Acer Connect X6E Review: a simple and effective dual router
Table of Contents
It might be a less-known brand in the router market, but Acer has got something interesting to offer. A 5G featureful travel router capable of using either WAN or mobile internet to provide you with a variety of connection capabilities. In which case we see how it performs and what it has to offer as we test and review the Acer Connect X6E.
The WiFi 6E router allows you to run a SIM to connect up to the 5G network and broadcast that out as WiFi or as an ethernet connection. What might be useful for getting a connection on the go, or if your home might be better off on mobile than the network coming in. So with that in mind, let’s see how it holds up to the rest of the competition and general usage of the router.
- Standard: WiFi 6E
- Frequency Bands: 2.4GHz, 5GHz, 6GHz
- Max Speed: 5.4Gbps
- LAN Ports: 1Gbps + 1x RJ-11
- WAN: 1Gbps
- CPU: Qualcomm SDX62 + IPQ5018 + QCN9024
- Memory: 512MB Storage, 256MB LPDDR
- USB: USB-C
- Dimensions: 101 x 101 x 206mm
- Weight: 930g
The Acer Connect X6E provides a strong solution for your networking setup. Being a mobile router makes it a useful feature if you want to use it in different places, or combined with ethernet can give you a dual WAN solution. Giving you versatility and a backup. It also provides plenty of features and controls, without locking them behind a paywall. But its limited number of ports and their speed constrain your options and usability, along with no mesh support do detract from its design.
- Dual WAN capabilities
- Good packaging to get out and set up the router
- Strong default security with guest network and parental controls
- Can’t use both 5 and 6GHz frequencies at the same time
- Doesn’t prompt for firmware updates
- Limited availability
Design
In general, the X6E is a rather imposing tower of a router. With a white and tall general look, it’s nothing too drastic or that eye-catching, nothing like the gaming routers we’ve looked at previously. Keeping things simple with no lights but it’s not small like other mobile routers we’ve reviewed such as the Nighthawk M6 Pro, that have a lot more mobility in mind. Seemingly the Acer choice is one to place down and forget about once set up.
Top President's Day deals
This year's President's Day sales have officially kickstarted, offering up huge discounts on some of the market's leading tech products. Below, we'll list the best President's Day deals we can find.
- Samsung 990 PRO SSD 1 TB - WAS $159.99 NOW $99.99 Save - $60
- Alienware X16 R2 gaming laptop - WAS $3,099.99 NOW $2,499.99 Save - $600
- CLX Horus Gaming PC - WAS $3,749.99 NOW $$3,449.99 Save - $300
- Western Digital 8TB HD - WAS $204.99 NOW $179.99 Save - $25
- Samsung 85-inch Class Crystal UHD TV - WAS $1097.99 NOW $799 Save - $300
Prices and savings subject to change. Click through to get the current deal prices.
Measuring in at 101 x 101 x 206mm it stands tall with ridges on the front and back creating channels up and down the whole router, something satisfying to run your nails across. In between those are the majority of the important pieces of hardware you’re going to be looking at. The front showcases the logo on top, with the bottom adorned with the WPS button and status lights.
Round the back are your available connections. There you find the RJ-11 phone port, one LAN, one WAN/LAN, and the power barrel connector. Both of the ethernet ports are at Gigabit speeds, which should be satisfying enough for 5G connections. Then there are a few more things underneath that you may be interested in with the SIM port, reset button, and a USB C port available. That in itself is rather puzzling, as it’s not going to be much use being covered underneath for whatever its purpose, as there is no mention of it in the manual except for its existence on the router but no information as to its use case.
Lastly, on the look and design in general, it has in fact got some venting on it. With the bottom edge sloping down hiding the air holes. The top does it by giving it a hat of sorts to sneakily add in a missing top that adds in more air holes at this end of the device as well. Otherwise, the top is patterned and channeled white plastic, with the bottom similar but with rubber feet across it that should keep it in place.
Other features
When it comes to the setup, it’s fairly quick and simple. No apps to download, just connect to the IP or web address once connected to the router. There you can follow the on-screen messages after putting in the default password, which even if it is quite secure immediately prompts you to change it anyway.
Whilst setting up you will have to choose between only having 5GHz or 6GHz as you can’t have both at the same time, but 2.4GHz is available independently. Otherwise, there is a good amount of data and settings in the dashboard to utilize. As the homepage gives you plenty of data on what is running and happening on the router.
It also has the important feature of tracking your data, particularly for 5G usage, as you can limit how much you can use over a period of time so you don’t go over your limit along with still being able to access your texts and setting up a SIM pin if you want one.
Then there are the handy features to protecting your network or controlling it in general. As with port forwarding on quick access for any sort of games and networking you want to do. But also has a handy addition of a guest network so you don’t have to provide access to your main one to just anyone, adding in that layer of protection. Along with some more basic parental control where you can block unwanted websites on specific devices.
In terms of security though, it does not prompt you to update your hardware. Something that;’s important for getting the latest features and firmware to ensure it’s up to date, you’ll just have to be on top of checking especially when setting it up initially. All in all, this makes it a strong choice for simplicity and management.
There is also a quick way to connect up to your network on the router with an in-built NFC tag, this will let you tap any enabled device to connect to the network. Now you or your guests don’t have to faff around with passwords and such, similar to sharing your network off your connected Android or such as well.
Pricing
At the time of writing, the availability of the Connect X6E is quite limited. Only found in its own store, it can be found for £299.99 (around $320) making it a bit more steep in price than other mobile solutions, but not quite as much as some. In particular, compared to previous ones we’ve reviewed.
Such as the M6 Pro, that’s much more expensive at £800 but surprisingly less featureful even though it’s also WiFi 6E. But the X6E comes in more than both the ASUS RT-AX57 Go at $130, which itself keeps things a bit flatter and smaller although it lacks the 6GHz capability. It’s certainly no GL.iNet either but the X6E does have a lot more home potential with its size and design, and less mobile, with the SIM providing a good dual WAN option if you need it.
Performance
We obviously put the router to the test, to see how well it holds up against the rest and if it can live up to its expectations. In that case, we set up the router in its usual spot and used both the office broadband and then mobile 5G to test its performance for both options. Then we tested the speeds and signal using a Samsung S21 FE on WiFi with WiFiMan and Speed Test apps, with a gaming PC for LAN tests.
There are some drawbacks to this methodology though. As testing in our office isn’t the same each time, with a changing amount of traffic and with changes in interference and number of people, it’s not a good comparison each time. That also applies to our broadband which is limited to each terminal up to 300MB/s and is throttled, so just be aware when comparing the results below. But for the wireless, we test at different distances and obstacles, with 10 ft/3 m and 30 ft/9 m with no walls, then 60 ft/18 m with a wall in between, then lastly attempt 90 ft/27 m with 4 walls in between.
Signal strength
Starting off with the signal strength, which is how well the device and router are connected to each other. The lower the number and closer to zero the better. For the X6E we see slightly higher than normal averages on both 2.4GHz and 5GHz, but not much more than the Nighthawk M6 Pro and could be particularly affected by being the first after our office reshuffle.
But either way, it still doesn’t mean it’s terrible as it still works well and averages out further away, although does lose signal at our furthest distance like most others. This translates to a strength of -42 to -69dBm on the network and -46 to -67dBm mobile at 2.4GHz. Whilst 5GHz spans -55 to -73, and -58 and -75dBm.
Speed and latency
Then we checked the PHY speeds, this is just between the router and device and shouldn’t be impacted by bandwidth. There we find the speeds to be adequate and comparable to most, although on mobile it sometimes fell down. But we saw a 2.4GHz range of 229-51Mbps for the WAN download and 172-51Mbps for mobile, then for the upload ranges 286-114Mbps for WAN and 206-137Mbps for mobile. As for 5GHz these range from 960 to 216 Mbps and 960-216Mbps for downloads, with the uploads spanning 1200-288Mbps, and 1080-288Mbps.
In reality, on our network, this comes to a 58.2 to 45.6 MBps network and 129 to 41 Mbps mobile download speeds at 2.4GHz. With the uploads spanning 105 to 18.9 Mbps, and 46.9 to 16 Mbps respectively. As for 5GHz, that changes to 90.1 to 71.5 Mbps on the network and 232 to 123 Mbps download on mobile. With the upload spanning 286 to 54 Mbps and 46 to 39 Mbps respectively.
Then the latency is fairly low and consistent. For 2.4 GHz on the network, it ranges from 15-19ms, with the mobiles sitting around 13-14ms, with 5Ghz ranging from 10-14ms overall. Lastly, we checked the LAN speed and found it to be quite good and up there with other routers, maybe not as high as the top-end picks. But on wired it got a 220 Mbps download and 292 Mbps upload, with mobile getting 171 Mbps download and 38 Mbps upload.
Conclusion
- Standard: WiFi 6E
- Frequency Bands: 2.4GHz, 5GHz, 6GHz
- Max Speed: 5.4Gbps
- LAN Ports: 1Gbps + 1x RJ-11
- WAN: 1Gbps
- CPU: Qualcomm SDX62 + IPQ5018 + QCN9024
- Memory: 512MB Storage, 256MB LPDDR
- USB: USB-C
- Dimensions: 101 x 101 x 206mm
- Weight: 930g
Overall the Acer Connect X6E is an OK router, nothing too grand or innovative, but gets the job done. It does offer no subscription walls or requiring apps to set up, it’s rather simple with everything available. Plus with the 5G connectivity availability, you can get a dual WAN connection that gives it great uptime especially if your ISP isn’t the most reliable. Along with 6GHz channel potential, it does create a good router to go for.