GL.iNet - GL-SFT1200 (Opal)

Gli.net Opal is a great deal at $35 (amazon) if youre budget minded, but newest Beryl or Slate are great if you want to spend around $100.

I have a glinet berryl.ax.and a opal and both are great. Berryl is better but costs twice as much.

Hello, Quick question for you all: I have a GLI net travel router in my rack connected to my XR 18 and my computer will be connected to that GLI net router. And The X Air edit app for Mac. I frequently see it disconnect and say auto reconnect is active, but it doesn’t automatically reconnect. Any tips for fixing the situation? This is the Router: GL.iNet GL-SFT1200 (Opal) Secure Travel WiFi Router, AC1200 Dual Band Gigabit Ethernet Wireless Network, IPv6 USB 2.0, Repeater Bridge Access Point Mode, Router for Public Use, Easy Setup with Guide

The Opal is way more capable than the UTR. The UTR’s max transmission power is just 13dBm. An iPhone 17 hotspot (25dBm) is literally 10X more powerful than the UTR, and the GL.iNet Opal is 14X more powerful (30dBm). And that’s before external antenna gain which will benefit the Opal. Even the tiny GL.iNet Mango has a tx power of 20dBm.

I would say yes, unless maybe you have the opportunity to replace the router (not access point) directly with Opal. But this depends on the availability, the broadband provider and type of connection. If you have the technical knowledge to achieve this, you may have relatively secure network for yourself during your stay. The issue here is, DNS and NTP are by default unencrypted. So there is a risk of interception. While you can use DNS-over-TLS/HTTPS services to mitigate interception, NTP is harder to achieve. You may deploy use NTS on your device but afaik NTS is not available natively on most of the devices unless they're linux. And the risk with NTP interception, it is hard to detect if it is intercepted and an attacker may change your computer time so that any of the websites that you're visiting throw expired SSL warnings and this creates chaos on the user and as victim you may choose to ignore these, allowing you unknowingly ignore the other SSL warnings that makes you vulnerable to MiTM attacks on websites. There are valid cases to intercept NTP traffic to provide more security but it makes it possible for the bad actor as well. The best and easiest option is using a trusted VPN service whenever you're connected to an untrusted network either on you devices, or on your travel router. As an another option which probably may cost you more is that you may have is using a mobile broadband router or mobile tethering. This completely detaches your devices from the Airbnb network.

I have this exact setup. Glinet router with VPN just for streaming tvs as many as five on at a time. How much you want to spend? Future proof now or test the setup? How big of a house? Tested all the devices. Looked at current Amazon prices. Travel routers are great. Opal for $30 handles just fine as long as it's not trying to cover a house > 3000 sq feet. 4k films with bitrates over 70 will struggle since the max Wireguard speed is quite low vs anything else. Also wifi 5 Beryl ax 3000 which I've had for a while at $70 can cover that space and handle high bitrate 4k video. It's wifi 6. There are others in the $60 to $90 range Future proof you could look at the newer more expensive options.

I have an opal and has 4 cores (don’t know the tp-link) speed wise in 2.4 GHz is the same as the tp-link, but it seems in 5ghz band tp-link wins based on the specs, you can run adguard home in the opal but I don’t recommend it is heavy in resources, there is a possible ban of tp-link routers in USA so that also something to think about.

Forgot to mention in opal you have vpn options client or server and even you can use tor

I never used Opal outside home or with VPN I still need to test that area, but for what I read VPN can be slower, in general WireGuard is faster than OpenVPN

I have three GL.iNet routers: a Beryl AX, Opal, and Marble. The user interface may be similar across them, but I haven't been able to get the Marble to pass through the login portal so that it can authenticate and use the free wifi available here. Both the Beryl AX and Opal connect to the same wifi network, then display a link to the login portal. After I authenticate, I can access the free wifi. It might be user error, but I think the Marble simply doesn't offer it because a home router doesn't need to connect to public wifi.

Beryl AX hands down. When I connect to the free wifi, I get 50mbps through the Opal, but I get 220mbps and up via the Beryl AX (even with the VPN running) With the Opal, I have to connect via the 5ghz band, and then I cannot use it for connecting devices to it, they have to use 2.4ghz. Again, this could be user error. The speeds for connected devices are fine, but if I did need to transfer files across the network, then I may see some limitations. The only advantage the Opal has is the three ethernet ports. The Beryl is superior in every other way. It can connect to the free wifi, as well as run the vpn and Tailscale without skipping a beat. The speeds are much better when connecting to the same wifi, and I can use the 5Ghz antenna both for the free wifi and to allow devices to connect to it. The Opal can run a vpn also but at lower max speeds. Tailscale is too much for it. If you have time, you can wait for sales on the Beryl AX. I bought mine at the lowest price a bit before Black Friday, and it comes back around at that price every few months. Right now I have the Opal acting as a failover connection for my Marble, mostly because of the low power draw. But if I didn't care about the cost of it all? I'd have just gotten a second Beryl AX and connected a switch to it rather than the Marble and Opal combo. It's that good, and the speed of the free wifi are better than one of my home networks. I just need to find someone selling a lightly used Beryl AX 😆🤣😂

The hardware is. I've left the Opal running for days at a time, and the Beryl AX should only be better. However, the challenge here is that the free wifi provider could drop due to overuse, or staying connected too long. At least with my free wifi, that's the case. Someone on the sub mentioned the same issue with the same provider (Cox), so it could be chalked up to being on the provider's end. Can't control that. They set up a daily reboot to help with that, but it isn't a perfect solution. No idea what would be necessary for your provider. Also, at 36mbps, you might be able to get away with the Opal. Just a thought. As I said earlier, I've had it running for days here.

Ya, even if you could get something installed on a unit, it may limit the router's own routing abilities in trying to manage both. I know from experience with trying to get Tailscale working on an Opal. It slowed to a crawl just trying to run things. Poor little guy is on light duty now, picking up local free wifi and routing it as a fallback for my Marble.

Correct! I have a cheap opal one, it serves only VR purposes and does a perfect job. It's also very small and usb-c powered, so it's easy to take with you.

It could work in some extender mode it has.. But in extender mode it normally becomes part of whatever network it connects to - it doesn't nat and provide its own isolated network from the network it attaches too. Maybe that c50 your looking at does - but I doubt it. And know for sure the gl.inets do. Which could work but then really anyone on the same trailer park wifi could say see her printer and other devices, etc. I have a gl.inet (Opal (GL-SFT1200)) router - and can tell you its range is quite good.. And its nice an tiny.. So unless your mom is in some 8 wide trailer or something I doubt coverage would be an issue. Mine is only a AC (wifi5) but they do sell AX (wifi6) models - but I doubt speed your seeing from the trailer wifi would warrant the extra cost since just wifi 5 should be able to handle it. I see that c50 on amazon for 79 bucks, the gl.inet is only 39. Also the c50 only has 100mbps interfaces.. So anything wired would be limted to max 100mbps.. Half the cost, better features, firmware that gets updated, etc. The firmware on that c50 looks like last time it was updated was 2020.