Netgear WGR614 Wireless-G Router
by Netgear
|
List Price: Our Price: $34.96 You Save: $24.03 (41%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $14.99 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
|---|
Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Netgear WGR614 Wireless-G Router
Customer Review: Excellent router with no problems whatsoever
Summary: 5 Stars
This is an exceptional router and at this price you can't find a better choice. I see a lot of disgruntled people here who can't connect to the router wirelessly after changing settings. I would like to give a couple of tips. First of all, make sure you configure the router when you are hard wired. You have to ensure that you are connected to the router via a LAN cable whenever you are making any changes to the router's configuration. This way when the router restarts etc. you will still be connected to it. If you are carrying out any changes to the router through your wireless card, for example if you have changed the WEP encryption code in the router, then once you submit those changes, the router will not let your wireless card connect until your laptop's card is configured for the same WEP key. So once again, please ensure you carry out changes to the router only when hard wired. The moment you get your router, I suggest you carry out a firmware upgrade (go to netgear's support site and download the latest firmware for your model from there). Once again follow instructions and make sure you are connected through a cable to carry out the same. Now log onto the router and then do a couple of things.
First of all, rename the SSID to anything you want (eg. Joan's Arc). Then go to the wireless settings, then to wireless access, and click on 'Disable SSID broadcast'. This ensures that the SSID is not broadcast to others around you who have a wireless machine. So when their software searches for a wireless access point all they will see is a blank name. To be able to connect to your network they would have to know the name of your SSID (Joan's Arc in this case) and manually type it in their machines (Highly unlikely that they will be able to think of the same name as you do. You can make your name even harder to obtain by simply using numeric characters in it.. for example Joan's Arc2004). Secondly, to make it secure use a 128 bit WEP key (this has to be a 26 digit key consisting of alphanumeric and numeric characters. You can use only certain alphabets in small and large case so you need to check that out. Also remember that you have to feed the same WEP key number in your laptop wireless card software (or the windows wireless settings if you are not using your wireless card's software). Finally you can ensure that only the wireless devices you specify can logon to your router. Go to the Wireless settings, then to wireless access setup and then click on 'enable wireless access'... Thereafter click on 'Setup access list'. Once there add your wireless device by using its mac address (the mac address is a unique number given to a wireless device, very much like a phone number- this enables the router to identify the device trying to connect to it). The mac address will be listed on your wireless device and you can also see all the devices that you can allow to connect to your router in the router's configuration window. (One important note to remember is that if you have already enabled WEP then you will have to first feed in the same key into your wireless device software settings before the router will display it in it's list of devices). Select the device that you want to allow to connect to your router and apply.
Hope this helps to a certain extent to configure your routers. Trust me, this is an amazing router and if you are having connection problems, it most likely is due to the settings in the router- not because the router is faulty.
Customer Review: Much better than I expected
Summary: 5 Stars
[...]Well, all I can say is I am extremely pleased with this so far. Although I haven't really had it long enough to say that it's reliable, it has maintained a fast enough connection both wired and wireless so far, with no fade outs and no resets. This is WGR614v4, so perhaps many of the problems people have had have been sorted out. Fortunately, for my sake, I am not an early adapter ... I prefer to wait for new technology to stabilize before adopting it.
Setup was so easy it was done almost before I knew it - less than 15 minutes from plugging it in to being able to use my laptop in the next room. That's including WEP setup - no WPA yet, unfortunately.
One of the concerns I had from reading other reviews is that of its speed being much lower than advertised. But now I am wondering if some of the complaints people have is because they don't really know what to expect. I get the same download speed connecting to the internet through the wireless connection as I do with a direct wired connection - up to 160 KBytes/sec, or about 1.3Mbs.
If you have only one computer, there's no point in buying a Wireless g product since you are never going to push it to anywhere near the maximum bandwidth - get wireless b and spend the money on something else.
Only if you have a home network do you get the advantages of a wireless g network. I have a small home network, with two computers (one WinXP, 1.8GHz, 7200rpm HD, the other Linux, 400MHz, 5400rpm HD) wired directly to the router and one laptop (Win2000, 350MHz, 4200rpm HD) with the wireless PC card.
I decided to do some speed tests to see how the network held up, so I enabled the FTP server on the Linux machine and FTP'ed large files across both the wired and wireless connection. FTP gives you close to the real network speed because of low overhead, but still depends on the speed of the hard disk since you're writing to disk.
I got these results:
WinXP <- Linux (wired): 72Mbs
WinXp -> Linux (wired): 44Mbs
Laptop <- Linux (wired): 16Mbs
Laptop <- Linux (wireless): 11Mbs
Laptop -> Linux (wireless) 11Mbs
If I didn't know any better I would be complaining about the speed of the wireless connection, but since the wired connection to the same PC was only 40 % faster, it's obvious that the network speed has much more to do with the CPU and disk speed than with the wireless connection, so I'm very happy with this. It just means I now have an excuse to go out and buy a new laptop to replace my 5 year old IBM.
So, can I recommend it? Yes, very much so. But bear in mind that it seems that whether this works depends on your circumstances. You may just have to try two or three different routers to get one to work.
Customer Review: Great, cheap access point + switch
Summary: 5 Stars
I own two of these, one as the router using the NAT and DHCP services, the other as an access point in the front of my unnaturally long and skinny apartment.The first unit (router) is in the laundry room near the rear of the house, and works great. The second unit is in the front, giving me a very large area of coverage throughout my house and a handy switch to plug in my PC and an older network print server.
Tips:
1. I am assuming you have an existing router (wireless or not) with an existing connection to the Internet through DSL or cable.
2. Log into your main router (Netgear is usually 192.168.0.1) through the Web browser. Go to the screen for connected devices or LAN setup and set a new device with a fixed IP address. For the IP address, choose a number at the top of the DHCP range for your unit (192.168.0.51 for Netgear, for example). Find the MAC address from the bottom of the new wireless router that you want to use as an access point and enter it. Give it a name and press enter.
3. Remember this IP address, as you will use it later.
4. Configure the second WGR614 by connecting it directly to a PC through one of the ports on the back of the unit (not the WAN port). Do not connect the wireless router to your network or Internet connection at this time.
5. Log into the router using 192.168.0.1 and set it to acquire its IP address and DNS dynamically (on the basic setup screen). Do not set up this router to connect to your ISP.
6. Select the wireless setup screen and set the SSID to match the SSID on your main router (usually defaults to the manufacturer's name "NETGEAR" or "LINKSYS", you get the picture)
7. Set the channel to a different channel than your main router. 1,6, and 11 are good channels. If your main router is at 6, set this one to 1 or 11.
8. Go to the network setup screen and set your IP address to the IP address you put into the main router earlier (see step 3). This will be the new way you log onto this WGR614.
9. Turn off DHCP by unselecting the radio button on the web screen.
10. THIS NEXT STEP IS CRITICAL, pay attention...
11. Using a crossover cable (Cat5 crossover, available at Radio Shack), connect the new wireless router you have just configured to your network by plugging one end of the cable into your network and the other into one of the four switch ports of the new router. DO NOT CONNECT IT TO THE WAN PORT. If you connect it to the WAN port, this configuration simply will not work.
This should do it. Test it by logging onto the main router (again 192.168.0.1 for netgear) to make certain you can see it. Then try out Internet connectivity.
Customer Review: One of the better Routers
Summary: 5 Stars
I started my quest to set up a wireless network at home with my Dell laptop and a Belkin F5D7230-4 router. The experience was painful and time consuming and ended up with me throwing the Belkin router into trash (Belkin's tech support told me that their routers are incompatible with Intel Centrino chips! I wonder what they are doing in wireless market then).
This is when I talked to my friends and almost everybody suggested Linksys or Netgear. A local Fry's store was selling Netgear WGR614 at discounted prices during a sale. I jumped on it.
To rate any router, one has to comment on its 3 "S", setup, specs and security. I have done quite a bit of research and below is my report on these.
SETUP: Took me less than 5 minutes to complete the setup. Only thing I had to do was to connect all the cables and turn the power on. Then choose a SSID, password, provide your connection information (depending upon what type of internet connection you have) and voila! I had a wireless network up and running.
SPECIFICATIONS: It supports both 108.11b and g networking. Weighs about half a lb. and is small (7"x1"x4.5") Mine is silver and looks so cool that I don't mind putting it on my tv!
SECURITY: Netgear router not only provides wireless network for your home but also protects it. It has a strong firewall to insulate your home machines for malicious hacker attacks like Denial Of Service, or attempts to access your machine from internet. It can also help you manage the content being accessed (if you have kids, this is a great feature). It allows remote management too and you can get the logs emailed to you.
I had to do almost no other maintenance in last 6 months that I have owned this router. It has a decent range. I can go to a park across the street and still access my network.
For 95% of us, this is enough.
I cannot comment on Netgear's customer service since I have never used it and I hope I won't have too!
In conclusion, I believe most known brands like Linksys and D-Link may also have some good routers. But you still have to make sure that the one you buy works for your laptop and your home (for example, according to Belkin's customer service their wireless routers are incompatible with Centrino chips.)
Netgear has worked great for me and I am sure it will work well for you too.
It is being sold for a great price right now, so go and grab yours. You won't be disappointed.
Customer Review: No problems - 30 minutes later, surfing the web
Summary: 5 Stars
Background
When looking to replace my older Netgear 802.11b wireless router, I couldn't find ONE router with generally good reviews. They seemed to be all over the map - some people loved it - others hated it. Since I had good luck with my original Netgear, I decided to go with the Netgear brand and ended up buying three items from Amazon due to the deal they ran ($25 off) and the Netgear rebates. I purchased:
Netgear WG511 Wireless 802.11g PC Card
Netgear WG311 54 Mbps Wireless PCI Adapter
Netgear WGR614 802.11g Wireless Router (version 6)
The PCI card was for my son's older, Windows 98SE PC, the PCMCIA card was for my work laptop (Win2K), and the router was for the family's main PC (XP SP2). We have a cable ISP (Optimum).
Router Installation
I uninstalled all hardware/software for the original router and followed the instructions as prompted by the installation software for the new router. I had absolutely no problems. I didn't even need to bring down any new firmware - I have "version 6" of the router which could make a difference I guess.
First Use
After stepping through the installation, logging on to the router, and setting the wireless encryption, etc. I was up and running on the main PC. It took no longer than 30 minutes.
Wireless Installs
The PCMCIA card install on my laptop was just as smooth. The card sensed the wireless signal (as well as a few other secure and unsecured networks in my neighborhood). I added the encryption key (WPA-PSK) and was off and surfing. My brother-in-law and sister-in-law were over and they both had their laptops (with non-Netgear wireless routers) and they were able to hop on the router after I gave them the encryption key. My son's PC - which I was expecting to be problematic due to it being 98SE - was smooth as well. His PC is in his room directly above the router and it grabbed the signal right away.
Wireless Use
As I mentioned above, we had 4 people wirelessly connected and they all were surfing as if hardwire connected. It was very impressive. I have not experienced any dropped signals nor have I had to reset the router in the past 3 weeks of daily use.
Price
I paid $118 for all three of the items together ($40 for the router), but I got $25 off immediately from Amazon and will be getting another $40 back from Netgear. So - $50 and change for the three of them.