Am I the only one having trouble finding a consistent network brand?

In most cases, I have brands that I trust. Brands who have always had a good product, and I'd be proud to buy from again. Asus, Samsung, Logitech, Evga recently, Western Digital, etc etc. However, with networking, I have no buddies to turn to.... So far, I've had crappy Netgear, crappy D-Link, and am on Linksys... Now, the stupid router (WRT54G) is being a moronic piece of hardware.... It's set as a DHCP, but every so often it will assign the same IP to two different machines. What kind of lame product does that!? Anyway, I'm wanting to get a Draft-N/gigabit router pretty soon, and I'm wondering what brand is least likely to make me upset? I kinda think D-Link... A buddy of mine has a netgear he's had no problems with, I've had quite a few Linksys that I didn't have many problems with, but I really have no strong alliances, either for cards or for routers. Intel wifi cards are about the only thing I 100% trust in this category.

i like netgear switches. anything intel, i love their NICs - their switches are good too. real cisco stuff (not the "linksys by cisco" consumer stuff). i like linux-based firewall/routers for wired lines.

wireless roooooters / APs you're on your own. at work we use cisco - but i imagine they are $500/ea.

kevineugenius said:

So far, I've had crappy Netgear, crappy D-Link, and am on Linksys...

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up to here I agree with you

kevineugenius said:

Now, the stupid router (WRT54G) is being a moronic piece of hardware.... It's set as a DHCP, but every so often it will assign the same IP to two different machines.

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Let me guess, either it's a recent version of the router, or you are not running a 3rd party firmware. The original version of this router is insanely cool.

I've probably installed over a thousand Linksys routers...haven't seen that problem. Wondering if you have some kind of mac spoofing software bound to one of those NICs.

You could always move out of the consumer market and into the commercial market with guys like Cisco. These products will obviously cost more and be more difficult to configure, but if you are looking for reliability, they are hard to beat.

That being said, if any of the problems you have are related to configuration issues (I'm not saying they are, just inserting a disclaimer), then moving up to the next level will only compound this problem.

Home routers are getting worse, not better. To wit: the ridiculous Linksys fiasco with the WRT54Gx Rev 5 and above.

The Dlink DGL-4300 has brought back some hope though for a high-quality consumer class router.

I use a Netgear 8 port gigabit switch mainly because it was the lowest cost gigabit switch I could find that supported jumbo frames at the time. It works fine.

Otherwise, Netgear is dead to me.

Had nothing but trouble with Linksys garbage.
Netgear same thing.
Only buffalo lasted me. Plus you can play with DDWRT on them.

For comercial stuff or SOHO

I liked SnapGear, Cisco, D-link switches weren't that bad either. Got some good deals on those suckers... Buy 3 get 1 free.. Talking about 24 port ones. Huge fan of Monowall

I would take a look at these 2 routers, sorta expensive but much better than any linksys,netgear etc.

Cisco SB101-K9
http://www.buy.com/prod/cisco-small...nd-router/q/loc/101/10410361.html?dcaid=17379

Cisco 851-K9 (851W-G-A-K9 if u want wireless)
http://www.buy.com/prod/ethernet-soho-security-router/q/loc/101/10411951.html?dcaid=17379

I have very little problems with my Linksys WRT54G, even when flashed with DD-WRT. I only have issues when connecting to it to make changes to the router, but a simple command allows the http connection to come back up. It's an annoyance, but one I can deal with.

YeOldeStonecat said:

I've probably installed over a thousand Linksys routers...haven't seen that problem. Wondering if you have some kind of mac spoofing software bound to one of those NICs.

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Yeah, Comcast made me enable mac cloning or whatever it's called.

It is an "older" version of the WRT54G, but not like the 1st revision.

I've never played with 3rd party firmware.

The real question is this: I want a draft-n with gigabit router. What should I get? I'm not out to spend $300, Dlink seems to have one findable for $120-ish. Or perhaps I should wait another 3-4 months...