1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:04,880 Yup, just like you, I saw the Minions Wi-Fi routers on Reddit and went, 2 00:00:04,880 --> 00:00:10,320 well, this can't be real, can they? But then, unlike you, I actually bought them. 3 00:00:10,320 --> 00:00:18,960 So here they are, Bob and Kevin, ready to turn your Wi-Fi evil. How evil, you ask? Does this answer 4 00:00:18,960 --> 00:00:27,440 your question? Oh, there's a thing about me. The truth is, there's not a ton of information 5 00:00:27,440 --> 00:00:33,680 about these other than what the manufacturer publishes on the box. The Bob version is AX1800, 6 00:00:33,680 --> 00:00:41,760 so this is Wi-Fi 6, while the Kevin version is AXE 5400, so Wi-Fi 6E. Other than that, 7 00:00:41,760 --> 00:00:47,920 the Kevin version is tri-band, which it has to be to be Wi-Fi 6E, so it's got 2.4GHz support, 8 00:00:47,920 --> 00:00:54,880 and 5GHz and 6GHz, each at 160MHz channel widths. It has a 2.5GHz uplink port, which 9 00:00:55,760 --> 00:01:01,280 is not necessarily surprising at this price, but is a little surprising on something that I had 10 00:01:01,280 --> 00:01:05,360 perceived to be pretty much a novelty item. Typically, they give no thought to performance 11 00:01:05,360 --> 00:01:10,640 whatsoever, but this clearly does, because all we have to do is flip over one more panel, 12 00:01:10,640 --> 00:01:16,240 and we see that it also uses an upgraded Qualcomm processor versus the more basic 13 00:01:16,240 --> 00:01:22,720 dual-core MIPS IA processor on the Bob version, and it's got more, I guess, DRAM. I'm assuming 14 00:01:23,680 --> 00:01:30,000 Flash DRAM doesn't really mean anything. I think they mean Flash and DRAM, so it has 512MB 15 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:34,240 of RAM. This side of the box is also where we find out these are designed by DavoLink, 16 00:01:34,240 --> 00:01:39,920 a Korean company that's been around since 2000 and specializes in business and education networking. 17 00:01:39,920 --> 00:01:45,120 We've got a QR code for the installation guide, and then that is about it. And online, you won't 18 00:01:45,120 --> 00:01:49,840 find much more in the way of information compared to what they tell you on the box. They are mesh 19 00:01:49,840 --> 00:01:54,080 supported. You could have one Kevin for your internet connection, and then have a whole mesh 20 00:01:54,080 --> 00:01:59,280 of Bob's connected to them. They had support for WPA3, which we actually did a video over 21 00:01:59,280 --> 00:02:04,400 online as tech tips recently, and explained why that's very important. And what's included in 22 00:02:04,400 --> 00:02:09,200 the box is, apparently, all. Now, we're going to need a little bit of clarification on that, 23 00:02:09,200 --> 00:02:18,880 so why don't we go ahead and get, oh my god, it's so cute. My very own minion. It's not very heavy, 24 00:02:19,440 --> 00:02:25,600 but a wireless router doesn't necessarily need to be heavy to indicate its quality. 25 00:02:27,600 --> 00:02:32,800 Oh my god, it's so cute. If you want to connect more than one wired client, you're going to need 26 00:02:32,800 --> 00:02:38,320 a network switch, so you've got just the one LAN port and the one LAN port. There's a mesh button, 27 00:02:38,320 --> 00:02:46,480 which I assume is for setup, an LED, which I have to assume lights up the eyes. I really, 28 00:02:46,560 --> 00:02:52,480 really hope it does. And then, powering. Oh my god, the shoes are rubber. 29 00:02:53,840 --> 00:02:56,480 The attention to detail, you guys. 30 00:02:59,280 --> 00:03:07,600 So cute. Even the cable's cute. Look, it's a minion's cable. Not really expecting to find 31 00:03:07,600 --> 00:03:15,040 anything extra in Kevin's box, but who knows. He does cost $130 compared to just $69 for Bob. 32 00:03:15,040 --> 00:03:19,760 He's a lot heavier, which highlights that this is a completely different product, 33 00:03:19,760 --> 00:03:25,040 not just two different versions of the same thing stuffed into a smaller chassis and a larger 34 00:03:25,040 --> 00:03:30,560 chassis. This feels like it's got some heat sinks in it too. Oh my god, his hair tuft is rubber too. 35 00:03:30,560 --> 00:03:34,720 Oh, it's probably not the eyes that light up. It's probably this right here. Okay. Oh wow, 36 00:03:34,720 --> 00:03:40,480 this is a really short Ethernet cable. That's kind of a bummer. Hey, there we go. We've got 37 00:03:40,480 --> 00:03:45,600 activity LED now. Well, here, let's do the setup. This is pretty simple. Just scan this QR code to 38 00:03:45,600 --> 00:03:51,600 connect to it and then scan a second QR code. Well, the easy setup kind of broke down here. 39 00:03:51,600 --> 00:03:55,920 Well, we got there. It turns out that whatever Apple's doing with their default DNS settings 40 00:03:55,920 --> 00:04:01,200 and Safari on the iPhone, it just doesn't work for this. It works just fine on Android, 41 00:04:01,200 --> 00:04:06,720 and it works just fine on a desktop or laptop. So let's go ahead and check out this control panel. 42 00:04:06,720 --> 00:04:13,040 I love that the default admin username is Bob. Come on. How perfect is that? 43 00:04:13,760 --> 00:04:22,640 Like they really did, they really did put in the work on this one guys. Wait, what? If you reconfigure 44 00:04:23,200 --> 00:04:32,000 SSID zero, SSID one just shows up. So now I've got Kevin sucks, and I've got Bob underscore one. 45 00:04:32,800 --> 00:04:40,000 How do I turn that one off? Oh yeah, it's not secured. What is going on right now? 46 00:04:40,960 --> 00:04:48,000 Was this enabled box here before? No, that enable and disable thing is not here, 47 00:04:48,000 --> 00:04:53,600 and this apply button that is here in the easy setup is not here in the Wi-Fi settings one. 48 00:04:54,320 --> 00:05:01,440 Right? Guys, tell me. Tell me what's happening right now. Is that apply? 49 00:05:04,880 --> 00:05:10,320 The little paper airplane is apply. Wouldn't recommend using the easy Wi-Fi setup. There were 50 00:05:10,320 --> 00:05:13,680 a couple of concerns we saw raised about the device online. Someone said that it doesn't 51 00:05:13,680 --> 00:05:22,640 support PPPOE. So if you need that, then I guess the Minion router is not for you. And more importantly, 52 00:05:22,720 --> 00:05:26,800 a Reddit user pointed out that there's a vulnerability where the Wi-Fi passphrase is 53 00:05:26,800 --> 00:05:31,600 passed to the UART console in plain text. However, it should be noted that someone would need physical 54 00:05:31,600 --> 00:05:36,480 access to the device in order to take advantage of that exploit. So once someone's got physical 55 00:05:36,480 --> 00:05:40,800 access, you're pwned anyway. Enough chit chat though. It's time for the moment you've all been 56 00:05:40,800 --> 00:05:46,720 waiting for. Is it actually a functioning Wi-Fi router? It's a gigabit connection running into it. 57 00:05:47,440 --> 00:05:55,360 Half a gigabit. Wow, uploads even better. 500 megabit download, 700 up. Very reasonable. 58 00:05:56,080 --> 00:06:00,560 But can Kevin do better? I'm not going to bother configuring everything on this one and 59 00:06:00,560 --> 00:06:03,680 guys, I'm sure there's things we could do to tune things a little bit better, 60 00:06:03,680 --> 00:06:06,960 but we want to see how these are going to perform out of the box because realistically, 61 00:06:06,960 --> 00:06:12,960 come on. That is how most people buying a novelty router like this are going to use it. 62 00:06:12,960 --> 00:06:17,520 All right, not bad. You can see our ISP is delivering a little bit more than gigabit on 63 00:06:17,520 --> 00:06:22,400 this connection. Unfortunately, UBC is really not giving us good enough consistency in our 64 00:06:22,400 --> 00:06:27,680 downloads to really draw any kind of reasonable conclusion. Let's move. The testing consistency 65 00:06:27,680 --> 00:06:31,040 isn't that big of a deal though because under normal circumstances, you're not going to be 66 00:06:31,040 --> 00:06:35,920 right next to your router anyway and the bottleneck is going to be, you know, what kind of connection 67 00:06:35,920 --> 00:06:40,480 can you get to it through a wall or whatever. So we're at one wall right now. Let's see how we're 68 00:06:40,480 --> 00:06:49,280 doing here. Oh, yeah, I don't think the university of British Columbia is the problem here. Wow. 69 00:06:49,280 --> 00:06:58,400 Okay. So then I just go through this one door. Oh, wow. This is with no wall. Guys, look, 70 00:06:59,360 --> 00:07:08,800 the set is right there. It's like right there. This is bizarre, guys. Kevin? Kevin? 71 00:07:10,720 --> 00:07:16,880 Are you okay? It probably switched over to 2.4 when I went on the other side of the door 72 00:07:16,880 --> 00:07:22,880 and then just didn't grab five gigahertz or six gigahertz again. Oh, that's not good. 73 00:07:23,840 --> 00:07:29,760 Oh, man, I had not intended to go into Kevin's control panel, but I'm going to have to do that. 74 00:07:30,320 --> 00:07:36,480 So here's what we're going to do. You're in an apartment and you just don't need 2.4 gigahertz 75 00:07:36,480 --> 00:07:41,920 and we're just going to turn 2.4 off. So the question we're trying to answer here is can you 76 00:07:41,920 --> 00:07:46,160 buy one of these for your mom or is she going to call you complaining the second she walks, 77 00:07:46,160 --> 00:07:50,400 you know, 30 feet away from it or goes into another room if you understand the compromise 78 00:07:50,400 --> 00:07:54,720 you're making that 2.4 gigahertz isn't going to work. Let's go. Let's go again. Back to the other 79 00:07:54,720 --> 00:08:00,560 side of the door we go. Okay, moving around doesn't seem to be good for it. Seriously? 80 00:08:02,880 --> 00:08:10,160 Surprisingly, this fares much better. So the problem is not necessarily the wall 81 00:08:10,880 --> 00:08:14,480 or the distance. I'm probably about the same distance from Kevin as I was before. 82 00:08:15,120 --> 00:08:21,680 The issue seems to be the pickup pattern of the antennas. So if you live in like a row home, 83 00:08:21,680 --> 00:08:30,240 you know, like a three level but like small building, man, perfect. All right, we're back. 84 00:08:34,640 --> 00:08:42,160 All right, yeah, like we can really see it here. So the problems are twofold. One, switching between 85 00:08:42,240 --> 00:08:49,120 different bands is handled extremely poorly. Now that could potentially be exacerbated by the 86 00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:56,400 devices own tendencies, but whoever's fault it is, it's not a good experience with the Minions 87 00:08:56,400 --> 00:09:02,000 routers. I'm assuming Bob is no better than Kevin. And then problem number two is that the pickup 88 00:09:02,000 --> 00:09:07,280 pattern on this antenna is, I don't know what word to use to describe it other than inexcusable. 89 00:09:07,680 --> 00:09:13,840 It worked great upstairs. So it's not that it's completely unable to punch through walls. It's 90 00:09:13,840 --> 00:09:22,880 that the pickup pattern is really strong vertically. And yeah, it's all it's, it's a can tenna sticking 91 00:09:22,880 --> 00:09:28,560 out of the top of this thing and really poor horizontally. So at this point in time, I can't 92 00:09:28,560 --> 00:09:34,080 say that I can recommend the Minions routers for anything other than cuteness factors. So if 93 00:09:34,160 --> 00:09:39,440 you're in an extremely small space and you just want a cute little Wi-Fi access point, then they're 94 00:09:39,440 --> 00:09:43,600 great. And if you want performance, then you should probably look elsewhere, like to your 95 00:09:43,600 --> 00:09:50,960 ISP provided access point compared to these things. Subscribe to ShortCircuit.