Cisco-Linksys BEFW11S4 Wireless-B Cable/DSL Router
by Linksys
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List Price: Our Price: $16.45 You Save: $53.54 (76%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Cisco-Linksys BEFW11S4 Wireless-B Cable/DSL Router
Customer Review: Great Router/Switch and WAP
Summary: 5 Stars
Before I bought this product, I read the customer reviews..There are definitely a lot of bad feedback on this product. I decided to purchase it because I heard a lot of great things about Linksys products and because it was one of the very few cheap items out there that offered a router, switch and wireless access point all in one. I was however very skeptical because of all the bad feedback. Well after I received this product I followed all the directions. I connected my desktop to the ethernet ports on the back and I also connected my laptop using the Linksys 802.11b pcmcia card. Well everything worked great, I was routing through my ISP using both my desktop connected by wire and my laptop connected wirelessly. I was very pleased however I refrained from putting feedback here because I wanted to make sure that this thing worked for some time.Well its been 1 month now and the thing still works great. I stressed this thing with as much traffic as I could, I connected two computers wired directly to the ethernet ports on the back and they transferred data between eachother at an amazing 90Mbps, WOW! At the same time I had my laptop downloading data wirelessly from one of the wired computers, I'm only able to download at a rate of 6Mbps through the wireless card on the laptop but it maintained this data rate across the street from my house into a friends house, and the AP was indoors, again WOW! During this process, the box never froze or locked up.
In conclusion, through the switch ports I was able to transfer data at 90 Mbps and wirelessly at 6Mbps. This is a great product and I would highly recommend it. I believe that all the customer complaints prior to this had to be due to a bad batch of these boxes. I love mine, and they already dropped the price from the time that I bought it a month ago. This thing is so good that my next door neighbor is going to buy one because of what he saw with mine. There is one flaw, or one feature that I haven't been able to get working and that is the port forwarding feature. I wanted to be able to FTP from my work computer to my home computer so I set up the router to forward the FTP port. I was able to ftp to my home computer however the session ended abruptly and I was no longer able to FTP back. I waited a while and the same thing happened again. My conclusion is that the router is not able maintain a port forwarding state. If I try to transfer data, it forwards great but then it abruptly stops. Thats my only negative comment. But other than this the product works great. Highly recommended.
Customer Review: Solid!
Summary: 5 Stars
I installed this unit and it works great. Out of the box I read the easy set-up instructions and connected the router to my cable modem and then into the desktop computer (hard-wired into the router with a cat-5 cable). I had then realized that the internet connection was lost on the desktop computer. I figured that nothing would be that easy although it would have been nice to get going right away. I ended up just having to re-boot the computer a couple of times for Windows ME to recognize the router and then it was smooth sailing. My best buddy put his Linksys Wireless Router on his computer, which runs Win 2000, and that was a flawless setup.
A day later the Linksys wireless laptop card came in the mail and it was literally plug-and-play. I believe it had to be rebooted once or maybe twice. No signal loss at all.
I have read all the reviews about people having serious troubles. There is a ver 2 of this router which I got and I would assume anyone who bought it from today on would also recieve the same version. Remember, computers are very touchy! They are all set up in many different ways with many different software configurations. If people cannot get these things working then it is probably the computer. If your computer is prone to problems or you have had troubles installing items in the past then don't expect this to be a cakewalk. The tech reps from Linksys are only there to help you set your router up. If there are problems then they will try and determine if their product is defective. If not then it isn't their problem. They are not there to reconfigure Windows or anything else on your computer. That is what Microsoft or the other SOFTWARE manufacturers are for.
Yes, this product did install some-what smoothly. Yes, I had relatively little trouble with getting everything to work. However, I am rating this product according to its performance. If I had troubles installing this equipment I would still give it a five-star rating. It is a very solid piece of equipment. There is no signal loss between the Linksys Wireless laptop card and the Linksys router. The speed is fantastic, and I am going to add another desktop computer to see how good the Linksys Wireless PCI card is. Also, remember that it is always good to have the brand of the wireless cards match up with the brand of the wireless router. I realize that they are supposed to work with any router but it's always beneficial to keep the number of brand names down to a minimum.
Good Luck!
Customer Review: I love it so much that I did it again!
Summary: 5 Stars
I've never networked anything before using this, and I have successfully created two different wireless networks. I used the BEFW11S4 to set up a wireless network in my two story house (~1500 square feet), and I don't have a dead spot in the entire house. Not only that, but I am able to use my laptop at the pool, over 100 feet away. It was a little bit tricky to set up because the router had the same IP as my modem. But after getting this figured out and simply changing the IP of the router (which is extremely easy with the setup utility), the network worked very well. Now I am in a house in Mexico which is made out of solid concrete and rebar. This does create an issue with distance, but we fixed that by setting up the router in the middle of the house, that way we still get our 11 Mbps here in the office and on the other side of the house. The greatest benefit of the router, though was its MAC address cloning ability. Even though our ISP here limits our access to a single computer which it recognizes (I learned after a couple hours of messing around with different options) by the MAC address of the network adapter card, we were able to connect an entire house of computers (>5) with the hub by simply (again using the awesome configuration utility) having the Linksys router change its MAC address to match the network adapter of the old computer. Now we have wireless access in the states, and we can bring the laptop to my parents house here in Mexico and instantly get service here.
PROS
*Can use inexpensive ISP service to a single computer to give internet and network access to multiple computers.
*Can offer both wireless and wired (up to 4 computers wirelessly) connectivity.
*Maintains speed up to 50 feet away through 3 6-inch walls filled with concrete and rebar.
*Easy to set up.
*Great configuration/setup utility which is accessable through a web browser (firmware is also upgradable by downloading an update from the website.)
CONS
*It does show a loss in speed or even in connectivity in certain "dead spots" in the house. (To fix this, you just scoot over like 3 feet in either direction and it goes from 0% to 50%).
*Poor customer support over the phone.
I bought a second one based on my experience with the first one. As I discover more and more about what this unit is capable of doing, it makes me more and more willing to recommend it. So that's what I'm doing: "I recommend that you get this router/WAP."
Customer Review: Superb router with full configurability.
Summary: 5 Stars
I wanted wireless, and I wanted a wired home LAN, and I wanted to share my cable modem Internet connection with the above, and I needed a great deal of flexibility. I picked Linksys after checking out the browser-based interface, which for my money is the easiest net configuration interface I've ever used. And I'm delighted I did!I'm a long time Apple user, but Apple's Airport is so idiot-proof that it doesn't really offer the level of customizability that I needed. Linksys fit the bill perfectly. Here are the features I particularly loved:
MAC cloning. My cable company knows which computer I've got hooked up to the internet, because they keep track of the MAC address of that machine's interface. If I change machines, I have to re-authorize - and if I change it to something that's not an Apple or PC, then it won't serve internet at all. That ruled the Airport out. With MAC cloning, Linksys fools my cable company into thinking that my Apple is still connected directly to the cable modem - I never have to re-authorize.
NAT/Port forwarding: I run a couple services on my box. It can be hard to configure this for access behind a router, but with Linksys it's the work of about a minute. I didn't even need to read the manual - it was just done.
Wireless security: you can easily turn OFF SSID broadcasting, turn ON 128-bit WEP encryption, and easily change your admin password. And you'd better do all those things if you don't want someone stealing your bandwidth.
Remote configuration: If you leave this on, you're leaving yourself open to security problems, but you can turn it on just long enough to let a friend help you configure the router. Makes it easy.
DHCP/Static IP: By playing with the settings you can make DHCP and static IP assignments peacefully coexist on both your wired and wireless LAN.
MAC access list: when enabled, only specific wireless devices with a particular MAC address can connect to your wireless network. An added layer of safety, much appreciated in high density, bandwidth-starved Manhattan.
And after all this configuration was done, the machine acted as a firewall and started logging intrusion attempts - and man, I never knew there were so many hackers out there!
Tip: If you're having trouble, manually reset the router with the physical 'reset' button. I had to do this once before the router would operate properly, but since then, no problems!
I'd buy a Linksys again and I recommend you do so as well!
Customer Review: Exceptional Product
Summary: 5 Stars
After six weeks of reading reviews like this and doing a little research, I decided to scrap my Intel hub and purchase the Linksys WAP w/Cable/DSL 4Port Router and Linksys Wireless PC Cards. Actually it was a Christmas gift from my wife...lucky me. Anyway, I had a desktop and two laptops that I wanted to link together and share my cable modem with. Setup was relatively easy and only took about 30 minutes. I decided to simply plug my desktop into one of the ports rather than make it wireless since I had no plans on moving it around regularly, which saved my wife about $150. I opted for 128 bit signal encryption and enabled the DHCP server so that all three of my computers could share Internet access off of one IP address. The system is working terrific. I have a 2400 Sq. Ft. one level home and have no problems with range or speed. Even outside on the back patio the signal strength is still excellent. Linksys may need to upgrade their signal monitor though, because even when it says that there is no signal, I can still surf the web and transfer files between computers with great speed. Most cable modem users will never see speeds above 1.5MBPS anyway, which is actually very fast, so the fact that Linksys only estimates speeds of about 11MBPS up to 30 feet should be a moot point. Unless you regularly transfer huge files between computers and have something like a T3 line, then you will likely never see a loss in speed. Most people who purchase this system simply for the capability of being mobile with their laptops should be pleased with the speed of their Internet connection just about anywhere around their house. Also, with my laptops and desktops being assigned IP addresses from my Linksys DHCP Server rather than from my service provider, they can't be scanned or pinged by outside intruders, which makes them invulnerable to little hacker kiddies. The router itself has an effective built-in firewall of sorts, and the firmware utility that allows you to configure your router through your web browser is also excellent and easy to use. Although I have not tested any other wireless products such as this, I see no reason for anything more than what Linksys delivers in this system. I have absolutely no complaints and am more than satisfied with this product. The only other thing Linksys may need to improve on is the spelling in their online manuals and instruction sheets. Who writes those things anyway?