Keeping old router on Verizon Fios will cost you

Q. Verizon says I can only keep my old, discontinued router if I pay a new, $2.80/month fee, or I can buy a new router from them. Do I have any alternatives?

A. Fios subscribers around the country who got their routers for free from the New York firm years ago may be getting an “Important Service Information about your Fios Account” e-mail.

Vague but non-positive subject lines like that almost always herald bad news, and in this case it’s the impending arrival of a “monthly Router Maintenance Charge of $2.80 (plus taxes)” for subscribers still using older models.

The e-mail that a reader in Arlington, Va., forwarded was short on details, and Verizon’s tech-support documentation on routers doesn’t seem to mention this new charge. But a post on a Verizon tech-support forum from an official representative offers a few more details:

• The models involved are the A, C, D, E and F versions of the Actiontec MI424WR (first on sale at Amazon back in 2007) and the A and C versions of the Westell 9100EM (first offered at Amazon in 2010).

• If you don’t want to pay the $2.80-plus-tax surcharge, you can buy a refurbished Fios ME424WR G or I router for $59.99 or buy the “Quantum Gateway” that replaced it for $199.99. (Verizon’s site lists a $149.99 sale price for new customers, but my reader was also offered that discount.) Or you can rent that new router for $10 a month, but you shouldn’t unless you think you’ll move within the next 20 months.

• That maintenance fee, starting in Verizon’s September or October billing cycles, is supposed to recoup the “higher call-in rate” tech support gets from customers with those models.

What’s so bad about those old models? Verizon’s explanation cites faster WiFi on new hardware, which is true. Those older units max out at the “802.11g” flavor of WiFi’s 54 megabits-per-second speed limit, barely above Fios’s 50 Mbps entry-level speed.

That Verizon post also warns that some of those older routers only support “WEP” encryption, an obsolete way to control access to a wireless network that now provides no security. The company’s documentation, however, indicates that the 9100EM and the Actiontec both support stronger “WPA” and “WPA2” encryption; spokesman Raymond McConville said the very first versions of each only do WEP.

Given the choice between those two newer models, the Gateway has a clear advantage in its support of the faster 802.11ac version of WiFi and its guest-network option (handy if you want to lend Internet access to visitors). But if you’re on one of Verizon’s slower tiers and don’t have house guests in need of Internet access, the refurbished MI424WR (yes, it’s absurdly confusing that it has the same name as the obsolete model) should suffice.

If you only get Internet access, not TV, through Fios, you have an option not mentioned in that Verizon post: running an Ethernet cable from the “Optical Network Terminal,” the networking box that links the fiber-optic cable to your house, to the third-party router of your choice.

Verizon normally runs a coaxial cable, like the ones used with cable TV and Internet, but if you don’t get Fios TV you don’t need that. That’s the setup I opted for when we got Fios over six years ago; McConville said it continues to be possible, although you’ll need to call tech support to have the ONT’s Ethernet port activated.

Rob Pegoraro is a tech writer based out of Washington, D.C. To submit a tech question, e-mail Rob at rob@robpegoraro.com. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/robpegoraro.