When it came time to upgrade to a gigabit home router, I agonized for a long time between Cisco’s e4200 and Apple’s AirPort Extreme. In the end, Apple’s big January 6 sale made the decision for me, and I bought the big AE (MD031) on the spot.
The big AE paired with a MyBookLive is great value for the money compared with a Time Capsule. The gigabit Ethernet port has genuinely been a huge win — I get up to 100MB/s transferring files from the MBL, though wireless still feels a bit slow. And the one-click network extension you get from pairing the big AE and the little AE is genuinely handy.
Signal coverage is okay, but signal stability disappointed me. The W941n I bought earlier (a bit over ¥200, probably cheaper now) paired with an AirPort Express one wall away (roughly 10 meters in a straight line) would only stutter occasionally on AirPlay. After switching to the big AE, AirPlaying from my iPhone to the little AE stutters so badly that the connection drops. The Apple TV one wall away (about 5 meters in a straight line) playing videos over 5GB with XBMC buffers far more often than before. I figured 5GHz would be smoother, but when I checked, the signal on 5GHz was already down to -80, and the rate was actually lower.
In short, the wireless performance doesn’t even match a three-antenna router that costs a bit over ¥200. Weak wireless, and on the wired side it actually has one fewer port than the other guy’s. Apple, what am I supposed to do with you? Next time a friend wants to buy a gigabit router, I’ll absolutely recommend the e4200.