CenturyLink ZyXel C3000Z Upgrade

pratyekmeal6

Hello-

New to networking but really interested in the topic.. hoping you guys can help me.

We signed up for gigabyte internet service from Centurylink a few months back but I don't think I'm getting what I paid for or my hardware isn't performing to the full potential.

My Router and modem are the same device ZyXel C3000Z that I rent from my ISP for the time being. I planned on getting my own device after a few months and that day has come.

When I do a speed test my laptop I'm getting pretty consistently 45mbps download and 65mbps upload. When the test is performed on my PS4 I'm getting consistently 200mbps download and between 5-10mbps upload.

My Laptop is connected via WiFi while my PS4 is connected directly to the ZyXel. I'm confused as to which one of these is more correct. Both of them seem low for what I am paying for.

At times it seems like our WiFi is all over the place whether it be reception or speed. And about 25-30% of the time my PS4 doesn't recognize the network via Ethernet cable without restarting the console or the router, but connects via WiFi just fine. The router sits in the basement as that's where they installed the inbound Ethernet cable in a concrete wall of our 2story duplex. I believe its possible the concrete is causing some signal loss but I'm not an expert on this so that's why I'm mentioning it.

I've been looking at the modem/router settings to see if anything looks off and I've noticed that the settings is set to 802.11n, would it be better to set it as 802.11ac? Will that help at all?

The SSID for 5GHz only has my PS4 and laptop connected. While the 2.4GHz is what the rest of the 1500sq ft apartment uses. We live in Portland and everything is very condensed in our neighborhood so I figured having the gaming on the 5GHz frequencies would be better for less lag, but now I'm not sure if switching everything to this frequency is not the better way to go since there are so many other networks in our neighborhood that are (I'm assuming) on 2.4GHz channels.

From what I am reading on past posts is that I should call my ISP and put the modem in bridge mode and then connect a better router for my network. I'm just overwhelmed with which device(s) to choose from to fix these small issues. Is there an affordable way I can get the maximum potential out of the service I'm paying for with Centurylink? Is it at simple as ditching their hardware and getting my own? If so, what types of devices should I be looking at?