Good afternoon.
I have a GT AX11000, which I bought for its WAN to LAN throughput to support my 1Gb VM connection, its outstanding wifi performance and for its general general power as a media server. The fact that it is touted as a gamer's server was also a factor, given that my twin 19-year olds both have serious gaming PCs and a good range of games.
With a 1Gb connection the adaptive QoS facility is pretty well useless and, to be honest, WTF (What the Fast) is a waste of subscription fee. The router does feature a nifty method of applying NAT rules from a fairly comprehensive list of games. However, I have come to understand that port forwarding is a pointless if one has UPnP enabled, because that facility allows games and devices to port-forward automatically and seamlessly anyway. Tell me now if I have been misled.
Reading the literature also tells me that UPnP is a security risk because it allows hackers to emulate a legitimate access request and thereby access all my UPnP devices! e.g the webcam I have pointed at my conjugal bed.
However, it hasn't escaped my attention that experts who tell me to switch off UPnP also tend to be selling an advice service or VPN. It is also clear that if I switch of UPnP I have all sorts of IP devices in the house, ranging from printers, to smart plugs, to led hubs and phones that might need manual port forwarding within LAN or to WAN ,if I were to disable UPnP. My router only has capacity, apparently, for 30 open NAT rules. Just counting up the twins PC games, that is 20 used up already if I go down the 'disable UPnP' route.
So, my questions are: 1) Is UPnP really such a security risk? 2) Is port forwarding pointless if UPnP is enabled? 3) Does life as we know it end if we disable UPnP?