GRYPHON GUARDIAN Mesh WiFi Enhanced Security Router, up
GRYPHON GUARDIAN Mesh WiFi Enhanced Security Router, up to 1800sqft, Advanced Parental Control System, Hack Protection w/AI-Intrusion Detection & Malware Protection, Smart Mesh WiFi System AC12
Gryphon protects all your smart devices in the home at the network level with the latest machine learning threat detection algorithm.
| Weight: | 431 g |
| Dimensions: | 10.16 x 10.16 x 2.54 cm; 431 Grams |
| Brand: | GRYPHON |
| Model: | GRYG1-UK |
| Colour: | White |
| Batteries Included: | No |
| Manufacture: | GRYPHON USA |
| Dimensions: | 10.16 x 10.16 x 2.54 cm; 431 Grams |
I bought 3 Gryphon AC3000 and used 2 as repeater and it works really great. The customer service tech(Francis) is very knowledgeable, patience and helpful whenever i reach out via chat or email with issues or questions.
Find this very useful tool for parental controls not only for devices like phones and tablets but also for smart tv.
Only downside is some features like delay suspension of internet to specific device is not working properly.
But it will fulfill it’s purpose.
Surely recommend to parents who want to put some restrictions on wifi devices not only for kids but also for themselves
This product is an excellent choice for parental control and child protection. Very impressive settings and user interface. In addition, customer support is outstanding.
This wifi routers is very nice, I can finally use at least 100 devices and more, without using the basic router of my internet provider! It blocks malwares, security threats and you can take it everywhere without having to re-install your devices everytime!
Very quick for the technical support!
Doesn’t wifi 6 yet, but I couldn’t live without it anymore!
We have two young boys. We’re certainly an “online family”, as most are these days. Protect Young Eyes recommends this product, for keeping kids (and others) safe online. I was shocked to see how easy it was to access immoral and even illegal web content, in just two clicks… This device is inexpensive, easy to install, and works as advertised. It also helps a lot in limiting screen time. Not having this device, or one like it, is like leaving your front door open wide (or not having a door at all!), allowing anything or anyone to come in. I had wondered if this little device would provide a strong enough WiFi signal through our house, but it is plenty strong enough (our house is about 1200 sq ft).
Following Shell energy removing its isp end filtering, this has been a God send to ensure all devices are protected. I’ve got this set up between a 3 D-link mesh system and the ISP modem, disabled NAT firewall, and it works well.
Shame that I can’t use the guest network on the D-Links anymore however, and it did require a remote firmware update on the first day, but tech support was really good.
Love the parental controls but the range of the WiFi is appalling unfortunately. Works in the one room only. The parental controls are that good though we’ve just bought an extender so we can carry on using the router. Easy to set up as well. No subscription needed for the comprehensive parental controls, can block apps, URLs, set times and limits without paying anything extra.
This router has excellent software for keeping you and your family safe online.
It has built in malware protection, family groups with access controls, easy individual time limits for people or devices.
You can block websites, store web history, block access to bypass these with the use of VPNs, a built in as blocker and safe search filter over rides for Google services and yahoo.
You can also restrict access to many major time wasting apps from the Griffin Connect app, blocking or time limiting things like fortnite, facebook, tiktok, facetime, skype, Snapchat and Twitter to name a few.
All of this can be done from a router that is the size of the palm of your hand and has a good Wi-Fi range for both 2.4 and 5g networks.
Be aware that you need an Android or Apple device to use the app (you can sideload to Amazon Fire).
I’ve had the Gryphon router for over 2 years. We’ve had a good wifi signal throughout the house, malware protection, and most important, internet access for our family with profiles and settings appropriate to each device/family member. I use Homebound for my teens’ phones so that the web filtering follows them wherever they go. Security and safe internet access for my family is a big priority and the Gryphon has made a big difference for us on that area.
Our Gryphon has been a vital member of the family team. The monitoring is persistent but not intrusive, and the controls are intuitive, provided you are to be technically minded. The router’s ability to tell user-directed browsing from background processing needs work, but decent considering the complexity of the problem. That and a couple other problems have been frustrating, but we have always found the tech support extremely responsive.
Wrong power supply for Australia.
Set up help is too simplified – doesn’t explain clearly the best set up to piggy back on your existing Wifi router – I had to deduce that from some hints.
Associated App could be improved
But actually does the Parental Control well.
This gives you more control than other competitive products on the market at least from what I’ve seen or tested
As someone who works in cybersecurity, it gives you functionality similar to what goes on behind the scenes within a corp IT environment. That said it doesn’t make it complicated it just keeps it simple to understand your network usage and protect you or your family from threats.
I use it with profiles for me that are essentially free for all, and then have a separate network and user profile for guests that come over and if you want you can make sure they don’t watch anything inappropriate while there
I’d say this is great for someone who wants more control than just a simple access point if you want to keep simplicity but have more robust than just “WiFi” than this is it.
This is what I’d use for an AirBnB too or when I have kids
Easy to install and works well with my AT&T equipme
I love that the Wi-Fi signal actually reaches where it says it will. It’s such a great product especially if security is important to you. I should stress that security should be important to you, I had to learn that the hard way unfortunately. This router has helped out immensely in securing my network and letting me be in full control of it. I haven’t had to call tech support for anything, as I’m familiar with networking and their user interface is actually quite simple to navigate. It supplies all the important details and has amazing features.
The system works great once its set up and recognise by the app. I purchased a pack as a promo back in Nov. 2021 to supplement my Gryphon tower coverage and to maintain the yearly malware protection plan that I purchased.
One router in the set came defective, so I got a return label to return it and did. Instead of one router being sent back, I got another replacement set from Amazon. I tried to get a return label to return the extra router but could not since it has been more than 30 days. I received an email today that I am being charged for the extra unused router still without a return label to send it back. My only choice I have is to dispute the charge with my bank and maybe then will I get a return label.
Great product. I own a childrens home and have used various products to manage access to the homes network and this works perfectly. I’m able to assign devices to users and restrict access based on time age or block specific sites. All controllable from my phone.
I have this connected to Starlink internet then to a switch which then has unifi access points and it all work great.
When I was trying to set it up I was having difficulty and called the helpline. The person on the phone was very helpful and had the issue fixed in no time. The app is easy to use and gives me peace of mind with teenagers in my house.
I purchased this as a repeater for an existing Gryphon tower. it functions perfectly in boosting the signal strength as expected on the back side of our house. The installation issues that I worked through with tech support help were related to outdated software and connectivity as follows: my app version was outdated and had to be updated, my tower firmware was outdated and had to be updated by Gryphon, the new repeater firmware could not be updated as expected requiring Gryphon to do it. Each of these had several steps that played out over the course of 2 days via email and phone, a little frustrating but it all got sorted eventually by the excellent tech crew. If you are installing this as a standalone you shouldn’t have any of these issues, if you are purchasing it as a repeater do yourself a favor and make sure you have the latest app version and tower software version before attempting installation.
Very pleased with the options available to set up this router and monitor internet usage. We wanted full control over our family’s online habits, and this router is far better than any other I looked at for being able to finetune what is allowed or blocked.
One note to mention: this router DOES require a smartphone or tablet to run the Gryphon Connect App, which IS REQUIRED to set up the router and new devices, user profiles, etc. However, I was able to use a Kindle Fire HD 8 (7th gen) by installing Google Play first (which is a whole process by itself: check online for the steps) and then downloading the Gryphon Connect App. When the app asked to scan the QR code on the router, I was unable to get the Kindle to scan the code. However, Gryphon tech support used the MAC address of the router and my email address to finish the setup of the router from their side, and the app worked perfectly after that.
This router has very advanced security. It doesn’t have a web interface making it secure from hackers, and also has advanced features most routers don’t like malware protection. It also lets you keep track of every device on your wifi. For those who have had issues with hackers This is one of the best routers of the yea
I bought this because I wanted to control when devices went off for the night & how long my children could watch TV in the bonus room. It is even better than I expected. It has warned me about open ports on devices like my robot vacuum cleaner and it allows me to control who can gain/keep access to my network. I love how they structured the set up. The directions were easy to follow and so smart… having ke rename the original router and then naming the Gryphon with the old user/password. My guests have been able to easily gain access and all the devices reconnected quickly. It prompts me to assign each device to a user, as new devices are discovered. I also love being able to bl9ck socials for some, and allow for others. Bedtime extension requests are easy too. I can see the logs of where my kids have been, which gives me peace of mind. I did have a small issue with my doorbell not having a strong signal. Cuatomer service gave prompt advice and solved my problem within 24hrs.
This is my second Gryphon router! The features that most impressed me are:
1. The ability to assign user group permissions for groups of devices.
2. I can also turn off the internet for a device while still keeping the device available on the network. Printers are a good example–you want all computers to be able to access the printer on a WiFi network, but you don’t want the printer online 24/7.
3. You can block users from accessing your network on a per device basis.
There are many more features, those are the ones that are stood out for me.
Really important… email tech support. They WILL get back to you. And, they will keep on replying to you until you are satisfied that your problem is fixed.
The Gryphon Guardian is amazing! If you’re a parent especially, the Gryphon app gives you all the info on what your kids are up to online, and provides them with safety and clear boundaries, and for parents, peace of mind, though you still have to keep an eye on them. The screen/bedtime/suspend timetable works a treat once you’ve got your head around how to set it up, and how to change it..read the simple instructions several times, I made the mistake of thinking I could do it without but it’s worth taking the time to get it right the first time round.
I’ve also had quite a lot of difficulties with teenagers viewing inappropriate stuff – the Gryphon Support team have been so helpful to explain how to make it as safe as possible, no system can be 100% but the Gryphon goes along way toward it. When they bring in developed tech for preventing VPNs being used it would be better still.
The time delay for getting support is at most a few hours, they’re very good responding generally by email, and from the app you have direct access, which has been really helpful when I had questions, and I’ve had many! There’s been no blips in coverage and only 2 essential updates needed when 2 security alerts flagged up because of open ports caused by teenagers trying to dodge parental controls! So, I’m very happy with Gryphon, would definately recommend it. Thanks Grypho
This product is not the best performing router, it is not the most configurable, the wireless isn’t the farthest reaching…..in short this product doesn’t really do the best at anything except maybe simplicity. If you want basic protection for your family devices this should work well for you, so long as you know what you are getting yourself into. I will say, if you want a browser interface to work from then just check the Gryphon off your list and go find something else. You can ONLY configure this from a mobile device through the app, that’s the only way, and I have no idea why.
The set up is the most time consuming, as you would expect. The mobile app walks you through setting up each Gryphon device. After all of your devices are in place you set up users, set up schedules for each user, then assign devices to each user. You have basic control over what those users can get to on the internet. You will get a list of where the user has tried to go on the web, and if something is blocked you don’t want blocked you can allow it. Likewise, you can block sites you don’t want visited. This block/allow function is specifically for websites. There is also ‘app’ support, where you can block or allow specific apps, but that list is so small that I’m not even sure why they bothered to add that feature. That is definitely the biggest complaint I’ve had with Gryphon. My daughter got an Oculus for Christmas. Gryphon HATES Oculus. It bocks the Oculus even if the user is in ‘play’ time on the schedule. Oculus is an app, but it is not one of the apps in the short list of Gryphon controlled apps. It does not show up in the blocked list, it doesn’t show up anywhere, it just flat doesn’t allow it to work! In order to use Oculus you have to move whatever device it is connect to into the ‘unmanaged’ devices within Gryphon, then it immediately works. I worked with the support team, which I found to be very good, and there is nothing that can be done about this behavior at this time. It is annoying, but overall it works well for blocking her from the dangerous stuff on the web, so I’m willing to put up with a few headaches.
In closing, if you want a router and access points that you can set up within a few hours without knowing very much (that includes setting up the users, the schedules (homework, play, sleep, etc), and adding/naming all of your devices, then this will probably work for you. The hardest part is probably trying to match the MAC addresses that show up in the Gryphon phone app to the devices on your network. Once you get past that it’s not hard too keep up with.
Absolutely fantastic great speeds and also a super cool authentication tool for informing you about the genuinity of the manufacturing details of any device
This unit goes over and beyond my expectations in fulfilling those requirements. I have a 2,500 sq ft 2 story home and my biggest problem were the numerous dark/dead spots throughout my house that was barely getting any wifi bandwidth. The parental monitoring software offered through Disney Circle was not quite adequate for my needs in monitoring and controlling my kids internet use. With Gryphon, I’m now getting 70 to 90 percent improvement in bandwidth throughout many areas in my house. Truly remarkable improvement. The parental monitoring software is absolutely outstanding. It’s some what similar to Disney Circle in that it allows for one to create individually restricted profiles but the Gryphon software is WAY more powerful and thorough. Excellent value considering that there is no subscription or additional service required. The overall router configuration is incredibly easy. This is an amazing value for the price.
We’ve found the Gryphon helpful but not perfect at weeding out inappropriate content. I really like that it helps us set limits on screen time. The user interface is very easy to use. It would be great though if there was also an option to turn on the wifi for an hour rather than always having set hours. I would also like it to be more flexible with what apps it can limit. Right now there are only some specific ones but it would be ideal to have the functionality to limit or block others as needed.
Gryphon is the only router I have found that supports a true “white list” but the documentation doesn’t really tell you how to do it. With covid, my kids are spending a lot of time on the computer and we all know that there are inappropriate sites that kids want to access but shouldn’t. I started out by setting up the router and then watching the sites the kids were going to and then blocking them. It was a never ending game of cat and mouse.
The secret is to put the router in toddler mode and then only allow school sites or other sites you specifically approve. It works great! I can rest easy that I am doing my best to protect the kids
Nice little multifunction device. I picked up a Gryphon Guardian because I had been looking for a content filtering device for the home and I had used Eset antivirus in the past. I purchased one Guardian to cover about 2700 sq ft of living space split between a single floor and basement with the device located in the basement nearly dead center in home. Coverage overall was pretty good, but a bit weak at edges of the main floor, so I picked up a second Guardian using WiFi backhaul in mesh config and that solved the coverage gap. The reason I give 4 stars is primarily because I haven’t seen the content filtering aspects directly at work. There have been some obvious examples of an online game for one of the kids not working that required a tweak in the settings, but after 2 1/2 months of use, I still haven’t seen it explicitly block a single site or detect any malware. That could just be due to safe browsing happening by household users but I wish they’d provide some example test sites to prove the filtering works/ is active. Also, it’s “vulnerability” scan leaves much to be desired; best I can tell, it just looks for open ports on devices and you can’t run it on demand. I realize this isn’t a NGFW like Palo Alto, but providing some capability for the end user to have some more control would be a certain improvement. I also hope for URL logging options in the future and better insight into URL categorization to understand what the different age groups can access. Overall though, I am happy with the product and do plan to open a support case to pose some of these questions.
Open DNS had been recommended as a means to control what young ones can access on the internet. I could not get it to work with ATT U-Verse. I kept researching and ran across the Gryphon Guardian. During setup the tech support I needed was excellent. The Gryphon provides wonderful control. Devices can be assigned to users. Devices and users can be controlled separately. User profiles can be set be grade or age level. Logs are generated of websites allowed and blocked, and you are given control to modify what can be accessed. Access to popular apps is also controllable. I am very happy with the results I am getting with the Gryphon and am even contemplating investing in the company.
I bought the gryphon guardian so I could block various apps ,etc for my kids computers, and I can’t really complain in that respect. The phone app works pretty well and easy to use. Also customer support was excellent. But unfortunately the WiFi signal to this just isn’t that great, it’s ok through one wall but then it drops off drastically. I tried moving it around between our house but I couldn’t achieve a comfortable signal strength for both our kids devices. You really need two or three of these and then I think they’re are WiFi 6 mesh boxes out that are in a similar price range. I used WiFi test apps to check on my phone and it showed that the strength just couldn’t give a good both computers my kids have.
I also had it just reset and reboot on the second day of us, whilst my son was on a teams classroom call. No idea why. I’ve used many modems, routers,p and mesh systems over the years but I just found this too unstable.
Going to try a WiFi 6 mesh from Asus instead.
I bought the Guardian as a mesh repeater for the Tower unit (which I’ve already had for 18 months). During the initial setup the Guardian kept failing to update its firmware and consequently wouldn’t pair with the Tower base station. However, a combination of help from Gryphon customer service (always very prompt despite the time zone difference) and a few trial and error moves from me (such as creating a second account, disconnecting the Tower and setting up the Guardian as the base) got the firware updated and from then the setup was a dream. The unit is now providing an ethernet connection to an X-Box together with an extension of the wifi signal to another part of the house. The app functionality is fantastic. 4 stars not 5 because of the initial work required to set up, but I’m already thinking of getting one more as the intelligent hand-off functionality is impressive.
As a parent, I have long sought a filtering/monitoring device that is clear, simple to use and effective. When I found Gryphon, it has done what I have expected it to do. It allows the administrator to assign devices to different user profiles. It tracks sites that have been blocked and allows the administrator to review all sites and services connected to so as to determine if there are other sites that need to be added as blocked access. The process for blocking a site is simple and user friendly. There was a little bit of a learning curve to get a handle on the interface and features.
Ideas for improvement. It would be great to be able to have access to actual pages of search results attempted on a device. It would also be great to be able to have a feature that allows tracking of social media apps like Instagram as well as monitor text/message communication.
I’ve been using a TP-Link Deco M5 system for a couple years. Currently I have four Deco pucks throughout my home, all hardwired together (so not having to rely on wireless mesh). The Deco includes some decent parental controls and malware protection but it does not offer any enforcement of search engine SafeSearch or allow prevention of VPN connections. Wanting to add SafeSearch protection, I decided to purchase the Gryphon Guardian and experiment with it as a supplement to my existing Deco network. This allows me to continue to use the investment I already have in the four Deco pucks.
I decided to save a few dollars by purchasing the certified refurbished Gryphon Guardian. It arrived quickly and looked physically fine. However, the power supply that was included was defective (output 1.9V instead of 12) so the unit refused to power on. Luckily I have a box of spare power bricks and was able to find a compatible one (12V, 1A).
As I mentioned, I wanted to use Gryphon to supplement my Deco environment so I had envisioned two possible implementation scenarios. Both involved cabling the Gryphon between my master Deco and cable modem. From there I had to decide whether to keep the Deco in router mode or put it in access point mode. For ease of install, I decided to keep the Deco in router mode and see how that went. Sometimes having double routers and double NAT can cause issues with speed and some network functionality; but so far it’s been fine.
So, I am currently implemented by having both the Gryphon and Deco in a NAT/Router mode. From the Gryphon standpoint it only sees one client which is my master Deco. I have older kids and don’t really need the ability to set parental controls on a device by device level. In my case, I’m fine with everyone getting the same parental controls and SafeSearch settings. If I needed granular ability then I would control it in the Deco or turn the Deco into AP mode so that Gryphon saw all the individual devices rather than just the master Deco.
Anyhow, now on to my experience with the Gryphon itself.
In general, setup was easy. All app drive like you’d come to expect with most modern home tech devices. Other than the bad power supply they sent me, I was able to get the system up and running in about 15 minutes. As mentioned, I’m using my Deco system, in router/NAT mode, behind the Gryphon. So, the Gryphon app saw one client (the Deco), and it was easy to set up parental controls and assign the client to that policy. In my testing, the Gryphon was able to block access to the sites I tested in each category. The Gryphon was also successful in enforcing SafeSearch usage on Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo. Other search engine sites that I tried (Yahoo.com, Ask.com, Dogpile.com) were totally blocked because they couldn’t enforce SafeSearch. I’m OK with that behavior in my case.
As far as Wifi goes, I’m not using the Gryphon Wifi in my setup (continuing to use the Deco). But, over time, I may consider migrating to the Gryphon Wifi and buying more units for around the house.
Many vendors have primary and guest wireless network options which isolate traffic for improved security. The Gryphon introduces a third which they label as an IoT network. This allows you to create a dedicated network for IoT devices (thermostats, cameras, sensors, etc). This is helpful because it keeps these IoT devices isolated from your home and guest networks which is great from a security standpoint. Also, many IoT devices require compromises on your network like disabling of fast roaming or band steering. Isolating IoT devices allows you to dumb down the network for them without affecting the rest of your devices. This alone may be enough for me to make the switch to Gryphon WiFi in my house sooner rather than later (and replace the Deco altogether).
I did experiment with the HomeBound app on my iPhone a little and it seemed to work well. This app will keep a constant VPN connection back through your home network so that all policies and logging are enforced as if they were on the local home network. This is an interesting approach to this problem and a different way to tackle than I think most vendors tackle this need. At a high level, this VPN based approach, may significantly impact Internet speed performance of your mobile devices because they have to route back through your home network no matter where you are in the world. However, I can think of a number of positives to this approach as well especially if you are using tools/apps that are better served coming from the IP address of your home network or want some added security in public hotspot settings. I’m not sure if I’ll continue to use the HomeBound app for my use case; especially at the additional annual expense.
Pros:
Easy to set up
Can be used in a variety of ways to supplement or replace your existing setup.
My Internet speeds do not seem to be have impacted; even in a double NAT setup. I’m getting my published internet speeds of about 350Mb down and 12Mb up.
Seems to do a good job with Parental Control and SafeSearch enforcement. Hard to really tell if the security features are working well unless you go looking for trouble 🙂
Cons:
No ability to shut off wifi permanently (seems to be schedule based with 23 hours, 45 minutes seeming to be the maximum disable period.)
No ability to fine turn parental control policies/categories of sites. You have to pick from 5 predefined “age groups” or select “unfiltered”. You can however explicitly allow or deny certain sites within a policy.
Be wary of the refurbished units on Amazon; mine came with a bad power supply.
Extra fees involved with ongoing use of the enhance security feature and HomeBound apps are a downside.
I’m a professional network security engineer, so I have experience in managing enterprise- and service provider-class WiFi access points, firewalls, and UTM platforms manufactured by the “big boys”: Cisco, Juniper, Palo Alto, Fortinet, etc.
When I’m off the clock managing my SOHO network, I want platforms that are simpler to manage and have 50-80% of the capabilities of those offered by the major vendors. The Gryphon Guardian satisfies my use case.
The app used to control the Guardian provides a user friendly, fairly intuitive parental control interface . The UTM features are solid: URL and web content filtering, and ESET-brand malware protection.
Via Xfinity I get a solid 450 Mbps down / 10 Mbps up. If the throughout were capable of >1 Gbps this could be an SMB-class UTM appliance.
If I have one criticism takes a little time getting the schedules set up for each individual child. It would be better to have the capability for grouping of kids into groups that share common schedules (i.e. role based access control, RBAC).
I rate it an 8/10.
I went ahead and bought this even though I had some questions that I could not find answers too. I figured, I could always return it if it doesn’t do what I need it too.
Glad to say it’s awesome.
My big question was, how well does it work with an existing WIRED network? And what if I don’t want to use it’s own built in WiFi?
Over the years my network at home has increased dramatically. The fridge, the washer, the dryer, light bulbs, the Nest thermostats, the Nest Smoke detectors (all 7 of them) are on the network. Smarts TV’s. I have 2 TP-Link EAP access points (one on each level of the house). 3 kids and 2 adults means there are phones, tablets, PC’s, Xboxes, PS4 etc etc. A considerable combo of Wireless and Hardwired devices. (As a network technician, I have Cat6 outlets around the house and prefer to hardwire where possible). So my big question was, how well does it handle wired devices? Will it SEE everything if you don’t use it’s own WiFi?
Well yes it does. Admirably. I now have profiles for all my family members, can pause each kid if i need to, have bedtime shutoff schedules set, have TikTok and Facebook BLOCKED etc etc.
The unit itself is pretty tiny. It has 1 port labelled ‘Internet’ for connecting to your ISP NID (modem), and another port labelled ‘Lan’ for plugging in to the rest of your network (most likely a Switch, which all your hardwired stuff will be connected to). I took great delight in de-installing my TP-Link Router and simplifying my systems (the TPLink Router is great, but the parental controls are not a patch on the Gryphon).
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So, there you have it. Buy with confidence if you need to control your kids’ online activities. It works. And you don’t have to use it’s own WiFi if you already have AP’s that you like.
We have been using gryphon for 7 months now. It takes a little bit of a learning curve, but once you’ve mastered it you become a God over the kids wifi privileges. Before if one kid did bad, I’d have to shut the wifi down for everyone. Now, I’ve set it up for individual devices. They won’t get their chores done, suspend. Won’t take the dog for a walk, suspend. I’m 16 and know everything, suspend. Gryphon also has filtering. So, kids aren’t getting into stuff they shouldn’t be. Schedules to shut down internet for bedtime and limited use for times they should be doing school work.
Gryphon is very diverse. I’ve recommended it to several of my friend who’ve been having issues with their kids and the internet.
The router is great and works nearly 100% of the time, though there have been some glitches with the app such as when setting up schedules it will tell you there is an overlap when there isn’t, but just a little bit of playing around with it to figure out which days and times to enter first to prevent the overlap error didn’t take long to figure out. The app doesn’t work exactly as it should every single time, but you learn to live with the little idiosyncrasies and it works well enough to do what we needed it to do. By little idiosyncrasies, I mean things like when you try to do a one-time change of the schedule by canceling just one block of time, it sometimes cancels the rest of the schedule for the day, but not always. What I love is the ability to customize internet access for each device in the house and have easy visibility of what devices are connected and what they are doing. Very easy to monitor kids internet access and prevent unwanted access for each person or on each device, and very easy to control in real time from your phone.
As a level set I’m more than willing to fiddle with any electronic to get it to work. I have loads of patience and am the IT support for the house. In truth I like it that way and nerding out with the router is not a chore to me.
So I buy the Gryphon and am pretty happy with the router. This also coincided with moving to a new home. Said new home is good sized and has 2 floors. The house is roughly 4300 Sq ft. My office ends up being right next to the router and I really did not have any performance complaints. My family though… Ugh. Complaints galore, and I had written some of it off as a new internet provider when we moved.
As I said I continue to fiddle and change things hoping to get a better experience for all. What was frustrating is that the router seemed to put out the signal I needed at the edges of the house and while the speeds were not as fast as next to the router they were acceptable when not being heavily taxed.
I finally came to the conclusion that I should add a mesh repeater as the system worked especially up where I did most of my work, but the complaints did not subside so my work was not done.
I added one repeater which was quite easy. There wasnt a lot of fussing just scan a qr code on the bottom of the repeater in the app and you’re off and running. After I added one it was a bit better….but Still getting complaints.
So what’s a guy gonna do? I decide to just go deeper down the rabbit hole.
Adding a second and… Still complaints… Then eventually a third as I had grown tired of the complaining. I also came to the conclusion after speed checking every corner of the house and swapping around positions of the routers for several days in my spare time. Let me offer this peice of info also…. Sony PS4s have TERRIBLE WIFI ANTENNAS. I could not figure out why I couldn’t get their machines to pull the speeds I could when testing on my phone…. Standing right next to the dang thing and I’m getting 200mbps more download speed. After some research I figured out that the PS4 unless sitting almost on top of the router is going to struggle to pull reasonable speeds. Do yourself a favor and just run an ethernet cable if you’re in that position, or reserve yourself that you’re going to have to add repeaters close to the PS4. That’s free advice and it took me a long time to figure that one out.
So besides all that I finally came to the conclusion is that this setup does not have great wifi signal out of the box, and you have supplement with the mesh system to unlock true performance.
So after all my fussing what kind of speed am I getting? Cloat to the main unit I can pull 500mbps down and 450mbps up. Those aren’t typos either. The hardware is legit after it’s weak antennas are overcome. In the far corners of the house and yard I can pull roughly 100 mbps down and 125 mbps up. That compares to what it was before of 20ish mbps down and 30 mbps up. It’s made a big difference. Lots of whining has gone away and now everyone can do anything they want and not worry about everyone else. Everyone can Zoom at the same time, while playing video games, streaming 4k videos, and uploading selfies to social media.
So all that withstanding, what about the real reason I bought it? The parental controls are slick and simple! Want the kids to do their homework? Great just kill all the wifi to only their devices all at the push of a button.
Want the wifi shutoff at midnight so they don’t watch TV all night? Cool. Just set it up that way for that child.
Kids going to “questionable” sites. No problem BLOCKED at the push of a button.
When I was having complaints about the internet I had rounded up anything extra I could think of that would suck up bandwidth (Wyze Cams, Amazon Echoes, smart switches, light bulbs etc) nd assigned them all to a group in the app as a user. So when complaints started I could add bandwidth quickly with the push of a button by just suspending internet to those items.
Assign static IPs with ease. We have a printer that loves to not marry up with the computers. Set that bad boy as static and never worry about it again. Assign whatever name you like to devices. In my house we have close to 100 wifi items to be assigned. Being able to identify by name (and it makes sense to me) is a God send. I was able to catch one of the kids in a lie because someone came over and hooked into our wifi and you can set it to ask permission to join. Mine is not set that way, but when all your devices are hooked up and suddenly a new one shows up… It’s pretty obvious.
Want 2.4ghz and 5ghz as a choice? Sure no problem. Want to not have to think about it and let the routers do the work. No problem you can do that too.
The system really provides a lot of flexibility and performance once I finally got it all dialed in. It did end up being more expensive than what I could have done with a different setup, but I would not have had such a slick interface to deal with the kids. I am now very happy. The kids have been unhappy since it came in the front door….and I don’t care! Lol. I hope you can make your teens unhappy soon too.
Before I got the Gyphon router I had a couple of simple requirements – I needed something that is easy to manage, safe and dependable. This device ticked all the boxes. Easy to manage: the app is simple, intuitive and responsive. Safe: you have #1 continual firmware updates to keep you at the latest vulnerability protection level at all times, and #2 real time, active malware filtering and protection that is also updated multiple times a week. I am not saying this is THE BEST and SAFEST solution out there, but it is pretty damn close at this price point. Very few people (tech-inclined) have the time or desire to make something better from open source software available currently, and if you rely on just plain old “buy our product and come to our website to see if we have blessed you with a firmware upgrade”, cough-Lynksys-cough, then… well, you might as well not rely on false sense of security.
Anyway, the Gryphon devices are easy to setup, easy to use and simple and no-effort protection for your home network. Just stop looking for others and get it. Do it.
I really like this product, it is nice to block certain sites. It would be nice to have more options besides bedtime (which your limited to 12 hours) homework time (which I actually use for home school time). I would like to be able to block gaming sites in general instead of having to shut them down as my son finds them. So far it has blocked him from the really bad sites though, which is peace of mind. Overall good product for the price and good customer service.
I needed a router with a built-in parental control app, and I have been very happy with Gryphon. I can set up profiles for each child with different age restrictions and customize them by further restricting specific websites. The homework, bedtime, free time settings allow me to create a detailed daily schedule for each child and designate which apps and websites they can visit at what times of day.
The only reasons I gave 4 instead of 5 stars are because occasionally the app malfunctions and homework restrictions stop working or it stops tracking WiFi time limits until I have deleted and reset the profile. Hopefully this bug will eventually be worked out of the app by Gryphon. The other frustration is that FaceTime and iMessage are lumped into one control category. I want to be able to restrict FaceTime but not iMessage. Fortunately, I discovered how to do this using the parental controls on the child’s device.
Overall, I am very happy with this product. It has given me the control I need to keep my kids safe online and limit their screen time in age appropriate ways.
The user interface is what sold me. As soon as you open the package it is pretty self-explanatory. I was skeptic and a bit nervous about the setup but it is very simple. You scan the QR code, download the app and from there it’s pretty much step-by-step. Simple! I started off with just my work items; laptop, iPad, cell phone; now I have my entire network including Google home running through the Gryphon. It truly protects and will notify you when something isn’t right or acting up in your network. Cool thing too is you can set up different internet settings based on the different devices you need set up from cell phones, to security system, it covers it all. This has been a game changer for my confidence in feeling protected.
I was researching a way to have better parental control on the home network. Did a whole bunch of research and found Gryphon. Since I just upgraded to a new mesh network at home with another brand, I just got the Gryphon Guardian instead of the Tower. It work seamlessly. The parental control gives me many options to customize to individual kids. The only few functions that I wish it can have is to have timeout per hour, so they can rest their eyes. The next request is I can control individual apps time limits. Right now you can only control the total online time or enable/disable an app. I would like to have the option to say, online 30mins YouTube per day. That means the enable/disable plus time limits will solve this problem.
It did not help my signal strength.
I haven’t needed to use it yet disabling or time limits….will update.
Update 3: Apparently I had a defective unit. It is supposedly a very rare issue. We have gotten it fixed now, and I am again happy with the device. The features are great and with 4 kids, I don’t think I could live without the control this provides (being able to let one kid work on homework online only while another is done with homework and given full access while a third is on bedtime mode, and a fourth has the internet temporarily turned off so she’ll help with some chores). It is truly fantastic when it works. Hope it continues to work without issue.
Update 2: My Gryphon just stopped letting me log in. I am trying to contact customer service to no avail. The app just wants me to reinstall all the routers from scratch!?!? When this system works, it’s good, but when it doesn’t, it is painful to deal with.
Update: I have a computer that I turned off at the Gryphon control center. When I turned it back on, it didn’t come back on. The computer says it has no internet, and when I troubleshoot, it says “The remote device or resource won’t accept the connection”. All my other computers and devices are working fine, but I can’t figure out for the life of me why one computer won’t get on the internet.
Previously:
I rarely write reviews but after reading some of the negative reviews here, I feel like I need to tell people this is a pretty good device.
I don’t think it’s the best mesh network out there, but the parental control apps are excellent. We have found it to be very helpful and are ever so slowly tightening the wrench, so to speak.
The internet speed did take a slight move down on the computers. I don’t know if it’s the fact the parental controls slow it slightly, but I’m guessing that’s it.
We have a 100mbit connection, 4 kids that might be on an iPad and tv or computer concurrently with one streaming or FaceTiming. I also will be watching TV in the other room and on my computer or phone. It works perfectly fine for me although the repeater speed test is only showing 30-40 megs down but a low ping. Not sure if that’s the mesh router or some other issue.
But overall, I would give this mesh network an A. It did what we want and I think is better than Circle. For parental controls, this hands down gets a A++ from me. It’s worth it if that’s why you want it.
Oh, and I bought the Gryphon Guardian and not the Gryphon towers. It covers my 6600 sf / 2 story house just fine.
This is what I’ve been looking for to control screen-time for my kids! I have tried various paid services from routers, to device profiles, to VPN. This is by far the most comprehensive solution with minimal interruptions. No need to install an app on monitored devices (it is an option). Previous routers lacked performance and required a monthly fee. Installing devices profiles was cumbersome. VPN added to much latency and made the internet very slow for simple activities. Gryphon is straightforward and highly flexible for my family’s needs. Only drawback is there is no way to permanently opt-out of two-factor authentication: reminders pop-up every few days (reason for 4 out of 5 stars). I have a separate router that has a separate network the kids previously connected to. I changed its password and thus forced the kids to join the new Gryphon network. All newly joined devices are blocked until I approve and assign to a user profile: brilliant! My kids were previously able to circumvent screen time controls by changing the time on their devices and various uninstall approaches. Gryphon negates those bypasses swimmingly! Highly recommend.
We have found our Gryphon WiFi remarkable with regards to tech performance and parental controls. I’d done research on best performing routers and routers with the most reliable parental controls and Gryphon seemed the best option based on what we’d found online. The setup was intuitive, but did require logging all devices back in manually with the network verifying the device was allowed on the network and assigned to which user.
Following the Gryphon online tutorials allowed us to customize Internet access per family user, which was incredibly useful. For any parent who wants to protect their home from outside threats as well as having control of your child’s Internet access, I recommend going to the Gryphon website first and watching a few video tutorials to understand the product. I’ve recommended to friends and family members who have also purchased.
We have found the Homebase VPN a bit less intuitive, but you don’t need to use that service.
I tried to use the ISP’s parental control and he was able to bypass it with a quick youtube tutorial where he found a MAC ID generator and kept getting online. I’m an IT professional so I knew what he was doing and I got tired and didn’t want to be the “Regulator” that everyone hates. Like at work I needed to delegate this work or automate this “project” because I’m busy in meetings all day then doing my work until the evening. Doing some research I found Gryphon and decided to give it a shot. Gryphon was very easy to setup and bring online. My son couldn’t hack through the gryphon and I even saw that he was trying to go to VPN sites, I guess that didn’t work for him either since I disabled VPN for his Gryphon profile. I love that he can’t go to other sites that are too mature for his mind and I don’t have to worry about that anymore.
He’s finally all caught up on homework and the teachers are even commending him for his good work. He’s a really smart kid it’s just that he was too distracted by his friends and just playing games online instead of doing school work during school(homework) hours.
He now asks me if he can get out of homework an hour early if he completes his work early, hey why not! I’m not the Internet Police Dad anymore now I’m back to being a Father.
Fyi- I had to disable any new devices on the ISP’s router so he wouldn’t physically plug into it when I first got the Gryphon. One night I found him passed out next to the router jacked in with an ethernet cable, he didn’t sleep that night. He can’t do that anymore..
So, here is your manual, below (written April 2020, so it could change). I am totally unqualified to write this manual. The fact that you are coming back to this review to use as your manual is pathetic, and deserves a two-star knockdown. But I just knocked it down one star because I don’t want to penalize genius engineers for their clueless Apple-wannabee marketing department.
1) Installation. The base unit is strong enough to drive the inside of a medium/small house, with download speeds of between 50 and 150 mbps on my typical devices, and 5-30 mbps 3 rooms and 1 story away from the base unit. So don’t buy the mesh (only buy one Gryphon Guardian unit) if you don’t have a big house or don’t care if the outer rooms go down into the single digit mbps. Set up the first (base) unit and get it working before plugging in the others. The Gryphon Guardian units are all identical hardware, but the base sets itself up differently than the second and third units, which automatically set themselves up as mesh/repeater units when you install them. The units only have three plugs: “Power” “Internet” and “LAN”. The power cord plugs into the wall, which is required for all three units, but the mesh repeater units do not have anything else plugged in to them. No need to connect an ethernet cable between the host and mesh units, since they communicate wirelessly, but I assume you could connect them if you wanted to. Think of the “Internet” ethernet socket as “Input” and the “LAN” socket as “output”. It comes with a 2-foot long ethernet cable, for you to plug the base Gryphon unit in to your Internet Modem (not used for the mesh/repeater units). In my case, I have a fiber optic modem, then a separate AT&T modem/router/WiFi unit that works with the copper ethernet cable that comes out of the fiber modem. You will need to keep your AT&T (or whatever) modem/router/WiFi, even though you are replacing the WiFi with this Gryphon, because you need the modem part of the AT&T (or whatever) unit that you currently have. It would be good to dig up your AT&T modem/router/WiFi documentation now before you buy the Gryphon (or call AT&T), because if you can’t figure out how to turn off the WiFi on your old router while the rest of it is turned on, then your kiddos will still be able to access the internet unfiltered. Of course, if they can reach the back of your old modem, they can still plug in an ethernet cable and access the internet through the cable, unfiltered. If you don’t think they are smart enough to figure that out, guess again. I had to keep my AT&T unit for another reason: I have VOIP phone service (land-line style phone) that ties into a standard POTS phone cable coming out of the AT&T modem. No problem, I could not throw out the AT&T modem anyway, so this AT&T VOIP hookup stayed unchanged. On the back of your AT&T (or whatever) internet modem are output ports that probably say “LAN”. Connect the ethernet cable from the “LAN” port on your AT&T (or whatever) modem into the “Internet” port on the Gryphon. You should have installed the software on our smartphone by now, and it will begin to give you instructions. It takes a photo of the smart code on the bottom of your Gryphon so you don’t have to type in any serial numbers for the handshake. But if it can’t get a handshake with the Grypon WiFi at this point, you are stuck on the first page of the instructions. Sorry. Just start turning things on and off randomly. 20 frustrating minutes later, as you wonder what the different blinking lights mean, it will probably work. Apparently what I did wrong, was to plug the ethernet cable from my Fiber Optic modem directly into the back of the Gryphon (and then plug the correct one in later, but by that time the Gryphon was confused). When you first turn on the Gryphon, it communicates with the WiFi on your smart phone using a WiFi identifier that you must see and choose from your Smartphone WiFi connection, which has the word “Security” in its name. But apparently if you mess up the first step, the security WiFi choice goes away, but it gives you two other choices with a very similar name that you will foolishly try, over and over, before you realize that you must shut everything down and start the installation process over. OK, maybe I am stupid, but that is why I like to read through installation manuals before I start the installation process. The only time you will make a WiFi handshake with the Grypon using this “security” Grypon WiFi name, is when you are setting it up. But if you don’t see it as a WiFi choice from your smart phone, you can’t set it up.
2) What do the blinking lights mean? The Gyphon has one LED on the base that can blink and change between red and white. Your goal is a WHITE STEADY light. Until you see the white steady light, don’t even bother trying to connect a device to see if it will work on the internet. The sequences of lights, and my BLIND GUESS of what they mean, is: Red Steady: You fed power to the unit and it booted up. Red Blinking: The unit can’t get an Ethernet handshake with your internet modem. White Blinking: You are getting close. (Maybe you have a WiFi connection but not internet. Your guess is as good as mine.) White Steady: SUCCESS!! This boot-up process, even if it works, takes several minutes while you wait for the lights to cycle through their sequence. And any time you make a basic change to the system through the software, it will take the same amount of time to reset and restart, so don’t do it while your family is waiting.
3) WiFi Name and Password. Once you get a white steady light from the Base Unit, you can dive into the software, cussing the marketing people who tried to be arrogant like Apple (“BAH! Only idiots need user manuals!”) but they don’t have the chops to pull it off. It is very easy to change the visible name of your WiFi and the password using the smart phone software. You can set up a separate visitor WiFi name and password to give to household guests, which you can change from time to time for security reasons. The “Guest” WiFi will show up as a single person/user in the software so you would not want to use the Guest network if you want to control individual guest access at different access levels (e.g., some guests are kids and some are adults). If you use the same name and password as the old WiFi you are replacing, as soon as you power up the Gryphon all of your family’s devices will handshake with the new Gryphon unit and your family won’t even know you replaced the WiFi (until you start tightening down the access a few days later, heh heh). You can ask them if their speeds increased, and they will gush with praise for the new WiFi. I have one of my devices, a Sony smart DVD, hard-wired to the Gryphon unit with an Ethernet cable (connected to the LAN port), and it works fine. But each Gryphon Guardian only has one LAN port so most of your devices must connect wirelessly.
4) Setting up mesh/repeater units: Power them on and use the smartphone software to take a photo of the smart code on the bottom. That’s it. No cables to connect. Move them around in the house until they all show up as “green” on the Network page of your phone software; yellow will work but it will be slower. The software automatically hard-codes them as hub-and spoke units that are paired to the base unit (not to eachother). There is a software setting where you can set it to “automatic” or pair them to a different repeater unit, which I assume would allow you to daisy-chain them in a very long line that could go on for a city block. But of course this “repeater” function has to be a slower than hub-and-spoke, which is preferable if you are in a mostly square house. When you change this choice in the software, it shuts down and restarts the network without warning, raising loud objections from your family as they wait many minutes for it to reboot.
5) Access Levels. Normally, when a new device signs on to your network, your smart phone software will ask you which person in your family the device belongs to, so you can assign it to them and it will default to their level of access. But if you use your old WiFi password, all of the devices will come online at once and you will need to go in to the software to assign devices to the person who uses them. This is easy to do. You can also change the name of the device, after you figure out what it is, so it will be easier to recognize it later. During setup, the software will ask you if each of your individual users are “elementary” “high school” “adult” or “unrestricted”. This affects what websites they are allowed to visit. You can make these changes from your smart phone and it will change their access instantly in seconds. I presume that Gyphon has a huge library of websites that are appropriate for various levels. The “Adult” level is more of a “Professional Adult” level—in other words, it still filters out web sites that would not be appropriate in a professional workplace environment. Only the “Unrestricted” setting allows all websites. You get the picture. In addition to the “level” for each person, you can also toggle “Youtube / Safesearch” on, which does two things: It turns off the “user comments” on YouTube, and it turns “Safesearch” on for Google and Bing (and blocks use of other search engines such as Yahoo search because it does not have a safe search function). This is my only complaint about the software: It should allow you to control YouTube and Safesearch separately. My kids really like seeing user comments on their favorite YouTube sites, which I think is OK, but that means their internet searches are also unrestricted. BUT this is not as bad as it sounds, because even if they get a search result for a bad website, if they click on that website they can not load it up because you have chosen the “High School” or even “Adult” option for them (not “Unrestricted”). Any level below “Unrestricted” blocks bad websites even if you have not toggled-on the “Safesearch”. You can toggle “track website” visited, or not. My own policy is not to track adults in my house, but to track all kids. If tracking is turned on, it only shows what site was visited, not what they did at the site. And it lists the sites that were blocked in a separate list. You can also toggle on or off the ability to go through a VPN, which otherwise would be a way to get around restrictions for a tech savvy user.
6) Malware. I have only had this installed one week, and it already flagged some malware on the computer (a MAC!!!) of a teenage guest using our Guest Network. It was malware that takes over your Google search engine for marketing purposes, not really causing damage. This Malware blocker is a subscription service that you get free the first year and then you can choose to pay for it after that. I’m already sold. There is also a companion software system that you can install on your kids smart phones, which will route all of their internet connections back through your Gryphon system even when they are away form home, allowing you to control all their access through Gryphon. I haven’t tried this companion software yet.
In summary, this is a great system, with a non-existent user manual. After you have sunk endless hours wandering cluelessly like an avatar in a computer game, you will love it.
UPDATE Fall 2021: After using this for about a year, I experienced intermittent performance for some computers, unless I was very close to a Gryphon unit. I discovered that there were so many neighbor devices using the same WiFi band, that interference was crowding the radio frequency. However, this unit also comes with a 5g radio frequency band; you have to set it up separately. It does not automatically swap between bands whene one is crowded. You must name and recognize the 5g band and handshake with it, as though it was a completey separate WiFi system. So, my low speed devices I left on the slower band, and my higher speed priority devices I put on the 5g system. I occaionally see speeds in excess of 200 mbps on the 5g side. They also recently “updated” the iPhone software. True to form, for a worse than useless marketing department, they apparently just changed the shape of icons and moved things around, so existing users have to learn the system again. But I did not see any real functional changes to the software.
Very happy with this router so far. Setup was simple using the app. Shipped with a power adapter and a Cat. 5e cable. The compact, simple design makes this a router that can be put where you need it without worrying about tall antennas or clashing home decor. The back of the router has one LAN port in addition to the “Internet” port for two total Ethernet ports. Speeds match what I was getting before with my previous setup, the maximum speeds advertised at the service tier I’m paying for. Signal strength is very good. Absolutely no down time since initial setup a few months ago. Router is in the center of our approx. 1600 sq. ft., single-story home and there are no lapses in coverage. Signal is strong into the back and front yards, as well. I have grouped devices for different users although our kids are still a bit young for us to really benefit from some of the more advanced oversight features. Glad to have access to them for future use, though. It’s nice to be notified through the app every time a new device connects. Again, very happy with this router.