TBE on 13/4/2010 at 18:42
I will have to shoot down the Linksys one right away.
It has been reviewed by several tech magazines and web sites. The reviews have been less than stellar. Mostly because the antenna design doesn't receive and transmit as well as the others with a visible external antenna.
I have had good luck with Netgear and Dlink. Are your other choices limited to those other two? Or would you consider any others?
Will get back to you on the choices in a little bit after I research them more.
Ok, I have (
http://www.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=459640) this router from Belkin. It also has USB storage available. Plug in a USB hard drive of some sort, and bam, instant NAT storage.
I'd highly recommend it. I have an XBOX 360 and 2 wired computers connected to it. I also use the wireless for my cell phones, and for a laptop. Setup was easy. Performance is really good. I get a signal outside of my house and down the street. Bandwidth between the gaming 360 and my gaming PC is not an issue. I'm gaming on the PC while stepson is on the 360 gaming as well. No issues.
dur4nd4l on 13/4/2010 at 18:43
Ok, a few questions:
Do you currently have a router?
Does every device you are planning to use on the network have an 802.11n NIC?
Are you going to connect the PS3 wirelessly or by cable?
Do you absolutely need to have 70Mb/s wirelessly?
VPN can be done on most routers, or you can set up a server at home with OpenVPN.
bikerdude on 13/4/2010 at 19:48
no office to TBE, but don't touch a Belkin with a 10ft pole.
Recommend:
Netgear = simple and reliable, aimed at the average home user with little tech knowledge (and on a personal note, it looks the best, in stealthy black)
Dlink = In the past these have been the weapon of choice for the tech savvie, as some model can be hacked to run linux.
3com = its as easy to setup as the Dlink but provides a good feature set to keep the techs happy.
Avoid:
Thompson, Belkin and other generic makes.
Undescided:
Linksys = never owned/played with one,
There are plenty of features to look out for but the top 5 in my list are.
* WPA2 encryption - defacto these days.
* Mac address filtering - even if someone hacks the wifi they cant use or see any other devices on the network as their mac address will be blocked
* Per App port forwarding(for allowing games and other apps access through the Fw,
* Dynamic DNS - as most people have dynamic IPs, this allows you to have a fixed real world dns name for your router should you need to remote in to the router or VPN to a home pc.
* An easy to view/read interface - there is nothing worse that a shitty unintuitive web interface to ruin a good router.
TBE on 13/4/2010 at 20:51
That's ok! I haven't been appointed to any office.
Yeah, the rest of the Belkin router line-up really stinks. I would only recommend the one I mentioned. It's for power users.
Also, what dur4nd4l said, do you have Gigabit LAN cards in everything you're going to use wired access for? Your network will slow to 100 Mbps if any device on it doesn't have a 1000 Mbps LAN card. 100 Mbps is still pretty darn fast, but you'll notice huge increase when everything wired is 1000 Mbps.
Al_B on 13/4/2010 at 21:46
Quote Posted by TBE
Your network will slow to 100 Mbps if any device on it doesn't have a 1000 Mbps LAN card.
Are you sure about that? I've not had a great deal of experience with gigabit switches but my understanding is that broadcast traffic will work at the slowest rate but communication between any two devices will work at the maximum supported by both devices.
TBE on 13/4/2010 at 21:50
Yes, that's how it works, like you described. Between two devices, it will always go to slowest of the two.
Zerker on 13/4/2010 at 22:07
Quote Posted by Bikerdude
* Mac address filtering - even if someone hacks the wifi they cant use or see any other devices on the network as their mac address will be blocked
Except that anyone who knows how to hack WiFi is capable of spoofing a MAC address (or can figure it out very quickly via Google). Any packet monitor tool (kismet is awesome FYI) will tell you a valid address you can use. All MAC address filtering ends up being is a pain in the ass to maintain.
Al_B on 13/4/2010 at 22:20
Quote Posted by TBE
Yes, that's how it works
That's fine - I thought I might have missed something. It makes sense as otherwise adding a slow device (e.g. printer) would cripple the network otherwise.
Quote Posted by Zerker
Except that anyone who knows how to hack WiFi is capable of spoofing a MAC address
I tend to agree with this. On the one hand it's an additional layer of obscurity but if they've got past the encryption then the MAC filtering is only a stumbling block. Just a personal view but I assume that all WiFi connections are going to be hacked and have a proper firewall between them and any internal network.
dur4nd4l on 14/4/2010 at 01:11
Quote Posted by TBE
Also, what dur4nd4l said, do you have Gigabit LAN cards in everything you're going to use wired access for? Your network will slow to 100 Mbps if any device on it doesn't have a 1000 Mbps LAN card. 100 Mbps is still pretty darn fast, but you'll notice huge increase when everything wired is 1000 Mbps.
Not quite. Each interface on a decent router will automatically negotiate the speed based on the speed of the device on the other end. Wireless will lower speed for any lower speed devices on the network. I.E. a G device on an N network will lower the speed to G. That's all you really need to worry about.
If any of the devices on your wireless network are G, just go buy a G router.
