The best thing of this router is that it's NBN ready and has both WAN/LAN ports supporting up to 1000Mbps which is abundant for movie streaming and VOIP communications within local network and a possible extension to future upgrade of NBN services. As for 802.11ac standard, this router does the right job for 5GHz Wi-fi transfer which is up to 433Mbps. It's also backward compatible with 802.11b/g/n. The cost is average but you might feel good about having an 802.11ac compliant router with this price tag. Compared with my old 802.11n router, it really makes a difference in terms of the speed and stability. One benefit is beamforming if you are using newer Macbook with antenna supporting 802.11ac standard.
Ref: http://www.tp-link.com.au/products/details/cat-9_Archer-C2.html
However, the firmware and software support is limited for this brand. Yet, it's still possible to find have a software upgrade to make things working.
First thing first, upgrade the firmware to the latest stable version via here:
Ref: http://www.tp-link.com.au/download/Archer-C2.html#Firmware
Ref: http://www.tp-link.com.au/download/Archer-C2.html#Firmware
High-end product like Archer C7 is based on the same architecture as C2 so their technical support recommended using newer version of software available for Archer C7 instead.
Ref: http://www.tp-link.com.au/products/details/cat-9_Archer-C7.html
The key to bridge up the USB printer connected to the router is the software called:
TP-LINK USB Printer Controller
It's better to use the package from a recent release of newer product line like Archer C7:
Try downloading the installation package
Archer C7_V2_USB_Printer_Controller_Installer_Mac
from here:
http://www.tp-link.com.au/download/Archer-C7.html#Utility
Extract it and find the .DMG file to install on Mac OS X:
TP-LINK_USB_Printer_Controller_Installer_Mac.dmg
A system reboot is required.
Before opening the printer controller software, it is necessary to have USB printer plugged into your Mac computer first and finish an initial setup based on USB connection. Assuming you have the printer driver for your USB printer, it's an easy but important step to setup a local printer profiler on your Mac.
Once it's successful on setting up your print via local USB connection, you should have a available local printer in "Printers and Scanner" Control Panel.
Now you can proceed to plug the USB printer into the USB port of TP-LINK Wireless Router for remote setup.
The software TP-LINK USB Printer Controller will let you to bridge up the remote printer to your local USB printer profile. It may show offline at first but will turn into online mode after the first remote printing is done successfully.
Assuming you are connecting to the Wi-Fi network from TP-Link Wireless Router, you need to open up TP-LINK USB Printer Controller interface.
Under the Router's name, you should find the USB printer device (whether it's UNKNOWN or exactly the printer model name) already connected to the router.
Click on the printer device and click on Auto menu button and then "+Set Auto-Connect Printer" button to find the installed printer list of available local printer profiles on you Mac.
Select the target printer profile and click Apply button to link up the remote printer and you're done.
Remember to keep TP-LINK USB Printer Controller Window opening during remote printing process. Now, you can have a try to print out anything you like with your local printer profile on your Mac and the print job will be redirected to the shared printer on the wireless router.
