Non-Mickey Mouse wifi solutions--that are affordable?

I'm not worried about security, WiFi is outside the firewall.  But would like it to work reliably and I would like to be able to extend the network to cover all our office space.

Would prefer to interconnect the devices by existing Cat5, not wifi, have them share and hand off the same network properly.  Though part of me is also thinking screw this WDS crap, just set the three up identically, same channel and let devices work it out.

For a while I had an Apple (shudder) Airport-N and two Express-N's working OK (though one or more was always blinking about a WDS error).  But then I updated them and reconfigured them (again and again and again)... now if I connect all three together, even with WDS fully setup, it tends to kill the connection for all.  And I hate the proprietary crap software one has to use to config.  Plus I think their special Apple built-in obsolescence timer is either ringing or will soon. 

Tried a good home 802.11AC router (Asus AC66U) but am underwhelmed by its reach and there are not really companion pieces (matching AC units from ASUS) for extending, plus it's unclear they'd support cabled (not wifi) interconnect. 

So is there another solution that's not too much more than the $200 or so I'm looking to spend for a router and another $100 or so per repeater? 

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Jeremy M. Lang
it4vfx
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