I could not agree less. I have been installing those freebie routers from ISPs for some years now and my experience (not received wisdom from forums) is they compare very well with any entry level router that you could buy on the high street or on-line.
This week I have dealt with 7 routers (5 Huwei Tal Talk ones - after Talk Talk service assistance they were still dropping connection orin one case max through put was 340Kbps). My own experience ith the BT Business Hub - 5 failures in 18 months - all tend to leave me with perhaps a blinkered view.
So far I cannot fault Billion, Draytek and Fritzbox units - perhaps over the top for the vast majority of domestic users but I believe the real test will come as more and more Network Ready peripherals start to appear (IPTV, NAS, Media Streamers, BD LIve Blu Ray etc etc) and the demands of the Home Network starts to get complicated.
Recently I have to say that I have been quite impressed with some of th TP-Link N series kit that we have been trying. The chap with the340kbps problem saw a jump immediately to 2.3M/bps the fastest he had ever seen (not fast for some here but this is on the edge of the distance issue from the exchange). Swapping back to the Huwei ad down it went. He is waiting for a new mode router form Talk Talk and we havlent theTP-Link tillth new one arrives - so my purpose is not to push people to buy something different.
My whol point is - if you want to do more with your network and the kit your ISP passes along to you "seems" to be struggling, have a read around. It may well be that a DLink 2 switc modem routr from Talk Tak does all you want, or the locked up tight Sky Box is coverig your needs then fine. It is my experince that a lot of people on say Talk Tak or are having connection problems - dopped connections, unexpected restarts, slow stream speeds - and have been through every bit of assistance from technical support and nothing has changed, that the option to try out a different router may well be the answer.
The other issue is that more and more households are dependent on their broadband for much of their daily lives - Banking, Working from Home, Kids school work etc. We will stick £1000s worth of media kit in our homes and then use a router that is often a cheap, and not particulrly robust , box of electronics that is the Critical elemet in connecting to the internet - then, as seen here, some people think £100 for something built to last, to do the job that businesses would see as Mission Critical, is a bit "expensive". That leaves me puzzled - its a matter of priorities really.
So I do take your points and cannot but nod to your obvious wider experience (I am a long time hobbyist in this field) but I do get results and am working in a rural copmmunity where we are trying to supprt an ageing population for which their Broadband is now proving to be more and more important as public authorities etc reduce their staff and information is more and more web based. For most of them they do not know the questions to ask of their ISP and volunteers like me often struggle to get things sorted. In many cases thy are more than hppy when we ge them back online but it would help if they coul learn to leave he routers switchd on!
Finally - thanks for your input on here Beerhunter - often your advice has helped us down here in snowy Somerset when you repsond to questionsthat we are struggling with.
Seasons Greetings
C