A WiFi 7 travel router I’ve had for a year and a bit. It was a good router. Then the updates came.
In year one I’d have recommended it to any tinkerer. Today, after two full resets and a trip where it failed me, I can’t.
Not again I’m not prepared to rely on it.
The way I had it set up in the car was Starlink on the roof, with PoE run back down to this router. All I can say is it worked perfectly.
I made use of the VPN and AdGuard features, and did a lot of playing around with other stuff too. All in all, a good router.
I used it at home connected to my MacBook, making use of its WiFi 7, something the M4 Pro doesn’t have. I ran it in repeater mode and it worked flawlessly.
Then I connected an ethernet cable to it and, with a VPN going, got 1,300Mbps down on a 1,600Mbps connection. I was very happy with that.
Updates started arriving, along with new stuff to play with. I turned on a few things and it started to struggle. I could only get 700Mbps down, a long way off what I had before.
So I did a full reset and started from scratch. Without a VPN I got the full 1,600Mbps. With the VPN back on, I got 1Gb down. Now I’m not happy.
It seems as though all these extra features have made it quite bloated. The CPU is working hard.
It’s starting to struggle even when turning on. It now takes longer to load than it used to.
I set it up at home, ready to take my older children to a concert. I’d booked an apartment 100ft from the venue, so I stayed behind while they went.
As soon as I could, I got the little router out, because I wanted everyone behind a VPN. Could I get it working? No. It let me down big time.
After seeing the kids off, I did another full reset and started from scratch. I was pulling 80Mbps down, with no VPN on or anything else for that matter, on a 1Gb connection.
Bear in mind I was using it in repeater mode. But I never had these problems before the recent updates.
Every result I got, as a share of the connection I was on. Watch it fall.
Download speeds, as I measured them. GL.iNet quotes a maximum of 490Mbps for WireGuard VPN running on the router itself, so my VPN figures are higher than its own claim.
GL.iNet’s published numbers for the Slate 7 (GL-BE3600).
| GL.iNet says | What I found |
|---|---|
| WiFi 7 travel router | Gave my M4 Pro MacBook WiFi 7. Brilliant in year one. |
| Repeater mode | Flawless at first. 80Mbps on a 1Gb line after the updates. |
| VPN and AdGuard built in | Great features, but turning more on made it struggle. |
| Quad-core 1.1GHz CPU | Working hard since the updates. Slower to boot. |
Specs are GL.iNet’s published figures. Price checked on GL.iNet’s UK store.
After a year and a bit.