N Draft 2.0 Routers 1

[KbrooksATC]

Hi,

I hope this is okay to post here, I tried to find a "General Routers/Networking Hardware" forum.

I'm getting ready to purchase a new router.

Here are some features I want to try and get:
Draft N 2.0
QoS engine
USB 2.0 port (for printer or network storage device)
Browser based device management
**Dual Band** Kind of undecided on this, a few people seemed to have problems with this on some of the routers I read about.
MIMO might be nice to have.

So far I have been looking at

D-Link DIR-825
D-Link DIR-855

Buffalo Nfiniti WZR-HP-G300NH
(I don't think this one has been released yet)

Apple Airport Extreme
(Don't really like the fact that this one does not use browser based management and you have to install software on each PC you want to admin it from.)

Ive been reading on the above routers and I am having a hard time deciding. Would love to hear some suggestions from everyone here. Anyone used any of the above routers? Or having any other suggestions?

For the wireless adapters I was leaning towards getting the same brand as the router but I havent decided on that yet.

Thanks for your time.



Kelly Brooks
ATC "Advanced Technology Contracting"


"Censorship is odious because it removes community
choice. Censorship says that the thought is the action;
that the common person can't distinguish between depiction
and actuality... Censorship says, 'Let me decide who
talks.' -Greg Tannahill

 

[wahnula]

Hi KbrooksATC

Here's my thoughts, although I do not run an "N" router yet...

Put some thought into who makes the majority of the wireless cards that will be connecting to the WAP. I use almost exclusively D-Link cards, so that's who I use for WAP/Routers/Switches. Their tech support is marginal but at least they can't blame the problem on someone else's hardware in the middle. I would stay away from the Apple unless you're running a couple of Macs.

I use D-Link exclusively for my home and office network (after testing out Linksys, Buffalo, SMC & Netgear quite a while back) and have been happy with them and their overall performance. I have an ancient DI-804 as the heart of my home network, never had problem one with it.

I like the gigabit switch in the 825, with its price I would probably choose that model. I think the main benefit of dual-band is being able to choose the least-crowded frequency. I've heard of cordless phones interfering w/ 2.4GHz WAPs in the past. Best of luck.

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[KbrooksATC]

Thanks for the reply, I'm going to get all new wireless cards as well. I think the D-Link DIR-825 is the way to go.

The DIR-825 is the one I've been leaning towards. The DIR-855 had better throughput at 200 feet and it has that cool LCD screen on it that gives info on everything from time of day to traffic and network security, but it costs about $300 and I also have to buy 3 wireless adapters








Kelly Brooks
ATC "Advanced Technology Contracting"
ATC_Computer_Repair@cox.net

"Censorship is odious because it removes community
choice. Censorship says that the thought is the action;
that the common person can't distinguish between depiction
and actuality... Censorship says, 'Let me decide who
talks.' -Greg Tannahill

 

[KbrooksATC]

Just an update,

I finally got our new network setup and running,

I went with the D-Link DGL-4500 and D-Link DWA-160 adapters.

After some tweaking I was able to get our 2 laptops and a desktop with the DWA-160's connecting at 270mpbs on the 2.4ghz band (that's even with the router upstairs in a room that usually has the door shut)

And our other 3 wired desktops all connect at 1gps, Going to have a little LAN party this weekend and test it out.

As far as real-world performance goes the pc's on the wireless network show a noticeable improvement over the LAN (especially when streaming music) and for internet use. Overall a huge improvement over our Linksys WRT54G, I know the wrt54g was a popular router and worked well for lots of people but we always seemed to have problems with it. Guess we could of just gotten a bad router since none of the firmware updates seemed to help or it might have been a problem with the on-board wireless adapters we were using.

As far as the wired part of our LAN it seems about the same but we have not tried any gaming on it yet.

I was not really going into the expecting much, I was just hoping for better stability with less disconnects, on the wrt54g we had disconnect problems even with the wired PC's. We have been up about 6 days now, I can't remember the last time I went that long without re-booting the router.

Had the new gear for about 7 days now and I'm really happy with this purchase, anyone thinking of upgrading to Wireless N might want to look at the D-Link gaming routers.

Oh yea and the LCD screen on the router is just too cool, besides all the network info it gives you, it even allows you to connect WiFi devices by using the LCD interface on the router.


Kelly Brooks
ATC "Advanced Technology Contracting"

"Censorship is odious because it removes community
choice. Censorship says that the thought is the action;
that the common person can't distinguish between depiction
and actuality... Censorship says, 'Let me decide who
talks.' -Greg Tannahill

 

[wahnula]

Hey KbrooksATC

Glad you're happy, I would be too with a new gizmo like that to play with! Your experience and mine with Linksys are (were) the same. I hated that Linksys router so much I really did throw it in the lake, and took pictures of it as it sank. Yes, I know that's environmentally bad but it was good for my morale. And our "lake" is a fish-less muddy drainage pond...

As you say many, many people have success with Linksys, they are a global standard, maybe we're just unlucky? Thanks for the update...and the star!

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[kjv1611]

I've had a Linksys Wireless Router - B or G, a G D-Link cheapie model router, and a US Robotics Wireless G "Max-G" router in the past. Currently I own the D-Link DIR-655 router, and absolutely love it. There is just no comparison. I've not even tried the dual-band routers yet.

Based on that and installing a few others for other people, the D-Link routers (particularly the N-band models) have been tons easier to deal with and worked much more efficiently in every situation I've dealt with.

I've also used them with all sorts of different wireless adapters with no issues.

KbrooksATC,

Another way to see the difference of Gbit lan versus 10/100 lan is to transfer really large files using an application that gives you a MB/sec read-out. I saw a HUGE difference when I went from the US Robotics model to the DIR-655!

Well, another plus for me is that with all the previous routers, I have just about killed them at times with network transfers - over web, pc to pc, etc.

--

"If to err is human, then I must be some kind of human!" -Me