if it previously existed, so that the numbers are not totally skewed. The Apple Macbook Air that was used is an older style (mid-2011) that only has hardware support for 802.11n. It can handle either 2.4GHz or 5GHz, but it is a bit on the slower side.

The average data speed on the 2.4GHz and 5GHz channels for the 1.8GB file was 72Mbps or approximately 9MBps. Being that the Macbook Air is not a MIMO capable device (it makes use of only 1 antenna as opposed to 2 or 3), we theoretically would only be able to reach a maximum of 100Mbps. The 72Mbps in the resulting file transfers is not that bad.

iPhone 6 Plus to Archer C3200 via Wi-Fi Sweetspots

Since the devices that are available to me are not 802.11ac MIMO capable, like a TRENDnet AC1900 USB adapter, I will not be able to push the router to its data rate limits. That is a shame because, at 1300Mbps, wireless device backups on my local network would be pretty awesome.

This is where Wi-Fi Sweetspots can come into play. It was used to check out the various average data rates that can be obtained throughout my home.

2.4GHz

In terms of 2.4GHz, I saw a steady 65Mbps average while I walked around the house with the phone in my hand. Which is quite similar to the results seen with the Macbook Air.

5.8GHz 1

When moving over to the primary 5GHz channel, we saw an increase of data rate, approximately 260.9Mbps. That is great, especially when wanting to move files like videos or photos between wireless devices and storage devices.

5.8GHz 2

This is where things get a little different, the secondary 5GHz channel only produced an average of 77Mbps as I walked around. I’ve read online that one of the 5GHz channels shares 3 antennas with the 2.4GHz channel. Even though it has its own separate Wi-Fi card with its own co-processor, it has to share bandwidth with the 2.4GHz channel.

Depending on traffic, the CPU and co-processors along with the drivers I would assume are utilizing these 3 antennas to the best of their abilities. The other 5GHz channel has 3 antennas all to itself and can push more data through.

Performance and Beam Forming

Based on the various data rate tests that were done, one could determine what devices you might put onto what channels. If you are streaming 4K video to a TV and want to ensure it remains jitter free, it would be best to place that on the 5GHz channel that has its own 3 antenna support. If you have some tablets that are used for just regular Internet surfing, then those could be placed on the 2.4GHz or 5GHz channels.

Remember, 2.4GHz will reach further than the 5GHz will, but that also comes to another feature of the TP-Link Archer C3200 and that is beam-forming. The Archer C3200 can adjust its antennas’ beam-pattern to help increase signal strength where it is most needed.  So if you have a device just on the edge of your Wi-Fi network, the Archer C3200 can help boost that area a little bit more so the signal quality and data speed improve.

Final Thoughts

With so many Wi-Fi routers out on the market, why would someone pay for a more expensive router? You want performance and don’t want to hinder your current wireless experience of course. You also may want to ensure that you can later upgrade other pieces of equipment to support the faster speeds. With the increase of 4K video streaming around the home, console or PC-based online games, the typical household is probably doing a lot of Wi-Fi based tasks. You want to ensure while you’re watching that 4K wireless stream of Star Wars: The Force Awakens in the back bedroom, that little Timmy out in the living room is not losing any of his frags during his latest online session of Star Wars Battlefront.

Out of the box, set up is straight-forward and easy. It took no time to get it up and running. With a little bit of tweaking, I was able to get my regular router settings applied and all my network accessories talking to it. I liked having the 3 separate Wi-Fi frequencies, so I could do my own little load-balancing. The devices that require higher throughput on the network get to go on one of the 5GHz SSIDs, most of the other devices are happy on the 2.4GHz SSID and then the third and final 5GHz is reserved for things that require the faster speeds but not as often.

During the setup of the external 1TB USB3.0 drive, I did notice that you can set up an FTP server with the router to the external drive and also configure it for outside access. I’m surprised that there wasn’t an sFTP (Secure FTP) version to ensure that if you connected from the outside, that you wouldn’t have such an exposed un-encrypted protocol available. Typically, people would want to make use of services such as SSH or sFTP, not Telnet or FTP as those are less secure services. I guess that’s one thing that I won’t be enabling on this router, though it could have been a really useful feature to people.

So, Should You Buy It?

If you’re a family who is digitally connected all around the house with a variety of wireless devices, then perhaps it is time to look at adding a bit more horsepower to your wireless network setup. I would recommend looking at the TP-Link Archer C3200 Tri-band Gigabit router to ensure that your wireless (and wired) devices do not put a damper on the experience your household members could experience. Keep little Timmy fragging Stormtroopers without him complaining about connection issues while you and your loved one stream 4K videos to the bedroom TV!

The TP-Link Archer C3200 is listed at $299.99 but sells for less online. It is available now.