looking for a decent wireless router

Skull_Angel

[H]ard|Gawd
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May 31, 2010
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hey guys,

so my latest router's crapped out on me (second linksys that's acted up right after warranty ended), but I needed to upgrade to something with wireless any way. I'm looking for something on the cheaper side (was hoping around $40 or so, but would like to keep it under $100 if possible), all it needs is basic wireless for browsing possibly with a decent range, and high-speed wired ports for gaming (would like at least 4 ports; 2 for gaming pcs, 1 for ps3, one for xbox 360, I still don't like wireless for gaming).

the wireless portion only needs to accommodate web browsing and some streaming media (buddy's getting a netbook for xmas, haha) over a decent indoor range (may be 100' indoors), the walls are dry-wall but there's a decent amount of electrical activity in the area. as for the wired connections I'd like them to be able to handle a good deal; I do a decent bit of on-line gaming, media streaming, large upload/downloads, P2P, file-sharing between connected machines, might get into distributed computing more (been running F@H on ps3, lol), so pretty much the works for a "normal" home network. integrated security isn't a necessity since I button up pretty tight and practice safe browsing/file sharing (bug free since '04 as far as I know).

thanks for the help guys
 
in my experience netgear has a lot of intermittent disconnects

linksys and d-link have treated me well

You can probably hit up the Verizon wireless router for $10 w/ free overnight shipping.

Link

I have one of these in my room so my cell phone can connect to it for UMA calling and it doesn't drop calls
 
haha, that verizon router's a "bit" cheaper than I was hoping for. I've heard about the problems with netgear from a friend and am reluctant to go with another linksys, I'm just not sure about what brands are showing quality in their more budgeted routers these days.
 
These would be my recommendations:
$55 - Linksys WRT160N Wireless n Router
$90 - Linksys WRT320N Gigabit Wireless N Router
 
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hey guys,

so my latest router's crapped out on me (second linksys that's acted up right after warranty ended), but I needed to upgrade to something with wireless any way. I'm looking for something on the cheaper side (was hoping around $40 or so, but would like to keep it under $100 if possible), all it needs is basic wireless for browsing possibly with a decent range, and high-speed wired ports for gaming (would like at least 4 ports; 2 for gaming pcs, 1 for ps3, one for xbox 360, I still don't like wireless for gaming).

the wireless portion only needs to accommodate web browsing and some streaming media (buddy's getting a netbook for xmas, haha) over a decent indoor range (may be 100' indoors), the walls are dry-wall but there's a decent amount of electrical activity in the area. as for the wired connections I'd like them to be able to handle a good deal; I do a decent bit of on-line gaming, media streaming, large upload/downloads, P2P, file-sharing between connected machines, might get into distributed computing more (been running F@H on ps3, lol), so pretty much the works for a "normal" home network. integrated security isn't a necessity since I button up pretty tight and practice safe browsing/file sharing (bug free since '04 as far as I know).

thanks for the help guys

Hi, Skull_Angel,

You might head over to the Networking & Security forum and check for threads there that ask this question.

Hope this helps.

Chuklr
 
ah haha, I forgot all about that forum section, I was looking through the hardware area an' didn't see a place where this thread would really fit.
 
lol, I couldn't really make heads or tails of a lot of what's going on in that section of the forums now that I got a good look... danm, I haven't even started up on learning networking stuffs other than how to screw with it to get games and apps running smoothly on it, haha.

either way, doing a bit of research the TRENDnet TEW-639GR looks decent for the price. the wireless speed is a bit overboard for my needs, but there don't seem to be any routers with "basic" wireless and up to 4 10/100/1000 lan ports.

the Linksys WRT160N seems decent also, but being limited to 10/100 lan seems like it's gonna slowdown the filesharing between my PCs considerably. that and I'm not a big fan of theirs going through two linksys routers in the past couple of years... lol

also considering the D-Link DIR-655.

if anyone has more info or recommendations I'd like to hear them.
 
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the Linksys WRT160N seems decent also, but being limited to 10/100 lan seems like it's gonna slowdown the filesharing between my PCs considerably. that and I'm not a big fan of theirs going through two linksys routers in the past couple of years... lol

also considering the D-Link DIR-655.

if anyone has more info or recommendations I'd like to hear them.
Hmm, I defnitely missed the 10/100 LAN on the Linksys. Definitely dropping that from any future recommendations. My bad!

As for the DLink, I have that router. It's a good router but a bit outclassed these days by many newer routers. In addition, it doesn't support a high amount of jumbo frames which means that while its LAN transfer speeds will still be faster than 10/100 LAN, it's nowhere near capable of true Gigabit speeds. In fact, the highest sustained speeds I've seen with the DIR-655 is roughly 20MB/s give or take.
 
I'd stick to a big brand like D-Link or Linksys..

My first Linksys (WRT54GS) was horrible. Constant drops and didn't jive well with my modem. It basically left a scar on my opinion on Linksys' reputation.

Before the Linksys, I had D-Links, worked marvelously. Absolutely no problems. Even after the Linksys, I still use a DIR-625 today and am considering upgrading to a gigabit D-Link in the near future.

I gave Linksys a second try recently with the WRT54G2 and so far, I haven't gotten any complaints from my grandfather (who's using it).

You might want to invest a bit more if you're looking to keep this down the road without upgrading. But $40 - $60 would get you a pretty decent one these days.
 
Hmm, I defnitely missed the 10/100 LAN on the Linksys. Definitely dropping that from any future recommendations. My bad!

As for the DLink, I have that router. It's a good router but a bit outclassed these days by many newer routers. In addition, it doesn't support a high amount of jumbo frames which means that while its LAN transfer speeds will still be faster than 10/100 LAN, it's nowhere near capable of true Gigabit speeds. In fact, the highest sustained speeds I've seen with the DIR-655 is roughly 20MB/s give or take.

well danm, lol. I'm gonna see what else I can find on that TRENDnet router, there didn't seem to be much about it using the search here, just a few good/bad comments (it's kind hard for me to follow all the networking talk here too since I haven't gotten too deep into it yet, haha).

edit: didn't find all too much. most reviews aimed at basic users seemed to be good (nice feature set for the price), but more of the power user based reviews weren't as great (most likely heat issues causing dropped connections). so I'm basically sitting in the same place I was at earlier, no danmed clue what's going on, haha.
 
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Asus RT-N16 is pretty decent

400-500mhz processor, 128mb ram, 32mb rom, USB for print/HDD sharing, gigabit, possible BT downloader, 300mbps antenna(no dual band though), loadable with DDWRT or tomato, around $90

mine's solid, been up for a month (though my first unit died because of PSU problems... so maybe not as good)

shared between 8 clients within 30 feet radius, 3 more connected via a wireless bridge 100 feet away
 
that RT-N16's lookin' pretty nice. was hoping for something cheaper, but it doesn't look like that's really gonna be possible atm.

edit: hmm, I might just go with the ASUS RT-N13U and connect a cheapo 10/100/1000 switch to it for file transfers between PCs, at least that's looking like one of the cheapest solutions atm. any thoughts about this idea would be appreciated.
 
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after quite a bit more research... :confused: I think I've finally decided on the EnGenius ESR9850, nice cheap-ish router with decent wireless, true gigabit ethernet, jumbo frame support (unofficially), and can handle close to 20000 connections. :eek:

seems to have a watered down-basic UI, but I'm not a big power user so that's fine for now (should be getting DD-WRT support eventually). over all is seems to fit the bill for my needs perfectly atm, if anyone has any experience it'd be nice to hear about it.
 
they're an off-shoot subsidiary of Senao or something to that degree. seems they use quality parts, and from the review on SmallNetBuilder.com it seems like a really decent buy.

took me a while to get through the danm thread that was attached to it. the wireless seems to be awesome for the price, but it sounds like it can have random problems (seem software related). either way, the wireless problems won't effect me and the newest firmware update seems to do some good any way.
 
lol, buddy-boy can handle the wireless problems if he's not dishing out for the thing, I jus' want my lan connection and this things seems better than most wired routers, haha.

edit: the random wireless problems don't seem abundant and most regular users seem very happy with it.
 
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