WL-500gP V1 or WL-500gP V2

[outlaw11]

Which one of this two units is, generaly speaking, better?

Browsing thorugh the internet shops they offer mostly V2

[trampjuice]

I have the v1, and its only real restriction is down to the broadcom 4 series cpu which restricts its bandwidth to 2MB/s. That is a bottleneck.
But - i still manage to record tv programs from my tv box to its attached USB drive and download and run other tasks with minimal glitches!
The v2 has a better CPU. But you want to check it doesn't have any restrictions which would prevent you running openWRT on it, to do this use the hardware list featured on OpenWrt.org

[al37919]

http://oleg.wl500g.info/devices.html

[gouryella]

if u want to buy new one, check successors of wl-500 series:
rt-n13u ~100$ (not supported by alternative firmwares yet)
rt-n16 ~150$ (dd-wrt, OpenWrt, ...)

[outlaw11]

http://oleg.wl500g.info/devices.html

Generation 3:
WL-500g Premium (WL-500gp) BCM4704/BCM4780 264MHz BCM5325E MiniPCI 802.11g (BCM4318E) 32MB DDR 32bit 8MB 2 x 2.0 (VT6212L)

Generation 2.1:
WL-500g Premium V2 (WL-500gpv2) BCM5354 240MHz SoC 802.11g (SoC) 32MB DDR 16bit 8MB 2 x 2.0 (SoC + USB2520)

According to this V2 has slower CPU, thats what I dont understand why would v2 of a product be of lower performance.

But apparently thats a case here.

btw, i think its roughly 2MB/s on V2 too..

[al37919]

the production cost of all-integrated solution is lower. Taking into account that the street price for wl500gPv1 and wl500gPv2 was about the same, it means that asus gets more income per item while selling wl500gPv2 than v1. That's IMHO the driving force of switching to v2 production.

However, buyer has right to make his own choice.

[trampjuice]

I read somewhere (I can't recall where) that although the Mhz frequency of the v2 CPU (BCM5454 @ 240Mhz) is slower, than the v1 CPU (BCM4704 @266Mhz) the ACTUAL speed of the CPU is faster in computing terms.

I read it uses a reduced instruction set (RISK) to execute more lines of code in far fewer clock cycles. I would imagine that the CPU bottleneck problem of 2Mb/sec is somewhat elevated although I am not 100% on this.

However, the other specs (32MB Ram, 8MB Flash) are the same as the v1.

And frankly, THATS the major drawback, because it would have cost them next to NOTHING to upgrade the memory to 64MB/16MB flash!!!

And the real drawback of running the WL500gP v1 is not the 2MB/Sec bandwidth problem! Its the memory!

I mean - for a home user like me - via thie v1 box - I can record and playback on demand PAL-TV to the harddisk, at the same time as downloading with transmission AND running other processes like cron, esniper AND with OLEG switching bandwidth to my VOIP calls dynamically without too many problems, (perhaps just a few skipped seconds on the tv record now and again when it gets totally overloaded) and giving me a fantastic 1TB HDD USB networked storage solution with a SAMBA share - backed up weekly by a script over the network to another PC HDD - costing me max 35 Watts HDD + 12Watts WL500gP router (about 50Watts) - around 1kWh per 24Hrs in electricity -less than 20p per day or less than £73/E100 per year. (The HDD has a power off mode when not in use so it should be actually well under this but I havent seen it power down yet - I must be logging on the HHD somewhere Grrr...) I can even (via ffmpeg) playback .avi's in .TS (MPEG-2) format from the tv box connected via router to the HDD!

But the real dream is doing all of this on a few watts of power, AND running a email server+ web server, perhaps with a phone exchange like Asterix handling voice calls as well!!!

But for all that you need MEMORY - a single Xmail mailserver process takes up 3MB and there may be 8-10 of them leaving no room foranything else, plus you might want a php mysql backend processes running etc.. to run a basic website, and you can basically forget Asterix without extra memory.

The v1 is at least potentailly hack upgradable to 128MB thanks to its PCB layout. You would not have the same ability with the stripped down intergrated v2 PCB.

As a user of the V1 I would say stick with it until something better comes along. Having now looked over the v2 it is is no better because the stingbags have went all intergrated and thus have not upgraded the memory as its now all onboard 1 chip so you have no chance of upgrading the box.

I am looking for a more powerful OpenWRT router with USB and with more memory, only a plus or nice to have: more CPU throughput. hopefully the same total system wattage or less

[trampjuice]

I guess this is the thing to upgrade to.
12-15Watts, 32MB Flash, 128MB RAM, 533Hz CPU! 802.11N (not dual band but who cares!) 2x USB ports which people claim are 10Mb/Sec. Comes with 4 Gigabit ethernet ports and with OLEG...

Well - I know whats on my xmas list now.

[al37919]

and with OLEG...

you are too optimistic. At the moment not yet.

[trampjuice]

you are too optimistic. At the moment not yet.

Too optimistic yeah thats me alright ... but it has

http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/viewtop...069c1c3b7abbee

DD-WRT support already for most features, so I guess OLEG will come along sooner or later.

I eventually tracked down the spec of the Asus RT-N13 and with its one USB port and much more limited memory and capabililties its no real comparison to the RT-N16. The RT-N15 is also cut down and is selling for just $20-$30.

In the US the price of the RT-N16 seems to now be around $99 (overstock.com, newegg.com) with the major online volume retailers.

Its currently £99 in the UK and not very available. In the next month or two, I guess major volume sellers here in Europe are going to be very keen to be stocking this router and will be taking a smaller margin on sales, so we should see the price shrink down like it has in the US. So its worth waiting a few months for stocks to increase.

By comparison:
I think the sheeva 'plug' for $99 is very interesting. 5 Watts!!! - One USB2.0 port, a network connection, a 1.2Ghz ARM processor, 512Mb RAM, 512MB flash with Ubuntu.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SheevaPlug. I guess all you would need is a network connection into a decent router and you could do almost anything with it (and a USB hub.)

[trampjuice]

The RT-N16 looked good for $99, but, thanks to its irrational marketing - the huge rollout lead time in the US where its $99, over Europe, where it has just now appeared for £99, there are other options out there for running a low power high spec linux box off the network which people might want to consider.

The RT-N16 has a bcm4716 533Mhz CPU, 128 Mb Mem, 32 Mb Flash 2x USB2.0 for £99 on 12Watts.

But a SheevaPlug has a armv5te 1.2 Ghz CPU, 512Mb Mem, 512 Mb flash, 1 x USB for £86 (all inclusive - delivery, vat) on 5 Watts (Gigabit lan connection) with full debian/ubuntu linux installed.

I have just tracked down where to buy one of these sheevaplugs (from newit.co.uk) for £86 and I am well pleased with it because of the massively expanded spec compared to the 32MB flash RT-N16. This might be something people want to consider. The WL500gP has an extra 2 USB2.0 ports if needed. I personally have no real need to upgrade to wireless N and a gigabit switch router yet so this is a great option for me.

Manufacturers are targeting these plugs for home server uses - like running home security webcams, asterisk, sendmail, websites, transmission, NAS, etc...