ASUS ROG has plenty of gaming routers to consider for your networking setup, and that keeps coming with every iteration of standards and price ranges. This time we’re looking at the WiFi 6E router options and a bit more expensive price range from the features and specs of the device, so we have a look at what the ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000 has to offer.
Certainly a more prominent option of a router, and you aren’t going to be hiding it anytime soon. But with that, there are plenty of features to look forward to enjoying and a key to setting up an in-depth home network and getting the most out of your internet provider. We put that to the test as well as evaluating all else on offer with the whole package.
- Standard: WiFi 6E
- Frequency bands: 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz-1, 5 GHz-2, 6 GHz
- Max speed: 16000 Mbps
- LAN ports: 2x 10Gbps (WAN/LAN), 4x 1Gbps
- WAN: 1x 2.5Gbps, 2x 10Gbps (WAN/LAN)
- CPU: 2.0GHz quad-core processor
- Memory: 256MB NAND flash and 2GB DDR4 RAM
- USB: 1x USB 3.2 Gen 1, 1x USB 2.0 Port
- Dimensions: 354 x 354 x 193mm
- Weight: 2425g
The ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000 is quite the monster of a WiFi 6E router. Although it might not be the latest tech anymore, it’s still plenty fast, and with a lot of features, you can customize it to a great extent with plenty of control as well. It offers a fast connection for LAN and WAN with 10Gbps options as well as USB ports for plenty of good connectivity options. Bringing in 6GHz you get on a faster newer band so you can get a whole lot of bandwidth that’s less likely to be interrupted.
But it is a rather gamer-focused design not exactly made for everyone or fitting in everywhere exactly, especially with the mirror on top that attracts fingerprints and a lot of RGB. Although easily turned off it’s still a load of space to take up, especially with all the antennae on top. Along with the price on top, it certainly is not for everyone.
- Strong performance across the board on ethernet and wireless
- Excellent port availability with 10 Gigabit ports and USB 3.2
- Quad-band WiFi 6E for 6GHz adoption
- Strong signal range and latency
- Easy to use and featureful app for lots of control
- Expensive for most casual users
- Unwieldy and takes up lots of space with towering antenna
- The mirror on top is a fingerprint magnet and along with LED, stands out a lot
Design
The ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000 is most certainly an eye-catching and uniquely designed router. It takes up plenty of space with the 354 x 354 x 193mm dimensions it is definitely not one to shy away and hide in the back. Especially as it opts for sporting 8 external antennae (as if that wasn’t enough there are 4 internal as well) it does make it an arachnid of a router but it’s not going to scuttle away when placed on its legs. However, it does let you get on the web with a lot of features with that as well.
Further to that, it has plenty of cooling vents scattered around the top and sides to keep the processor and components cooled and performing well. But on top you also get more than half the surface covered in a mirror surrounded by RGB and a prominent ROG logo. That makes the ASUS router quite the fingerprint magnet, and it is an interesting look to see yourself staring back at you on your router when meddling with it, but at least there are plenty of status lights as well to keep you company.
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router side, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router top down, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router USB and power ports, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router WPS and RGB buttons, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router in front of box, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router profile, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router box, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router box contents, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router mirror logo, Image by PCGuide
But all of that is to pack plenty of performance into it. Being a WiFi 6E router it does come with plenty of frequencies to connect up. You get a 2.4GHz band, two 5GHz options, along with a 6GHz channel to connect up to. However, these can be separated or just unified if you want automatic frequency adjustments. Sure it might not be WiFi 7, but that might not be necessary or needed quite yet as 6E isn’t quite available on everything anyway, it’s not missing out on much yet and won’t have an even greater price on it.
GT-AXE16000 is quite the monster of a WiFi 6E router
As for the RJ45 ethernet ports, there is quite a selection to pick from. It starts off with the incredibly fast 10Gbps ports which can be used for both WAN and LAN so if you have a great ISP provider you can certainly get a lot distributed around your network. Then you have a standard 2.5Gbps WAN port and four Gigabit LAN ports. That sets you up well for a rather fast network, especially for connecting up a NAS or other server of sorts on your network.
Other features
Even past the standard router features it still has a lot more behind it, such as the actual hardware behind it as it gets a 2.0GHz quad-core processor along with 256MB NAND flash and 2GB DDR4 RAM. Which combine to provide a strong performance and have enough cooling to keep it going it is a lot of processing for a router to utilize but there are plenty of additions on top for you to run and change settings for.
It does help that the setup on the app is rather straightforward and simple to utilize and gives you a lot of control through it. That includes an expansive settings list for use. That includes setting up a VPN for your network along with a range of meshing options or tools for your system.
There is also plenty of traffic data for you to look through and see each individual device on your network. Which you can prioritize, including QOS, but a great deal of parental controls as well. Setting up profiles for these devices you can restrict what they see but also the time that they’re connected. There is a lot of control on the web as well, and similar features such as port forwarding as well that can be key to enjoying some gaming features and it is rather simple.
Other external features of the router include two USB A ports, one 3.2 Gen 1, and a USB 2.0. An additional way to add in more storage, including a way for us to do our storage test later on. There is also a a WPS and LED button so there is a way to turn off the lights easily if they do get in the way. So let’s see how it performs and what it’ll set you back.
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router USB and power ports, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router WPS and RGB buttons, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router 10G LAN, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router Status LEDs, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router corner, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router LAN and WAN, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router web control, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router app and family control, Image by PCGuide
ROG RAPTURE GT-AXE16000 Wifi 6E Router setup, Image by PCGuide
Pricing
The Rapture GT-AXE16000 is certainly one of the more expensive choices of routers. With all its features and sheer size, it does come with a grand price too. It has a price of $599.99/£499.99 so it’s certainly a fair bit you have to pay for the WIFi 6E choice. However, with the embedded networking it’s not too terrible, especially for 10 Gigabit ports that the network switches can go for hundreds of dollars. With that embedded into a router with a lot more, it adds up quickly, but it sure brings a lot to the table for those who can utilize it and have plenty to plug in.
incredible piece of kit, a top choice for setting up all of your network needs in one
Performance
Testing the range of routers in our office is a bit different from a standard home setup, especially without a direct modem connection. Then the traffic on the network and amount of people physically in the way changed so results can be a bit up and down but should still be a good comparison. With the internet limited to up to 300MB/s we still got a good range of tests. With the wireless tests done on our Samsung S21 FE with WiFiMan and SpeedTest apps.
Router benchmark – LAN internet speeds, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – latency to router @ 2.4GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – signal strength @ 5GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – LAN read write speeds to SSD plugged into router, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – download speed @ 5GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – download speed @ 2.4GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – signal strength @ 2.4GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – physical download speed @ 5GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – physical upload speed @ 2.4GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – physical download speed @ 2.4GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – upload speed @ 2.4GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – latency to router @ 5GHz, source PCGuide
Router benchmark – physical upload speed @ 5GHz, source PCGuide
Signal strength
Starting off with signal strength, which in negative dBm tells us how well the router and phone talk to each other, the lower the number closer to zero the better. The GT-AXE 16000, was surprisingly not the best for it and fell behind others at 2.4GHz but 5GHz was close also it holds up for the connection distance.
Measuring the strength from distances of 10 ft/3 m, 30 ft/9 m, 60ft/18m with a wall in between, and a bit of a long-range stretch with 90ft/27m with two rooms and four walls between the phone and the router. With that at 2.4GHz the ROG ranges between -48dBm and -79dBm, with the 5GHz band getting between -38dBm down to -78dBm.
Speed tests
Next, we check to internet and connection speed of the router and phone, including physical speeds between them also at the same distance intervals. For 2.4GHz the physical upload speed ranges from 258 Mbps to 149 Mbps at 60ft with 90ft barely achieving 8Mbps at that distance. With the upload getting a similar 258Mbps close by to just 1 at the furthest point. Whilst at 5GHz the download ranges from 1200Mbps to 34Mbps, with the upload ranging from 1200 to 64Mbps.
As for actual internet speeds, 2.4GHz upload speeds range from 71.4 to 0 Mbps as the test struggles with the distance and speed so far away. With the uploads ranging from 66.3 to 0Mbps. At 5GHz that jumps up to 244 and down to 47.9Mbps in the download speed, as the upload reaches 280Mbps and drops to 9.8Mbps.
As for the latency of those 2.4GHz ranges from 13 to 22 ms, with 5GHz spanning 10 to 16 ms, one of the best out there and ensures a fast connection to the router. Lastly, the LAN internet speed of a PC connected to the router was able to get 262.4 and 266.5Mbps download and upload speeds.
Network storage transfer
Lastly, we checked the kind of network performance that a connected SSD could achieve. With the Samsung drive on a sled connected to the USB 3.2, we ran CrystalDiskMark to test its capabilities. There we see that the router is capable of handling data transfer quite well only losing out to the newer Netgear RS700 but still running over 195MB/s reads and 150MB/s writes sequentially. So it does give you a strong choice other than ethernet for connecting up other hardware.
Conclusion
The ROG Rapture GT-AXE16000 is an incredible piece of kit, a top choice for setting up all of your network needs in one. Spanning control over traffic, features, and devices it does have a great range of capabilities to it. It might not be on the latest gen of WiFi anymore but it still has 6E with a whole range of frequencies to utilize, along with incredibly fast physical connections as well making it an allrounder. Although the design and size of it may not be for everyone, with the price being another detractor from it, for those that can afford it, it is a strong choice to set up.
- Standard: WiFi 6E
- Frequency bands: 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz-1, 5 GHz-2, 6 GHz
- Max speed: 16000 Mbps
- LAN ports: 2x 10Gbps (WAN/LAN), 4x 1Gbps
- WAN: 1x 2.5Gbps, 2x 10Gbps (WAN/LAN)
- CPU: 2.0GHz quad-core processor
- Memory: 256MB NAND flash and 2GB DDR4 RAM
- USB: 1x USB 3.2 Gen 1, 1x USB 2.0 Port
- Dimensions: 354 x 354 x 193mm
- Weight: 2425g
