Thoughts on DD-WRT or Tomato

So, I was thinking about changing the firmware on my ASUS router. I'd love to have a router that can monitor traffic and given that the default firmware is incapable of measuring it, I was thinking about going with a third party solution. I have very minimal requirements - networking is not "my thing" so my needs are pretty limited. That said, this router does have a USB port (part of the reason I chose it) which I do use for my printer. Given that, I would like USB support. That's really my only requirement but I'd be flexible on that if there was some feature that was too good to pass up.

Router Model: ASUS WL520GU (Tomato website says no on the USB support, DD-WRT wiki page says yes).

Thoughts? Concerns? Experiences?

Some of you have suggested it before (thanks) but I'd love to hear what others have to say. The more info, the better.

I've been planning to do some experimentation with these myself - as part of a larger project I'm working weekends on. I'll be interested in what your findings are. I definitely think the tools are worth the price of admission. I haven't had time yet to look into what the firmware tweaks are that impact performance but am very keen to do so here soon.

I have the same router (Asus WL520GU) and would like to install either DD-WRT or Tomato (DD-WRT seems like the best option because of the USB). My purpose is to use the USB to connect to my external drive and run network backups through Time Machine. I would like to hear how things have gone for you so far.

Cheers

Since DD-WRT supports the USB Port, I would go with it. I have talked to you personally about my experience with DD-WRT firmware but of course that is on Linksys WRT54G and GL routers. It's been 100% stable, never once crashed and on the Linksys at least, gives me so many features that no other stock router does. My Dlink DIR-655 is the closest in monitoring traffic but DD-WRT is in a class by itself in my opinion.

Also with DD-WRT and the Linksys at least, you can make your router into a Wireless Bridge, Repeater and other things each which cost $100 each for a good one. I paid $5 for the Linksys's that I converted. Will never convert back to the stock firmware again.

I have heard good things about Tomato but never used it and since it does not support your USB port, I would not use it.

If you want I can log into my DD-WRT Linksys and take some screen shots of the different options.

DD-WRT all the way. I don't know why though...j/k. I basically picked it b/c I heard about it before Tomato and I've flashed several routers with it and it works pretty flawlessly. I've been happy so far. No experience here with Tomato though some people really like it. I think DD-WRT has more support and better options like dtravis7 mentions. And it actually has an options for a "Wireless Repeater Bridge" (which is a cool feature I use for my 5ghz band since the signal distance is so short). Oh and I've used it on two Netgear WNDR 3700 v1 and a v2 as well as a Linksys WRT600N.

Have a backup router on hand (just in case), and read through the instructions thoroughly because you can brick your router. I'd go with DD-WRT they have a bigger community and better support in my opinion.