AC1750 WiFi Extender (RE450), PCMag Editor's Choice, Up to 1750Mbps, Dual Band WiFi Repeater, Internet Booster, Extend WiFi Range Further

This is for the AC1750 WIFI Extender RE450: I feel like the way some of these reviews are being written it is making it appear that this extender is actually a router which is a giant no. I did see some reviews where they discuss this product isn't working properly which leads me to think it's a firmware issue or user error. Other reviews seemed to think that this would increase their internet speed over wireless, which is not necessarily true. Weak wifi signals will cause drops in connection which may make it seem like your internet is going slow, but it's really packet loss. So by boosting the signal strength you obtain a stable connection that doesn't lose as many packets which makes it seem like the internet is going faster when in reality you just aren't losing as much data in transmission and you're not waiting for your device to receive all the packets it expects. THAT SAID: I just received this product today and out of the box had it up and running in less than 5 minutes (I did not use the WPS method) and immediately noticed a stronger signal to all of my devices. THIS DOES NOT BOOST YOUR INTERNET CONNECTION SPEED. It merely ensures that your wireless connections are stronger to your router, thus giving you as much internet connection benefit as possible from your modem over a wireless connection. I cringe when I read reviews where people do speed tests and claim they see no benefit from this device. If this is you, you're doing it wrong. I went from a weak 5ghz signal (1-2 bar) transmitting at around 120 Mbps, to a solid 4 bar transmitting at 866.5 Mbps and have not noticed any hiccups in stability at that speed over the last few hours. This is on the farthest device from the extender through walls that have plumbing in them. I'm running 11 devices on my wifi network including phones/pc/laptop/security cameras and when it comes to the security cameras when I used to load them up over wireless there was usually a delay (device offline) before the images would come up. This extender has solved that and the images now pop up immediately. This alone makes me happy. While I'd prefer the device to not be such an outlet hog (You're going to sacrifice an outlet for this) I appreciate that I can turn the LED's off as well as use the ethernet port for a non-wifi device. For the price I can't really complain that there's only 1 ethernet port, but I wasn't buying this for that need. Overall so far I'm super happy with the extender. If it can hold up for at least 2 years I'd consider it a fair price, great product, and would buy it again.

I own a TP-Link Archer C5400 router that is several hundred feet away and behind several very sturdy walls. On a good day, I would barely get 200 kilobytes a second. This is actually pretty good considering every other brand I had tried (and there were a LOT I had tried), would not even connect let alone give me any sort of data. Once I installed this product into my room, it was as if I was hard-wired directly into the router. I may not have the fastest internet service available but being able to go from 200 KBps to over 5 MEGABYTES a second, wirelessly at that, is far beyond any expectation I had held. When it is hardwired via the ethernet port into my TV, I get full 4K video streaming without any stutter or delay. When I use the wireless function for gaming, my ping is extremely low and I can game online for the first time in years. I had mediocre hopes for this device to be honest. I was just hoping I could get a stable connection and maybe, just MAYBE 1 megabyte per second. This unit has beyond far exceeded my expectations. Not only does it play well with the android tethering app and enables me to control this unit and the router separately, it is nearly almost exactly plug and play. Almost anyone can install this with basic computer skills even without reading the instruction manual or having even mediocre networking knowledge. I would say I would purchase this again but this single one unit covers every single inch of my house that I do not even need to order another unit. Kudos to TP-Link again for providing me with quite possibly the best router and wireless range extender experience possible. Please do note that when I reference the router that I am speaking of the previous router from TP-Link that I had purchased as this unit IS NOT a router. And on a bonus side note, the customer service provided by TP-Link has far exceeded the customer service I have received from any product I have ever purchased, whether it was another form of electronics or otherwise. I cannot say for sure how well this product would work if not paired with a TP-Link router but based on how this unit is functioning, I can almost guarantee that it would work with any wireless router setup. This is a product that not only do I highly recommend with full confidence but would swear by it on my word. If you are experiencing poor reception or speeds that are far below what your service provider advertises (and I would test it hardwired on a speedtest site first to make sure your provider is not just feeding you fake rates), then this is exactly the product you are looking for and beyond.

If you follow the directions, this WiFi extender is a snap to get up and running. After I did the required setup, I moved it into the location where I was having problems. Voila! I had a strong, consistent signal and my reception problems disappeared. I would caution those who are not technically adept to be sure you KNOW your username and password for your 2.4GHz and 5GHz existing wireless networks. Without that information, you'll be dead in the water and won't be able to complete the setup screen. That will sound obvious to those of you who are experienced in setting up network devices, but in my experience many people never change the router default password for wireless. I'm also deducting one star because I have a minor issue with this otherwise fine piece of electronics. The shape of the unit requires that the plug below it, (in a duplex outlet) either be empty, or have a small, unobtrusive or flat-top plug. Otherwise, the bottom of the WiFi extender will hit the plug and you won't be able to plug it in. I was able to find a 1-foot extension cord that had a flat top that I used in the bottom outlet that allowed another device to be plugged in the bottom while the AC1750 fit above it. The Wirecutter recommended this range extender, and I trust their judgement. Immediately after installing it, my reception problems were gone! The interface is a snap to use, and I had absolutely no problems or anomalies when I then put it into it's final location. I also updated the firmware in the unit, and it can now also act as a WAP as well as an extender. DHCP can be left in Auto, On or Off, depending on your requirements. If you're just using it as an extender, you can ignore that setting altogether as Auto works perfectly and recognizes that another DHCP server is on-line. For me, since I don't need DHCP, I turned it off. One other feature I liked was the ability to turn the LED indicators on and off according to a schedule. My AC1750 is located in our bedroom. The LEDs are pretty bright, but using the configuration page I shut them off from 9PM to 10AM so during normal sleeping hours I don't even know it's there. Nice feature. I've only owned this unit a couple days, but I am very impressed with the coverage I'm getting. Hearing that, it may seem picayune to deduct one star based on the issue with the plug, but at this price, there could have been an option to mount the unit directly to a wall with an adapter and then plug in only a power supply, not the entire unit. Nonetheless, this is a well designed unit that will go a long way to giving you complete WiFi coverage in your home.

I ordered this Wifi extender because I needed an upgrade from a tiny Netgear model that was only capable of 300 mbps. That may be fine for inside the home, but I needed something that could extend about 125 feet and still be relatively fast. I believe I got that from this TP-Link Extender. SETUP: Setup couldn’t have been easier. You actually have two options: One with setup online and the other setup using the WPS button on your router. Both options are detailed in the included instruction manual. I chose the WPS option. All I had to do was plug in the extender, press the big round button on the front of it, and then press the WPS button on my router. That was it. The extender took care of the rest. It found the router and connected within seconds. I then moved the extender to a location about 125 feet away from the router. PERFORMANCE: I will include photos of a speed test I ran back in July with my old Netgear and the speed test I ran today with this new TP-Link extender. You can see my speeds have increased quite a bit, especially the download speed. And as I stated this is all at a distance of about 125 feet. I can tell a big difference when I am cruising the internet. It is so much less frustrating now. Of course this TP-Link extender is a higher quality extender than my old Netgear one so it should be expected to perform much better. INCIDENTALS: This extender was larger than I was expecting. It measures 6.5” in height, 3” in width, and a little over 1.25” in depth. There are three antennas which add an additional 2.5” to the measurements. The antennas are multi-positionable. FINAL THOUGHTS: Overall I am super pleased with this extender. I am happy to have found one that is dual banded, fast, and a breeze to set up.

Where to begin... This is my SECOND unit. Both have the same issue. Allow me to state up front that I am very tech savvy & knowledgeable about these matters. WiFi extenders are simple devices. You attach one wirelessly to your primary WiFi source & it extends the signal to areas far away from the primary WiFi. You should only need to set it up once & then forget about it, just like you do with your primary WiFi source. I have two Wireless Gateways available, a Motorola Cable Gateway & a T-Mobile LTE Gateway. Both are extremely reliable & function perfectly. My wireless devices connect perfectly to either. I have never had issues with connectivity with either Gateway with any device. Except for trying to get the RE450 to function, neither Gateway has ever required a reboot to restore an error or for connectivity issues. Not a single time. Enter TP-Link's RE450.... Setup - Setup for the RE450 is extremely easy through the Tether mobile app. I have no complaints with the Tether app or setup procedure & experienced no issues configuring the device. Just make sure you know your Primary WiFi SSID & Password before beginning the setup process. You first create an Administrative password for the RE450, enter the connection credentials for your 2.4 & 5 Ghz WiFi network, then decide in which mode you wish to operate the RE450. You can choose AP Mode (Access Point) to convert a wired network into a wireless network, or Extender Mode to extend your primary WiFi wireless range. Most users will likely choose the latter. The RE450 can use the same name & password info as your Primary WiFi which makes it transparent to you, or you can give the RE450 radios their own unique IDs. I suggest the latter else you never know to which system you are connected. The cloned mode would be fine *IF* the RE450 was reliable. Unfortunately, it is not... Issues - Again I have tried two of these. Both are on the latest firmware & have been reset multiple times. I ordered the replacement believing it couldn't be that bad & I must have received a defective unit. Unfortunately both have the exact same problem. 2.4 Ghz Connectivity - Both units have problems connecting to the 2.4 band on both my Motorola & T-Mobile Gateways. It seems the only way to get the RE450 to link with the 2.4 Ghz band is to reboot the Gateways. Only then will the RE450 link the 2.4 Ghz band. For a brief moment everything is connected & works well. Hard Lockup - Alas, in a short order, sometimes as little as 5 minutes, the RE450 locks up & ceases to function at all on either band. She looks lovely with her blue lights, but the device has hard crashed & you can no longer access the RE450. Its 2.4 Ghz band will appear in a WiFi scan but you can not connect. The 5 Ghz band simply vanishes. At this point neither the power, light control, or WPS buttons have any effect. The solution? Remove it from the wall outlet & wait a few seconds, plug it back in, pray the 2.4 Ghz band connects else reboot your Primary, wait a few minutes for the next hard lockup. Conclusion - Two brand new factory sealed RE450 units are both experiencing the exact same issues. The replacement has been here for 2 hours & required 10 reboots already! Both do the same thing with either of two perfectly functioning gateways from different manufacturers. TP-Link - How can the RE450 be this bad??? In fairness, I have not contacted TP-Link tech support, but I have already done what I'm sure they will suggest. The devices are on the latest firmware. They have been reset multiple times. I have written quite a few reviews & this is one of only two times I have rated something an absolutely worthless piece of garbage. This device deserves a ZERO STAR rating. UPDATE: I have since learned you can get the RE450 to function in a somewhat limited sense IF you only connect a single band to the Primary WiFi. Pick either a 2.4 or 5 ghz connection to the Primary & it works. For receiving connections you are able to keep both bands operational. This isn't a particularly desirable solution as it severely limits the speed of the RE450. *Note - I have also tested the RE650 & RE350. Both are on the latest firmware & have the identical issue with the exception of the hard lockup. On these units the 5 ghz band vanishes. The 2.4 band remains visible & permits a "limited access" connection with no access past the extender.

It works well and extended my wifi to my detached garage. Now my security camera and garage door opener have a stronger connection and I believe this will fix the frequency of these devices being offline. However, I paid for a new item and I don't believe that I received a new item. There wasn't any type of quick connection literature in the box and the device had no peel off protective film. I can also see minor scuffing on the device. It's not really worth the the hassle to me to return it as it's doing the job I needed it for now, but I would have liked a brand new device, like I paid for 🤷‍♀️ It's also not connecting on the 5GHz only the 2.4GHz.

I've had this for some time - with mixed results. I have two laptops, two phones, Roku streaming, Smart TV streaming and a few other devices. I live in a 4-level home - devices on all. My router is on a lower level on one end of the house. I was not getting great signal strength throughout the house, so I bought this unit. Either I didn't fully understand the concept, or I misread the instructions (which were very minimal). The installation is quick and easy. After I had it set up, I brought the unit onto the level where most of the activity is located - figuring that is where it would provide the best service. It did work - bought would fail intermittently. There didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason for it. I moved it a couple of times - same thing. Signal strength seemed good. I was blaming my wife's laptop, my laptop, the ISP, the router -- I no longer had the instruction pamphlet. My laptop would work fine - then FB would tell me that my connection had been restored. I would be steaming some music - it would stop. I would be streaming a movie, it would stop, I would have to go back and resume. But it wasn't constant - bu often enough to be quite irritating. I finally found the answer on Techjunkie.com. It seems I didn't completely understand the difference between a repeater and an extender. "Extender Placement People often confuse Wi-Fi repeaters and extenders. Repeaters connect to your wireless network and rebroadcast it into a larger square footage of connectivity. Alternatively, range extenders, such as TP-Link AC1750 RE450, are linked to the wireless network using a wireless link, thereby extending the network to a bigger area. This is why you shouldn’t consider the extender an extension of a router. You should place it within a couple of feet from the router, to ensure maximum effectiveness." Once I place the unit near the router -- Voila!!! Problem solved!!!

i am blown away by how well this worked. We have an almost dead zone in my parents' family room, where we like to sit and watch tv at night. The connection is weak and flits in and out. I first tried an Airport Express, but that only works well with an Apple router, and even when I found my old Apple router, maybe that extender doubled the speed of my connection. It wasn't great. Worse yet, the Apple extender kept losing the signal, and I'd have to unplug and replug it every day. So I returned it, and based on reviews on a few tech sites, claiming this had great range and fast speeds, I bought the AC1750 extender. I am blown away. 1. Set up. Easy as can be. We have an xfinity router from Arris, password protected. All I had to do was plug the extender in, let it boot up, press the WPS buttton on the router, then press the "lock" button on the extender, and half a minute later it was done. (In fact, I had to press the wps button a second time on the router, as the first time nothing happened.) That was all I had to do, and it worked! 2. Function. We tried a few different electrical outlets in the family room. The first "only" increased the internet speed by a factor of ten. Just on a lark I plugged it in in a different outlet in the same room. Now our connection in that room is faster by a factor of 20. It's insane. I've attached a Speedtest image. The 4-5 mbps download speeds in that image are before I installed the extender. The 37-58 Mbps speeds are from the first location of the extender. And the 88-89 Mbps speeds are from the final location. That's the same speed I get when standing next to our actual Arris router in the kitchen. I simply cannot believe this thing works as well as it does. It's been a day and so far it hasn't lost the connection at the final location. It did not however like the previous location, and was blinking its disatisfaction, so you just move it. The only real negative I found is what someone else reported: you can log into the extender via a URL once. The second time you try, you get an error, and then it's far more complicated to log in without resetting the entire thing. Also, I tried to update the firmware and kept getting error messages when unzipping the firmware download. Still have solved either of those problems. But that aside, this is an amazing device. I've tried three other extenders in this house, and this is the only one that has consistently worked, not dropped the signal, and has boosted the signal to speeds equal to standing right next to the main router. It's only been 24 hours that I've had this extender, and I'll update this review if things change, but this thing is simply amazing. UPDATE: It's been a few weeks and this thing hasn't lost the signal once. Can't praise this enough. It's exactly what I've been looking for, for several years now.