When comparing PHICOMM K3C (AC-1900) vs Asus RT-AC5300, the Slant community recommends PHICOMM K3C (AC-1900) for most people. In the question“What are the best wifi-routers?” PHICOMM K3C (AC-1900) is ranked 7th while Asus RT-AC5300 is ranked 17th. The most important reason people chose PHICOMM K3C (AC-1900) is:
Easy and stable.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Can use open wrt and asus router firmware
Easy and stable.
Pro Less congestion with multiple Wi-Fi bands
With the RT-AC5300 you get three separate WiFi bands, one 2.4 GHz and two 5 GHz bands. The additional 5 GHz band helps to lower congestion, because both 5 GHz bands can split the load between each other.
Pro Excellent performance
It's a device that delivers theoretical throughput speeds of up to 3.1 Gbps across both bands. It's capable of moving up to 1 Gbps in the 2.4 GHz band and 2.1 Gbps on 5 GHz bands. In real life testing at close range of 3 feet, RT-AC5300 delivers throughput of 661.6 Mbps. To maximize the router's speed it uses 1024-QAM which boosts the routers performance by 25% when compared to the more commonly used 256-QAM modulation scheme.
Pro You’ll be able to play games or stream 4K videos without a hitch
This router offers game-enhancement options such as Multi-User Multiple Input, Multiple Output (MU-MIMO), 4X4 data transmissions, and a wealth of management settings. MU-MIMO offers simultaneous rather than sequential streaming and 4x4 data transmission gives four individual streams to deliver and receive data.
Pro Supports MU-MIMO for effective network management
If you have multiple devices using a lot of traffic at the same time, the ASUS RT-AC5300 can handle all of them simultaneously without sacrificing performance.
Cons
Con No support at all
There was no site you can get support, files etc, besides only one in Germany. This means no more updates.
Con Poor Firewall settings
The firewall only offers a few switchable on/off settings like DOS, Flooding and Ping from WAN. Not allowing filter acess to LAN etc.
Con Poor Parental Control
The Parental Control only filter access from devices by MAC address at specifics times, not allowing to block specific sites. If someone brings a new device, it can access whatever they want, easily bypassing the security.
Con Can't change the timezone
The region combo box is dimmed, so you can't chance the country (fixed at US). Even the time zone field selection is from GMT-6 to GMT-10.
Con The company is not support the original firmware anymore
Con Bulky design
This router is large, thanks in no small measure to its bulky antennas. Without them, it measure 9.6 x 9.6 x 2.6 inches. Including the antennas increases them to 9.6 x 11 x 6 inches.
Con Overkill for an average user
Unless you have a large house or an office with plenty of Wi-Fi devices that play games or stream media, using the Asus RT-AC5300 is overkill especially considering its price tag.