How do I receive 1.5 Gbps on PC?

[Vanana]

I'm a new Ignite Internet 1.5 Gigabit customer. 

Rogers' technician installed a Nokia Optical Network Terminal (ONT) in my basement to which, my 2nd floor's ethernet cable is connected. The 2nd floor's wall ethernet port is connected to the Ignite WiFi Gatway (Gen 2) aka XB7 via port 4 using a Cat6 ethernet cable.

Now, my PC is also on the 2nd floor and PC has a 2.5 GbE controller. However, XB7's remaining 3 ethernet ports are all 1 Gbps rated and PC is connected to one of these three ports as the only 2.5 Gbps port on the XB7 is connected to the wall ethernet port.

How do I get the full 1500 Mbps speed on my PC? I imagine I need to use external hardware? Any suggestions? I'm new to networking so please be gentle.

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[Smarty_pants]

That would be your opinion. I tend to agree with @danno100 with this one. It's ridiculous that the only 2.5G port is occupied by the ONT .. this should be told to the customers up front when the little loony toon dressed in red shows up at your door. If you only have 1G ports then give the option to aggregate them together. At least you wouldn't be 90% lying about the speed you will never be able to reach but are paying extra for.

[-G-]

@Smarty_pants The problem is Rogers requires an Ignite "gateway" to deliver Ignite TV and Ignite Home Phone, and to support value-added services for Ignite Internet, and the XB7 and XB8 gateways are currently the only arrows in their quiver.

Comcast is currently developing their own router for FTTH customers that is due for release sometime in the second half of 2024.  Presumably, Rogers will also provide their FTTH customers with the XER10 router when it becomes available.

[Datalink]

@Vanana to answer the question you're asking, and it is a very good question, you need to replace the XB7 modem with a router that has a 2.5 Gb/s WAN port to connect to the ONT, and a 2.5 Gb/s LAN port to connect to the pc, or to a multi-gigabit switch if you happen to have more than one device that is capable of connecting at 2.5 Gb/s.  

There are a couple of items to consider if you're looking to buy a router:

1.  Do you want or need Wifi 6e capability which runs a wifi network in the 6 Mhz band, above and beyond the typical 2.4 and 5 Ghz networks that we all use today.  You need to know if you currently have or are planning to buy a Wifi 6e device.

2.  Can you find a router with 2.5 Gb/s WAN and LAN ports that fits the budget?

To answer the first question, here's a page from Bestbuy with their lineup of Wifi 6e routers.  I have not checked these to determine which routers have 2.5 Gb/s WAN and LAN ports:

 https://www.bestbuy.ca/en-ca/category/wireless-routers/26055?path=category%253AComputers%2B%2526%2BT...

For the second question, here's one possibility, an Asus ROG AX-6000 which has 2.5 Gb/s WAN and LAN ports:

https://www.bestbuy.ca/en-ca/product/asus-rog-rapture-wireless-ax-6000-dual-band-wi-fi-6-router-gt-a...

I have one of these and I'm quite satisfied with it.  

Note that Asus is currently moving several routers to and End Of Life status where they won't be supported beyond this year.  It looks like the AX-6000 will be around beyond that as Asus has already released its next generation of firmware for this router and a beta version for the version beyond is out for customer testing:

No pressure but this router is on sale until tomorrow.  It appears that it goes on sale every few weeks, so, you may want to wait for the next opportunity, and in the mean time, have a look around to see what else is out there.  If you're going to do that, look at the update cycle for the router on its support page and have a look at the forum that is used by the manufacturers customers to see that they say about the router.  

Fwiw, Asus routers have a few forums located on the small net builder site:

https://www.snbforums.com/forums/asus-wireless.37/

There are a couple of firmware versions used by Asus customers, stock firmware released by Asus, and Merlin's Asuswrt, which is produced by Montreal based Eric Sauvage (aka Merlin).  Merlin's version is based on the Asus stock version, but modified with numerous additional features and enhancements.  He has a pretty loyal following among Asus customers, and, fwiw, I've used his firmware versions on many Asus router models.  

Within the Small Net Builder site are threads for other manufacturers and their customers, just a matter of looking around.  If you have any questions about networking or router settings for example, that site is a good place to pose any questions that you might have.  

What services are you running with Rogers, Internet, Ignite TV ??, Home Phone??, home security??

The services that you're running will have an impact on how easy or hard it might be to disconnect the modem and replace it with a router. 

Just to note, Rogers only supports its ONT / modem configuration.  Rogers won't support an ONT / router configuration, so, if you run into any problems you would need to be able to swap the modem back into place for troubleshooting purposes.

[LordDrakkon]

One of the issues with adding a router to the setup, is that Rogers just loves to blame anything else but their equipment and will immediately blame any issues on something connected to the modem. Especially a router and not even consider troubleshooting or looking at their end for issues until you disconnect it. What Rogers needs to do is stop offering trash modems for their flagship internet services that limit them through the bandwidth provided by the eithernet ports on the device. One 2.5Gbit Ethernet port is not good enough!

Asus Merlin firmware is great! I have an old RT-AC68U that has ran Merlin once Asus discontinued support for it. I use it for connecting legacy devices mostly like my laser printer, Amazon Echo's, and surround sound receivers to get firmware updates.

There are some decent but expensive routers out there with four 2.5Gbit ports and some even offer a 10Gbit LAN. If you really want the best out of your 1.5Gbit service and potentially future proofing for 2+Gbit services coming (hopefully with a lot better upload speeds because 150Mbit is a sad joke) in the future. A router with four 2.5Gbit ports is an investment worth considering.

[jazz54634]

TPLINK BE9300 will work and is under $400. Cat 5e cable is no good as it has a max speed of 1g. You need cat 6 or above.

[-G-]

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@jazz54634 wrote:

TPLINK BE9300 will work and is under $400. Cat 5e cable is no good as it has a max speed of 1g. You need cat 6 or above.

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Actually, 2.5GBASE-T can run on Cat 5e cable for distances up to 100m.

https://www.ieee802.org/3/bz/ngeabt_objectives_802.3WG_approved_0315.pdf

... and I have it working fine on a 30m cable run in my own home.

5GBASE-T can also run on Cat 5e but pushes the limit of the spec so Cat 6 cabling is preferred.

While we're at it, 10GBASE-T can also run on Cat 6 cable but crosstalk becomes a problem beyond 50m.  For runs beyond that up to 100m, Cat 6A is required.

Of course, the cable terminations must meet specifications as well.