Tomato or DD-WRT?

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Gaiden133

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It's been about 3 months since the question was last asked.. and more people here seem to favor DD-WRT over Tomato.

However, i've been reading up a little bit on both and some people seem to say tomato is more "responsive and quicker" whereas DD-WRT may offer more features but those can either come at a price or the regular user wont need them anyway.

Has any of this changed? those comments I found were pretty dated.

To note, I have a brand new Linksys WRT54GL, going to be used in my small network between 1 desktop, 2 laptops, xbox 360, wii. I am looking for a fast firmware, that is stable and will allow me to monitor the bandwidth (I have comcast :( )
 
I found Tomato to be a bit snappier. I compared against standard DD-WRT though, not the mini. I think the graphing was equal in both though, basically just a built in mrtg.
 
Tomato is better and is much smaller so puts less stress on the router.
 
I have used DD-WRT for years and love it. To be fair, I haven't ever actually used Tomato because DD-WRT worked so well.
 
maximumPC compared the two in a recent issue and found DD-WRT to be the winner overall. try searching their website for the article. it was just a 'matchup' article. personally, i've never used either :p


edit: found it. it's in the september 2008 issue, which doesn't appear to be on their website yet. i can give you the rundown if you want it.
 
MorfiusX said:
I have used DD-WRT for years and love it. To be fair, I haven't ever actually used Tomato because DD-WRT worked so well.
Click to expand...
That's same here, and that's why I was curious as to why the definitive "Tomato is better". I've never seen anything that can pin point one over the other...more reviews I've read tend to lean towards DD-WRT but neither dd-wrt or tomato flat out out-shines the competition.

I did load tomato clear back when it was only available for the WRT54G and I didn't like the interface so I immediately pulled it in favor for DD-WRT.
 
DD-WRT seems to work great. I think my crummy linksys router is the only thing hindering its greatness. It has always seemed very stable. Graphing works well, and gives a lot of useful information for troubleshooting as well as advanced features if you really want to tweak.
 
Haven't used Tomato before, but DD-WRT has been fantastic for me. I have a Linksys WRT54G that was running the VXWorks OS. Everytime Blizzard would start to download their patches, my router would crash. Finally got fedup and installed DD-WRT and haven't had a single crash in over 6 months.
 
supergper said:
Just curious as to why it's better? Also, how does being smaller put less stress on the router?
Click to expand...

bit more resposive, after a few tweeks can take a lot more torrent connections that the default firmware

DDWRT fill the entire rom with no space for logs etc, I have found the router tends not to like this.
 
Jay_oasis said:
bit more resposive, after a few tweeks can take a lot more torrent connections that the default firmware.
Click to expand...

Not very much more...
Max Simultaneous Connections
Stock firmware, 48
DD-WRT, 60
Tomato, 16.

All under 100....which really shows, the limited horsepower of the old old wrt54g series..make me wonder why people still praise them. When for roughly the same money you can pickup a newer wireless model from Linksys, flash it with DD-WRT, and get much higher performance. You can only shine a turd so much...firmware doesn't magically make a much faster CPU and install additional RAM, math is still math. Todays current generation home grade routers can handle up past 100 and 200 and higher. Those of us who have discovered *nix distros can enjoy 1000, 5000, even 10,000 and more.
 
I use DD-WRT, haven't had a reason to change it.

Me and a friend in my apartment complex setup 2 DD-WRT routers, mine as the primary gateway and his router as a wireless repeater. It works quite well.

DD-WRT does work the router quite hard but the amount of features it has is just incredible.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
Not very much more...
Max Simultaneous Connections
Stock firmware, 48
DD-WRT, 60
Tomato, 16.

All under 100....which really shows, the limited horsepower of the old old wrt54g series..make me wonder why people still praise them. When for roughly the same money you can pickup a newer wireless model from Linksys, flash it with DD-WRT, and get much higher performance. You can only shine a turd so much...firmware doesn't magically make a much faster CPU and install additional RAM, math is still math. Todays current generation home grade routers can handle up past 100 and 200 and higher. Those of us who have discovered *nix distros can enjoy 1000, 5000, even 10,000 and more.
Click to expand...


Well, it isn't "roughly the same money" for most of the newer models (I assume you are referring to the upgraded models, and not different versions of the same model.)

If you are referring to different versions, they can be $20-$100 price difference across the same line (i.e. the WRT54G vs. WRT54GS.) That's why most people wouldn't "upgrade", since they don't see an immediate benefit. The numbers you are throwing out there (100, 200, etc.) are well above what most home users are going to need for daily usage, and even if it was documented on the box such numbers would only serve as sales fodder for savvy salesmen.

If you are referring to buying the same hardware again (i.e. WRT54G v1.0 -> WRT54G v6/7/whatever) most people have no desire to spend another $30-$50 on a new router for something so trivial. It's always more exciting to get more out of what you've got rather than going out and spending money. Plus, this is Hard|Forum.... would you expect anything less than trying to max out a piece of consumer electronics? :)

202276
 
A whopping 6 dollar difference between the wrt54g and its replacement..the wrt110. (actually 5 dollars and change..but I rounded up)

(I'm looking up on my wholesale site now).

20 dollars more for the wrt160 higher end model.

I'm not referring to the same old wrt54xxx line...they're all "old old generation" to me.

99.9% of people are turning towards these distros with the intention of increasing performance while torrenting, and avoid router lockups. Thus concurrent connections are important..and (as others here will testify)...getting up well past 100-200 connections is mighty mighty important.

For factual reference... ==> http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/25840/55/



Tytalus said:
Well, it isn't "roughly the same money" for most of the newer models (I assume you are referring to the upgraded models, and not different versions of the same model.)

If you are referring to different versions, they can be $20-$100 price difference across the same line (i.e. the WRT54G vs. WRT54GS.) That's why most people wouldn't "upgrade", since they don't see an immediate benefit. The numbers you are throwing out there (100, 200, etc.) are well above what most home users are going to need for daily usage, and even if it was documented on the box such numbers would only serve as sales fodder for savvy salesmen.

If you are referring to buying the same hardware again (i.e. WRT54G v1.0 -> WRT54G v6/7/whatever) most people have no desire to spend another $30-$50 on a new router for something so trivial. It's always more exciting to get more out of what you've got rather than going out and spending money. Plus, this is Hard|Forum.... would you expect anything less than trying to max out a piece of consumer electronics? :)

202276
Click to expand...
 
As a noob who just looked into these recently, it looks like Im going with Tomato because of the ease of setup. The DD-WRT page is a mess while Tomato's is so clean and simple.
 
DD-WRT is what I use. I found Tomato horrible for uploading and downloading simultaneously. It would often lock the router, or data transfers would take forever and pause intermittently. Not only that, but I find DD-WRT has a TON more customizable options. Then again, I'm lucky with a WRT54GS v.1 router with the 32MB memory. I added some +7dB antennas, have it set around 75mW radio power, oc'd to 250MHz, and have max connections enabled (4096). The thing is a tank and never has any problems. I've transferred several terabytes through it so far, lol. No, I won't sell it. This thing is the best router I've ever come across. :D
 
Installed tomato and loving it so far. Might have gone DD-WRT if the page wasnt such a hassle to navigate.
 
I ran DD_WRT for a year until my router went belly up. Got it replaced from Linksys and will run it again. I cannot run Tomato because mine is a WRT54G v8 and can only run micro dd-wrt.

I think I over heated it running the wireless at the 251 max setting. Going to run this one at 75.
 
I tried Tomato on my WRT54GL first because people hyped it over DDWRT.

However Tomato wasn't stable for me for some reason, lots of reboots and downtime. So I tried DDWRT and it's been up for 56 days thus far.

Cliffs: +1 for DDWRT
 
Tomato runs fine on my WRT54G with out issues. I've thought about going to pfSense running a PC but the low power of the WRT54G and smaller size and the fact Tomato works so well, I always just end up deciding to leave the WRT54G in.
 
I like tomato, it is nice, simple, and clean. I hate the bridging set up, though. It is not very intuitive. I debated several times switching to DD-WRT, but Tomato just works.
 
DD-WRT

I haven't tried Tomato because the router I had wasn't compatible with it last I looked. It eventually started locking up and I picked up a different router. Maybe I'll reflash it one of these days and try it again.
 
damn the more i read this thread im confused on which to pick... 1/2 for tomato and 1/2 for DDWRT
 
I used both on my v4 and the smallnetbuilder results are crap - Tomato performed so much better. Also, I couldn't even access the router control page under heavy load on DD-WRT and it was much better on Tomato. Also DD-WRT made me need to reboot 1-2 times a week even with the conntrack down and such. This was a couple years ago though. v23 SP2 or something. Tomato was unbelievably better. Tomato did not lock my router - EVER.

Then I switched to OpenWRT, did not like it, tried to go back to Tomato and it just froze in the middle of flashing and bricked it. F OpenWRT.

Either way, the WRT54g is not very good these days with ANY firmware.
 
Had DD-WRT on a Buffalo WHR-G125 for more than a year, tried upgrading it the other night and I bricked it. I think it was an ID10T error though, so I'm not too upset over it. :) I didn't have any problems with DD-WRT in that time.

Now I put Tomato on my WRT54G v2.2, so I'll see how that goes...
 
so i was upgrading from my crappy 801.11b network so i picked up a cheap netgear router... the DD-WRT site listed the model # (was checking from my phone in the store)... i get home open the box and go to set it up.... on the DD-wrt page had v1-6 and v8-9 listed... which did it get? v7!!!! not listed

i set the router up anyway to see how much better the g vs my crappy b was... well this router SUCKS.... being returned tomorrow wireless light flashes manual says its supposed to be solid... it drops connection ALL the time.

Got a WRT54GL 1.1 instead :) flashed tomato on it and will be setting it up when i get home from work tonight.
 
mt_100 said:
I think I over heated it running the wireless at the 251 max setting. Going to run this one at 75.
Click to expand...

There are a lot of mentions out there about not cranking it up past 75-85....because it gets too "noisy"..or distorted. Sort of like peak watts on a stereo....in trying to make it louder, it results in crummy results. The mark of 85 would be similar to RMS watts in a stereo..the max you can go before distortion starts to kick in.
 
can anyone provide any end of 2009 feedback. I've got an old WRT54G one of the first gens and would like to figure out which one to install at this point of time. The sole reason I'm interested is because I use DHCP and have multiple devices that are constantly on and off. I forward a couple ports on the xbox 360 so I can have unrestricted access to gaming (to eliminate strict or moderate NAT limitations) and it works fine, until I turn the xbox off and want to play a week later to discover my DHCP lease has expired and the IP address I configured for the port forwarding has been leased to my laptop, desktop, ps3, wii, or some other network device in my house. It's a bother. I'm hoping tomato or DD-WRT allows you to assign a static IP address in the DHCP scheme by mac address which the stock updated firmware does not seem to allow you to do.
 
I have a WRT54GL V1.1 running tomato. never reboots, always a SOLID connection even with comcast's new high speeds.
current stats:
Model Linksys WRT54G/GS/GL
Time Sun, 06 Dec 2009 02:09:16
Uptime 106 days, 05:15:08
CPU Load (1 / 5 / 15 mins) 0.00 / 0.00 / 0.00
Total / Free Memory 14.15 MB / 1,496.00 KB (10.32%)

The only reason this thing ever gets a reboot is for firmware updates.
http://www.polarcloud.com/tomato

I am thinking about experimenting with a few firewall distros in the near future though :D
 
Tomato has been working great for me for a few months now. Just thought I'd let you guys know.
 
Was using Tofu/HyperWRT then DD-WRT up until v23 sp2 I believe. I turned on to Tomato and never looked back. This was on Linksys WRT54G/S family routers.

What won it over for me:
- responsiveness in loading pages (web and local admin pages)
- no "heavy feeling" probably caused by overhead or bloat
- no need to constantly reboot
- no torrenting problems
- and ease of deployment and use

Tomato has several mods if you look on the linksysinfo site/forums. Currently using the Thor build as it has OpenVPN support.
 
I am currently using both. Two different locations.

DDWRT is needed because of the Sputnik plugin. Otherwise Tomato would have worked just as well.
 
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