BPI-R4 Wifi 7 Router board

BPI-R3 ends up costing more with a case, heatsink and antennas. You also have to buy 2.5GbE transceivers which adds to the cost if you want 2.5GbE WAN/LAN. Also, highly unlikely some dev board will have better range, shielding and RF front end modules compared to a proper consumer router. BPI-R4's Wi-Fi is particularly bad due to interference and integrated low power FEM.

1. BPI-R4 (MT7988), most powerful but not recommended for Wi-Fi due to Wi-Fi NIC issues. 2. GL.iNET Flint 2 (MT7986), currently best supported device for Wi-Fi. 3. BPI-R3 (MT7986), like Flint 2 but with SFP. Flint 2's Wi-Fi will be better though as it is not a dev board. 4. Flint 3 (Qualcomm IPQ 53xx), for Wi-Fi 7. Not open source OpenWrt due to Qualcomm but close enough if you intend on only using hardware offloading. Weaker CPU than Flint 2. 5. Other Qualcomm routers with the [openwrt-ipq fork](https://github.com/qosmio/openwrt-ipq) so you can still use mostly latest open source bits along with the latest closed source bits. See [forum thread here](https://forum.openwrt.org/t/qualcommax-nss-build/148529). No idea about the Wi-Fi 7 stuff though. 6. ASUS ZenWiFi BT8 (MT7988) has a preliminary build [here](https://github.com/dangowrt/owrt-ubi-installer/tree/v1.0.1-bt8) but it's not officially supported as far as I can tell outside of one person working on it. 7. TP-Link BE805, in hopes of future support since it's MT7988 but someone will need to buy the router and figure out a relatively painless install method first. All of these will support hardware NAT at least, and usually PPPoE too. Other types of offloading will probably be difficult outside of OEM builds. Both MTK and Qualcomm NSS support hardware QoS with fq_codel even, but not with the open-source drivers.

Flint 2. Don't need to use the Wi-Fi if it's not needed. BPI-R3 an BPI-R4 are fine too if you don't intend on using them for Wi-Fi. The negative stuff is when it is used for Wi-Fi (since proper routers have higher power and better antennas). The SFP ports have some quirks (if you get the SFP version) but that is about it. x86 is overkill and wasteful for your usage. Some of the used x86 stuff might be cheaper than a Flint 2 (specifically in the US due to the abundance of used electronics) but will rack up more in power bills and dump more heat - not great if you pay 30c per kWh like in California which would be ~$35/yr extra for every 10W more than an ARM based consumer router.

I have a heavily modified build running WiFi 7 on Zyxcel NWA210BE. I’ve found that these devices need hardware acceleration to get the speeds you probably want. Rather than mainline OpenWRT, I used the OpenWiFi image as a starting point. You probably don’t want to do that. I’m mostly pointing out that it is unlikely that you will ever see the optimal performance you would get out of the box for these Qualcomm devices in a mainline OpenWRT image. This is simply because OpenWRT does not futz with closed source hardware acceleration drivers. Will it work? Yes. I have it working. Will it work well using Linux kernel networking? no. Will there ever be an “LTS” version that performs at the level the chipset can handle? Hell will freeze over first since it would require Qualcomm to opensource its drivers.

I’ll say that you may not get the performance you are hoping for with standard OpenWRT. Options like the banana pi r4 have builds with hardware acceleration that aren’t in mainline OpenWRT and never will as these are proprietary closed source drivers. I have a bpi r4 pro without WiFi for my primary home router. The WiFi 7 hardware does not supply the needed power to the card, so I decided to skip it. One the WiFi 7 side of things I’ve been experimenting with zyxcel NWA210BE and an OpenWiFi controller. It’s something I’ve decided I want to try. Building images with hardware acceleration support is not for the faint of heart, but if you actually want OpenWRT *and* the full performance of the chipset, you have to do that. I have no experience with this, but it seems strangely absent from most conversations about wifi7 and OpenWRT. [The Velo7 Max BE19000](https://a.co/d/0d9syqwb) is the same chipset as the banana pi r4(Mediatek/Filogic 880). If I were to start over and just wanted a single device, I’d probably go for it.

Bpi-R4 with case/etc. is $159 as long as you don’t need WiFi. Otherwise go with the flint 2 or openwrt one.

The Banana Pi R4 is really excellent. Prices have gone crazy lately, but I got lucky and was able to snag one used for $80. WiFi—I use Unifi, so I can’t speak to that on the R4. In general with OpenWRT, I am of the opinion that the best route to go is to leave WiFi to other devices not running OpenWRT. It’s hard to beat proprietary software in that arena. (I do block these devices from accessing the internet though).

You can buy purpose-built OpenWRT routers, but there is definitely a learning curve. I use a Banana Pi R4, which has 2x 10Gb SFP ports. It has a web UI (LuCi) to configure most things, but as you learn more, you'll probably have to SSH into it and configure via CLI. For my use, it's perfect; it can push a lot of packets, it's small and low power (with several power input options) and I have full control of it. OpenWRT also lets me use it as a full Linux computer if I so desire. I have lots of devices on my LAN and about a dozen VLANs (just cos) so the advanced, high-performance router is a good fit for me.

Running a BPI-R4 right now as gateway/router/AP combo. Performance is good and for 250€ you will find little else with good performance and OpenWRT support. Using a GPON SFP stick for fiber Internet. Having the CPU and memory headroom is also nice. Currently running a samba share and VPN gateway as well. There is a note in the OpenWRT docs though about poor Wifi 7 performance punching through walls due to a relatively weak power amplifier. I do have any problems with it because I have drywall interior walls.

Probably, but the BPi-R4 has trash radio interfaces, so ditch it and get a Flint 2. Speaking from this exact experience, I can tell you that good WiFi 6 is *wildly* superior to bad WiFi 7. The BPi-R4 ships a very old OpenWrt firmware with closed-source drivers that works *okay,* but only at close range; with any meaningful distance or wall penetration, speeds crater. And its WiFi 7 is broken in the latest OpenWrt. You'll have a better time if you get a Flint 2.