ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 review: Meet the fastest router of 2017!

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is the world's first wireless router that is marketed to gamers. Not only does it use the Republic of Gamers brand, but it is also a beast, both design-wise and concerning hardware. We haven't used a router with a quad-core processor running at 1.8 GHz and 1GB of RAM before. Do its impressive features and hardware translate into a great user experience? If you are curious to know what a gaming router has to offer, regarding features and real-life performance, read this review.

What is the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 good at?

ASUS GT-AC5300 is great at many things:

• The fastest WiFi possible today, on the 5GHz frequency, using the 802.11ac standard
• Excellent for gamers who want the lowest latency possible when playing online
• Perfect for link aggregation so that you get 2 Gbps Ethernet connections for your NAS storage setup
• Ideal for securing your smart home
• Great choice for people who want to use VPN on their routers
• Amazing hardware that has the power to handle large home networks
• Excellent choice for advanced users who want complete control over their network

Pros and cons

ASUS GT-AC5300 has a long list of advantages:

• It offers the fastest WiFi on the 5GHz frequency
• It has impressively powerful hardware that can handle a large number of clients
• Includes several useful features for gamers who want the minimum latency in games
• The built-in security is the best you can get
• Plenty of advanced options to configure in detail how this router works
• Solid multi-lingual support and easily accessible Help documentation
• Excellent features for VPN connections
• You can control your router also from your smartphone
• The built-in analysis and troubleshooting tools are instrumental when dealing with problems

There are a few downsides too:

• This router is large, and it cannot be mounted on walls
• The design of the router and its user interface might not be to everyone's tastes. This device is aimed at gamers and geeks who love the Republic of Gamers brand
• The price is not for everyone

Verdict

ASUS has long experience in delivering high-quality networking equipment. They shine especially in the niche of premium routers with lots of advanced features and capabilities. ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is the successor to last year's ASUS RT-AC5300. While it looks very similar, when it comes to performance, features, and hardware, ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 beats its predecessor hands down. We were pleasantly surprised to see that it is a fantastic upgrade over the previous generation flagship, and we did not expect so many improvements in so many areas. If you want the ultimate speed for WiFi, and you can afford to buy it, ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is the best router you can buy. At least in 2017.

Unboxing the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 comes in a large black box, featuring the Republic of Gamers logo on the top, alongside the product name and the picture.

On the back, you will see some of this router's gamer-centric features: its accelerated gaming ports, the Game Boost feature and the WTFast gamers private network. You can also find some details about the impressive hardware of this router.

When you open the box, you immediately see the router, nicely packaged, and the RoG logo on top, looking back at you. All the accessories and the contents are carefully packaged and hidden beneath the router.

When you unpack everything, you will find the following elements: the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 router and its eight external antennas, the power adapter, an Ethernet cable, the quick start guide, information about the WTFast service and the warranty.

The unboxing experience offered by ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is an enjoyable one, suited to a premium device with excellent specifications.

Hardware specifications and design

When you read the specifications of this router, you can only be impressed. First, it features a quad-core Broadcom BCM4908 processor running at 1.8 GHz. It also has 1GB of RAM DDR3 and 256 MB of storage space for the firmware. Such powerful hardware is a first in the world of wireless routers. We get support for all the modern networking standards, including 802.11ac Wave 2. As you can imagine, ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 offers 4x4 MU-MIMO.

It is a tri-band router, meaning that we get one wireless network on the 2.4 GHz frequency, and two on the 5GHz frequency. ASUS recommends that you use one of the two 5 GHz frequencies only for connecting gaming devices such as your console or gaming laptop.

On the front side of the router, there are several LEDs, for the following: Power, the 2.4 GHz wireless band, the 5GHz wireless band, the internet connection, the LAN connection, and WPS.

On the back, there are the following: the Power button, the power jack, two USB 3.0 ports, the WAN port, eight LAN ports that work at 1 Gbps, and the Reset button. The first two LAN ports are named "Gaming ports," and they get automatically prioritized in case of network congestion. Therefore, if you want to play online games as fast as possible, you should connect your gaming computer to one of them.

On the left side of the router, there are three buttons for turning On and Off the following features: the LEDs, WPS, and WiFi broadcasting.

Also, two other LAN ports offer Link Aggregation for NAS (Network Attached Storage) enthusiasts, meaning that they can enjoy a connection that works at 2 Gbps. However, for this to work, you need a NAS client with support for 802.3ad (a common link aggregation standard in networking).

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is a massive wireless router. Its looks are very aggressive and aimed at gamers. This means that some people will not enjoy it and prefer something more discreet. As for size, this is one of the largest routers you can buy: it has 9.64 x 9.64 x 2.55 inches or 245 x 245 x 65 mm in width x depths x height. It also weighs a massive 4.14 lb or 1.880 kg.

One downside to this router is that it cannot be mounted on walls and it needs a lot of space. You can't place it somewhere discreetly, where it won't be noticed.

If you would like to see all the official specifications and features of this router, we recommend that you visit this page: ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 specifications.

Setting up and using the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300

Setting up the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 works as you would expect: you mount the router where you want to use it, connect it to the internet and one of your computers, and press the Power button. Then, fire up a web browser and load the setup wizard.

First, you need to set the login name and password for the router. We recommend that you don't use the standard "admin" username, to make your router slightly harder to crack.

Then, the router detects the type of your internet connection and asks for the appropriate connection details. Enter them, and then you can set the name and password for the three wireless bands that this router broadcasts.

Before ending the quick setup wizard, you are shown a presentation of the gaming-related features that are built into ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300. It is a good idea to take some time to read everything so that you better understand what you get.

 

In the end, you are shown a summary of your initial settings and the administration user interface is loaded. As you can see below, ASUS has opted for different visuals on the ROG Rapture GT-AC5300. The theme is red and looks like a cockpit made by a gamer. This might not be for everyone's tastes, and we would have preferred the standard user interface that ASUS offers on other routers. However, everything is neatly organized as on all ASUS routers. You won't have issues in finding your way and the settings that interest you.

It's good to familiarize yourself with all the options that are available and browse through all the categories of settings. You will find hidden tools and gems that might be useful. For example, we discovered that ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 offers disc scanning tools for external hard disks, which are useful in case your data gets corrupted.

As expected from a premium router, ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 offers tons of details, tools, and settings. Advanced users will be very pleased with what this router has to offer, and they can configure everything about the way this router works. Gamers will enjoy several tools that are aimed at them, making it easy to get the maximum performance possible in online games.

The user interface is available in 19 languages, which is a great plus for many users. You can see the list of available languages in the screenshot below.

When it comes to Help documentation, it is readily available. If you do not understand what a setting does, move the mouse cursor on top of its name and, if you see a question mark displayed, click the left mouse button. Then, a tooltip is shown with more information about that setting.

When you are done configuring everything on the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300, start connecting to the network all the devices that are in your home. We connected almost anything you can think of: computers, 2-in-1 devices, consoles, smart plugs, smart bulbs, a wireless printer, smartphones, etc. All devices were able to connect to the network with ease, and they enjoyed excellent speed in all our home. But more about speed in the next sections of this review.

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is a massive router with impressive features and a user interface that stands out. It looks like a cockpit that was made for gamers. This may or may not be to your taste. The firmware offers an unparalleled number of tools and features that allow users to configure everything they want and more. Digging through all the options is a good idea because you will discover things you did not know a router can do.

If you would like to see the real-world performance that this router offers, and comparisons with other AC5300 routers, go to the next page of this review.

Wireless network performance

Before sharing the data from our measurements, let's take a look at the apartment that was used in our testing and how it is set up. You can see that the router is placed in the living room. With most wireless routers, the signal strength is not that high in places like the Kitchen and the Medium balcony.

 

Our testing was done using a fast 1 Gigabit Internet connection that's capable of uploads on the internet of up to 500 Mbps. We used a Microsoft Surface Pro 3 for all our measurements and several software tools. To get a better perspective of the performance offered by ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300, we compared it with ASUS RT-AC5300 and TP-LINK Archer C5400. Also, to make the naming shorter, in our illustrations we refer to ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 as ASUS GT-AC5300.

We started by evaluating the 2.4 GHz wireless network and measured the signal strength offered in each room, using a tool named inSSIDer. The signal strength provided by ASUS GT-AC5300 seems to be quite weak when compared to other routers. However, it decreases more slowly from room to room. We found this interesting and we were curious to see how it fares in the next tests.

Then, we used SpeedTest to measure how fast the internet connection offered by this router is on the 2.4 GHz WiFi frequency. The download speed provided by ASUS GT-AC5300 was good, but it varied a lot. In this test, there was no clear winner.

The same was true for the upload speed. We received good performance but nothing outstanding.

Continuing our measurements on the 2.4 GHz wireless network, we used the PassMark Performance test to transfer data between two computers connected to the network. ASUS GT-AC5300 delivered good performance for the download speed, but it was not spectacular. In most rooms, it was beaten by TP-LINK Archer C5400.

When it comes to the upload speed, ASUS GT-AC5300 was ahead of the others in most rooms but not by a significant margin.

The 2.4 GHz wireless network offered by ASUS GT-AC5300 is very similar to what you get from other AC5300 or AC5400 routers. It is fast, and it works well, but it is not the fastest you can get.

Next, we analyzed the performance offered by the 5GHz wireless network. First, we looked at the evolution of the signal strength, from room to room. Again, the signal strength offered by ASUS GT-AC5300 was lower than that of other routers and also a bit more constant.

We moved to SpeedTest, to measure the speed of the internet connection on the 5GHz wireless network. To see the maximum potential of this router, we used the world's only PCI-E network card with support for 4x4 MU-MIMO: ASUS PCE-AC88. When we used this network card, we obtained a maximum speed of 553.47 Mbps for the download speed. This result is outstanding, and it proves that, if you have modern, high-end networking equipment, you can reach some incredible speeds with this router.

To get back to earth, and everyday devices people use, we took our Surface Pro 3 and measured the download speed with SpeedTest, in every room of our test apartment. Again, ASUS GT-AC5300 was excellent in its performance and beat its competition by a large margin.

The same was true when measuring the upload speed.

For the last measurements on the 5GHz wireless network, we used the PassMark Performance test to transfer data between two computers connected to the network. ASUS GT-AC5300 outshined its competition by a significant margin in every room. We did not have rooms with transfer download speeds less than 300 Mbps. We have never seen this before in all our years of testing wireless routers.

Looking at the upload speed, we were again dazzled by the level of performance offered by ASUS GT-AC5300. It's just amazing.

If you want the fastest possible wireless network on the 5GHz frequency, ASUS GT-AC5300 is the router to buy. Full stop!

Wired network performance

In order to test the quality of the wired Ethernet connection, we used a desktop PC, equipped with an Intel Core i5 4460 processor, running at 3.20GHz, 16GB of RAM and a very fast Samsung 850 Pro 512GB SSD and a Microsoft Surface Pro 3 with an Intel Core i5-4300U processor, running at 1.9 GHz, 8 GB of RAM and a fast 256 GB SSD drive from Samsung.

We started by measuring the download and upload speed of the internet connection offered by ASUS GT-AC5300 using SpeedTest. As you can see below, this router, just like the others, delivered above 900 Mbps for the download speed. Our internet connection is capped at 500 Mbps for the upload speed, and ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 reached this maximum. In the graph below, you see that ASUS RT-AC5300 delivered 200 Mbps for the upload speed. This is because, when we tested it, our connection used to be capped at this upload speed.

Then, we ran a network transfer between the two computers, using the PassMark Performance test. You can see ASUS GT-AC5300 delivered the fastest LAN transfers when compared with the other two competitors.

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 offers fast Ethernet connections, at 1 Gbps, as advertised.

USB performance

We connected a portable SSD drive to the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300, through one of the USB 3.0 ports and then we used LAN SpeedTest Lite to transfer data to and from it and measure the speed. You can see the download and upload speed we measured in the graphic below.

If you are interested to know the speed you get while transferring data using the USB port on this router, we measured 100 Mbps for the download speed and 72 Mbps for the upload.

Extra features

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is without question the most sophisticated wireless router that was released so far for consumers. The list of features included is massive, and it includes useful tools for gamers, as well as security, VPN and a lot more. Here are the most important features bundled on the ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300:

• Game IPS - these are the traditional security tools that are offered by ASUS in collaboration with Trend Micro. They have received some improvements over previous versions, and they are beneficial in securing your home network. We highly recommend that you turn them on and use them.
• Game Boost - analyzes network traffic and prioritizes gaming, for minimum latency when playing online. In other words, this is an advanced QoS (Quality of Service) feature that automatically prioritizes online gaming packets.
• Game Private Network - it gives users the possibility to create a WTFast account, for optimized online gaming. You get access to some free features but, for the full service, you need to pay extra to WTFast.
• Game Profile - the traditional port forwarding feature that is optimized for gamers and it makes it easy to unblock the ports that are required by popular games such as League of Legends, Diablo 3, CS GO, Fifa 17, Left 4 Dead and more.
• Wi-Fi Radar - this is a new set of tools to ASUS routers which allow you to analyze the wireless spectrum in your area and choose the best settings for your wireless network. They also offer advanced troubleshooting of WiFi problems.
• VPN - You can set your router to work as a VPN server using the PPTP and OpenVPN protocols. Also, ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 offers support for VPN connections made by devices that are in your network.
• Traffic Analyzer - if you want to see how much traffic goes on in your network, who uses the most bandwidth and how, this feature is useful.
• Guest network - you can enable up to nine WiFi networks for your guests, three for each band. You also get access to all the configuration options you could want for guest networks.
• DDNS - Dynamic Domain Name System allows you to connect to the wireless router, even with a dynamic public IP address, through a registered domain name. The router works with many popular DDNS services, including one made by ASUS.
• USB applications - you have apps for all kinds of USB devices: external hard disks, NAS devices, USB modems, printers and more.
• AiCloud 2.0 - this service allows you to create your cloud-based storage and access it from anywhere on the internet, with the help of your router and a smartphone app.
• Network Tools - a collection of tools that are useful when you have problems with your network, your router or your internet connection.

These are all the big features that you can find on ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300. However, if you dig deep into the firmware of this router, you will find many other useful tools that allow you to configure everything about its operation, even manual controls for how each wireless frequency broadcasts its signal.

Last but not least, ASUS also offers a smartphone app. It is named ASUS Router, and it is available for Android and iOS. With it, you can configure many of the features that can be found on this router, straight from your smartphone. However, the app works only if the smartphone is connected to your WiFi. It doesn't work from anywhere on the internet.

ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300 is the most feature packed router that was launched in 2017. You just can't wish for more from a wireless router, and other routers don't offer so many features. Don't think that its features are aimed only at gamers. Yes, some of them are, but most of them will benefit all users. Also, the built-in security features are great for securing your smart home.

What is your opinion about ASUS ROG Rapture GT-AC5300?

Now that you know our view about the "Spiderman of wireless routers" and the results it delivered in our testing share your opinion with us. Do you like this router? Would you consider buying it? If you already have it, what is your experience with it? Share in the comments below.