Need help on wire-less router buy???
- Thread starter e40water
- Start date
Yevrag35
Pushing Daisies on Saturn
- Messages
- 1,118
- Location
- Wisconsin, US
Are you in the US?
PP Mguire
Build Guru
- Messages
- 32,591
- Location
- Fort Worth, Texas
Pretty much anything that has wireless N 300Mb and dual pole or MIMO. Just remember, that you won't get a speed boost unless your wireless card also supports faster speeds.
Steer clear of anything Belkin or Netgear.
Steer clear of anything Belkin or Netgear.
Joe C
Golden Master
- Messages
- 5,004
- Location
- Great Lakes State
Belkin owns Linksys too. I happen to like my Netgear router, what's wrong with Netgear?
PP Mguire
Build Guru
- Messages
- 32,591
- Location
- Fort Worth, Texas
They were just acquired this year, and anything out on the market right now is still Cisco branded.
Their firmwares usually suck a lot of balls making their hardware seem worse than what it really is. I've owned almost every top end Netgear router since 2009 and haven't liked a single one. The WNR3500 would have been decent if there would have been an open source release for it.
Their firmwares usually suck a lot of balls making their hardware seem worse than what it really is. I've owned almost every top end Netgear router since 2009 and haven't liked a single one. The WNR3500 would have been decent if there would have been an open source release for it.
Joe C
Golden Master
- Messages
- 5,004
- Location
- Great Lakes State
I have had a WDNR 4500 Netgear router for over a year and it's better than the Linksys router I had. The WNR 3500 is a cheap router...you buy a cheap router so you get a cheap router
Last edited:
PP Mguire
Build Guru
- Messages
- 32,591
- Location
- Fort Worth, Texas
I didn't buy it, it was given to me and I then gave it to somebody else after unplugging it saying it's a POS. It was just one example of "could have been decent" but firmware ruined it. WHen it was given to me, it was the same price then that the 4500 is now. Wouldn't really call 150 bucks "cheap" for routers.
On the other hand, my experience with the 4500 is the 5Ghz range is absolutely terrible and the 2.4Ghz performance with perfect signal is far from perfect. Definitely an improvement over the 3500 from 2009, but not something I would spend my money on. The only Netgear router I haven't had a chance to play with yet is the 6300 but I haven't had the need to purchase AC equipment yet. If I went AC, my money would be on Asus anyways.
On the other hand, my experience with the 4500 is the 5Ghz range is absolutely terrible and the 2.4Ghz performance with perfect signal is far from perfect. Definitely an improvement over the 3500 from 2009, but not something I would spend my money on. The only Netgear router I haven't had a chance to play with yet is the 6300 but I haven't had the need to purchase AC equipment yet. If I went AC, my money would be on Asus anyways.
Joe C
Golden Master
- Messages
- 5,004
- Location
- Great Lakes State
I have not personally experienced any problems like that with my Netgear router, yup....firmware updates but if there are issues then I'm glad Netgear pushes out firmware updates. My Linksys dropped the wireless from day one, then after I had to search for a firmware update. It worked somewhat better but was never really good. I made my purchase from this review here
Netgear WNDR4500 Wi-Fi Router Review | Maximum PC
And I was glad I did
Netgear WNDR4500 Wi-Fi Router Review | Maximum PC
And I was glad I did
Last edited:
PP Mguire
Build Guru
- Messages
- 32,591
- Location
- Fort Worth, Texas
I like how you never mention which Linksys model. Take note, that I have issues with certain Linksys models as well. The only one I ever truly liked was the WRT54G. I'm stuck with an E4200 but it's at least decent compared to the others I have experience with. My brother in law has a wrt120n and it's the biggest piece of **** you could ever use. The E4200 has its own issues like heat, especially being placed on top of a DTV box with no air but the software is very flexible and doesn't require a reboot with every setting you change. It also has a lot of QoS options I want and repeater functions without needing open source. That doesn't mean that I won't be replacing it the first excuse I get. It just covers the whole place in 2.4 and 5 signal and simply gets the job done. I don't have the cash to test and return routers like I used to.
Both the 3500 and 4500 never received any updates in the periods of time I had them, but my issues with the 4500 wasn't firmware. The 3500 on the other hand had ridiculously crap software which needed an update bad or support for open source. I think V1 had the wrong controller for open source but it's been a while. The WNDR3400 on the other hand was a decent piece of kit, but the ports were only 10/100.
Edit: I should give a bit of backing info here. When I first moved out of my parents house I lived with my best friend and had money to blow. I didn't have a gf at the time, and wasn't working 50 hour weeks yet at my job so I had time to kill. I was really into doing reviews over at B3D so what I would do out of pure hobbyism was go to Fry's and pick up their latest routers. I would do little mini reviews for my own personal use testing 2.4 and 5GHz signals in a 2 story brick home along with transfer speeds on a wide variety of adapters from PCI to PCI-E and even USB. The routers I liked I would give to friends or family who needed new hardware. The others I would return. In the middle of this the 3500 was placed in my lap almost brand new which is how I came across that turd. I had to stop around 2010 but that same friend went out and bought the 4500 which is why I have experience toying with that one in 2011.
Both the 3500 and 4500 never received any updates in the periods of time I had them, but my issues with the 4500 wasn't firmware. The 3500 on the other hand had ridiculously crap software which needed an update bad or support for open source. I think V1 had the wrong controller for open source but it's been a while. The WNDR3400 on the other hand was a decent piece of kit, but the ports were only 10/100.
Edit: I should give a bit of backing info here. When I first moved out of my parents house I lived with my best friend and had money to blow. I didn't have a gf at the time, and wasn't working 50 hour weeks yet at my job so I had time to kill. I was really into doing reviews over at B3D so what I would do out of pure hobbyism was go to Fry's and pick up their latest routers. I would do little mini reviews for my own personal use testing 2.4 and 5GHz signals in a 2 story brick home along with transfer speeds on a wide variety of adapters from PCI to PCI-E and even USB. The routers I liked I would give to friends or family who needed new hardware. The others I would return. In the middle of this the 3500 was placed in my lap almost brand new which is how I came across that turd. I had to stop around 2010 but that same friend went out and bought the 4500 which is why I have experience toying with that one in 2011.
Last edited:
