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As long as it's not D-Link
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Belgium9950 Posts
go Buffalo with preflashed DD-WRT
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Usually I say the most expensive stuff is always the best stuff but that's not always the case. Even so, my bias opinion is to go for the more costy one as usually most of the time, they're better than the low cost one. Otherwise, follow the other advices here. Good luck!
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I've got one of those LINKSYS by CISCO ones...the E3000 is beast.
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if you're looking for gaming performance stick to wired
yeah I wish that I could but it's just not worth cabling through walls for me.
go Buffalo with preflashed DD-WRT
what does this firmware improve O_O, I looked at the wiki for it but it doesn't really tell me much.
Edit: Yeah I see the list of features on http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_DD-WRT?#Features but this pretty much means nothing to me as I have no clue what most of these things are 
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On June 28 2010 11:00 zeuS~ wrote:So I've never bought a wireless router before and did some research on pcmag,cnet ... ect and I've narrowed it down to two routers. I've chosen a Linksys because I currently have one and never had any problems with it. Linksys E3000 ($146.85) Specs: + Show Spoiler +
Technology: Wireless-N
Bands: Simultaneous 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz
Transmit / receive: 2 x 3
Antennas: 6 Internal
Ethernet ports x speed: 4 x Gigabit
USB port: Yes
Linksys WRT610N ($169.99) Specs: + Show Spoiler +
Technology: Wireless-N
Bands: 2.4 GHz and 5GHz
Standards: Draft 802.11n, 802.11a, 802.11g, 802.11b, 802.3, 802.3u, 802.3ab
Antennas: 6 Internal
Ethernet ports x speed: 4 x Gigabit
If anyone has any suggestions / recommendations on other routers I'm really only willing to spend at most 180$.
Geez man, $180 for a home router? Why do you want to spend so much? I got a $60 router about 2 weeks back. That was my first one, and it was real easy to set up and works great.
http://www.amazon.com/Netgear-WNR2000-100NAS-NETGEAR-WNR2000-Wireless-N/dp/B001AZP8EW/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1277693394&sr=8-3
The only thing I was really looking for was definitely 802.11n, I don't know why you feel like you need some of that stuff unless you're using it commercially.
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Dan is so sexy. Nuff said.
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On June 28 2010 11:57 Prozen wrote:
Dan is so sexy. Nuff said.
Quality contribution to the blog.
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my main concern is signal strength over longish distances (50ftish). As the router would be placed in my homes office (where the other computer is) while my desktop will be on the other end of the house. simultaneous dual band routers are supposed to preform better at this.
How well does the WNR2000 preform at those distances?
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A standard wireless N that runs at 5Ghz should work fine at 50ft even though thick walls.
A wireless G router could do that too but the 2.4ghz signal is used alot more so it's bound to have more interference from other devices.
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On June 28 2010 11:06 PH wrote:
As long as it's not D-Link
What's wrong with D-Link? :|
As Semantics says V
+ Show Spoiler +On June 28 2010 12:12 semantics wrote:
A standard wireless N that runs at 5Ghz should work fine at 50ft even though thick walls.
A wireless G router could do that too but the 2.4ghz signal is used alot more so it's bound to have more interference from other devices.
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On June 28 2010 12:06 zeuS~ wrote:my main concern is signal strength over longish distances (50ftish). As the router would be placed in my homes office (where the other computer is) while my desktop will be on the other end of the house. simultaneous dual band routers are supposed to preform better at this. How well does the WNR2000 preform at those distances?
Yeah dual band routers are nice because they get less interference. 2.4 Ghz is also the band used by phones and such so having dual on 5 Ghz also will get a better signal from far away.
I tested my WNR2000 about 35-40 ft away from the router and was at about ~90% signal strength, so it's really up to you if you need that additional small amount of speed. The WNR2000 is single band, mind you, and when I did test it the kitchen and living room were between me and the router so that ~90% signal strength is taking some interference into account.
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On June 28 2010 12:12 semantics wrote:
A standard wireless N that runs at 5Ghz should work fine at 50ft even though thick walls.
A wireless G router could do that too but the 2.4ghz signal is used alot more so it's bound to have more interference from other devices.
5 Ghz is standard on 802.11n? Hmmm... did not know that, learn something new everyday 
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Well though 5Ghz is standard in n i believe there are still routers laying around that are n-draft, and there are wireless receivers out that wont do 5Ghz but are listed as wireless n etc, tricky shit that messes with ppl right!
Just make sure it has the security protocol you want and the band operation you want.
http://www.wi-fi.org/discover_and_learn.php
I think it is standard, but also backwards support for 2.4 is part of that standard.
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platypuses0
United States44 Posts
5 Ghz is standard on 802.11n?
802.11n can use either 5 Ghz or 2.4 Ghz
Edit: Beaten
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I have the lynksis WRT610N, but I got it for way less :O I'm pretty sure I have the exact same model and got it for 80 $ at staples. Goin by there tomorrow, will confirm model number and price then.
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T.O.P.
Hong Kong4685 Posts
On June 28 2010 11:06 PH wrote:
As long as it's not D-Link
It's true that the regular Dlink series is crap. But the Dlink Xtreme series is really good. The DIR 655 has been one of a best routers for a while. It's selling for $60 right now btw.
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Holy cow why so expensive? I got my Linksys WRT54G for $30 and it works perfect, super fast, no problems.
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Get one of the routers that you can flash DD-WRT/Tomato with. Such as Linksys WRT54GL or Buffalo WHR-HP-G54/WHR-G54S
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there is also asus routers. they are pretty awesome. built in usb for wifi printer support or even have a harddrive to use as a ftp space. its also much cheaper that what you ahve posted.
http://www.mwave.com/mwave/skusearch_v3.asp?scriteria=AA97305
this is what i have pretty awesome and you can put dd-wrt on it as well
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What wireless adapter(s) do you have? I'm assuming you have some 802.11n adapter or else there'd be no point in getting a 802.11n router?
Although the 5 GHz band is generally not as saturated as the 2.4 GHz band, the actual situation in your home may be different. The range of 5 GHz signals is less than 2.4 GHz signals in free space and elsewhere, and higher frequency transmissions have more trouble penetrating walls etc. I think for 50 ft. in a typical home environment it's fine though and recommended.
However, my guess is that 802.11n might be overkill for your situation. What kind of transfer rates are you expecting from your remote computer? Only if you need more than 1-2 MB/s would 802.11n make a difference over 802.11g (depending, of course, on the actual SNR experienced over that distance).
The multiple antennas of 802.11n can improve effective range over 802.11g through spatial diversity coding techniques, yes. However, this advantage seems to be somewhat mitigated by the fact that consumer 802.11n routers are forgoing large external antennas that most cheap 802.11g routers had, so they're losing some performance there.
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On June 28 2010 15:20 writer22816 wrote:
Get one of the routers that you can flash DD-WRT/Tomato with. Such as Linksys WRT54GL or Buffalo WHR-HP-G54/WHR-G54S
This the best choice.
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i use mac airport, works perfectly
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+1 for Linksys WRT54GL
Great little router, relatively cheap and when flashed to tomato firmware can do advance QoS and traffic shaping.
If you don't have Wireless N, this would be my recommendation.
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I'd take a router with a USB port. That way you can plug in a normal external hard disk instead of an expensive NAS for backups and filesharing. Take care of your data security!
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Belgium9950 Posts
On June 28 2010 11:28 zeuS~ wrote: yeah I wish that I could but it's just not worth cabling through walls for me. what does this firmware improve O_O, I looked at the wiki for it but it doesn't really tell me much. Edit: Yeah I see the list of features on http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/What_is_DD-WRT?#Features but this pretty much means nothing to me as I have no clue what most of these things are
It's super reliable and stable, and 100% configurable.
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The third party firmwares give advanced features (some of which are normally only found in $600 routers) and better signal.
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On June 28 2010 22:49 writer22816 wrote:
The third party firmwares give advanced features (some of which are normally only found in $600 routers) and better signal.
Do you have anything to back up this claim? As far as I know, the firmware has no real control over the signal processing chain, and it's not like you can add new features to a signal that is defined in the 802.11 spec that would be compatible with other devices. These wireless routers are not software-defined radio. The firmware does not have access to low-level controls, except through the predetermined interfaces of packet encapsulation etc. However, as you said, it can provide advanced higher-layer network services and the like that would actually be managed by software.
One thing third-party firmware does allow for is to modify the transmit power setting beyond what the stock firmware allows. But I'm not sure if this actually does anything, and if it does, if it really helps. Depending on the underlying hardware, there's a decent chance that a transmit power setting given by the firmware will be ignored by the hardware if it's past a certain threshold. Also, there are physical limitations to the amplification chain of the hardware, and I doubt the original router designers would sell a product that is configured very poorly with regards to the maximum potential of the device. Past a certain power level, you can burn up the components and shorten the device's life span. In addition, amplifiers become nonlinear once they are driven to saturation (after reaching a certain power level), and this degrades the signal quality. So you might be transmitting a distorted, poor signal at higher power rather than a clean signal at lower power.
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On June 28 2010 18:03 xmShake wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2010 15:20 writer22816 wrote:
Get one of the routers that you can flash DD-WRT/Tomato with. Such as Linksys WRT54GL or Buffalo WHR-HP-G54/WHR-G54S This the best choice.
I have this Linksys, what is this flash DD thing you speak of? And what does it do?
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On June 28 2010 16:15 Myrmidon wrote:
What wireless adapter(s) do you have? I'm assuming you have some 802.11n adapter or else there'd be no point in getting a 802.11n router?
Although the 5 GHz band is generally not as saturated as the 2.4 GHz band, the actual situation in your home may be different. The range of 5 GHz signals is less than 2.4 GHz signals in free space and elsewhere, and higher frequency transmissions have more trouble penetrating walls etc. I think for 50 ft. in a typical home environment it's fine though and recommended.
However, my guess is that 802.11n might be overkill for your situation. What kind of transfer rates are you expecting from your remote computer? Only if you need more than 1-2 MB/s would 802.11n make a difference over 802.11g (depending, of course, on the actual SNR experienced over that distance).
The multiple antennas of 802.11n can improve effective range over 802.11g through spatial diversity coding techniques, yes. However, this advantage seems to be somewhat mitigated by the fact that consumer 802.11n routers are forgoing large external antennas that most cheap 802.11g routers had, so they're losing some performance there.
I don't have an adapter yet. I really just need a high enough transfer rate for gaming(sometimes streaming) / torrents / hd video streams.
So I'm thinking about going with the WRT54GL which is like 60$ on amazon. Should I get WMP54G Wireless-G PCI Adapter [$26.29] http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WMP54G-Wireless-G-PCI-Adapter/dp/B000085BD8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1277763762&sr=1-1
or
WMP54G - Network adapter - PCI - 802.11b, 802.11g [$34.10] http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-Wireless-G-PCI-Card-WMP54G/dp/B0002LHSKW/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1277763814&sr=1-6
There's one that comes with speedbooster but that that adapter is more expensive than the router wtf >_<
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On June 29 2010 07:27 zeuS~ wrote:Show nested quote +On June 28 2010 16:15 Myrmidon wrote:
What wireless adapter(s) do you have? I'm assuming you have some 802.11n adapter or else there'd be no point in getting a 802.11n router?
Although the 5 GHz band is generally not as saturated as the 2.4 GHz band, the actual situation in your home may be different. The range of 5 GHz signals is less than 2.4 GHz signals in free space and elsewhere, and higher frequency transmissions have more trouble penetrating walls etc. I think for 50 ft. in a typical home environment it's fine though and recommended.
However, my guess is that 802.11n might be overkill for your situation. What kind of transfer rates are you expecting from your remote computer? Only if you need more than 1-2 MB/s would 802.11n make a difference over 802.11g (depending, of course, on the actual SNR experienced over that distance).
The multiple antennas of 802.11n can improve effective range over 802.11g through spatial diversity coding techniques, yes. However, this advantage seems to be somewhat mitigated by the fact that consumer 802.11n routers are forgoing large external antennas that most cheap 802.11g routers had, so they're losing some performance there. I don't have an adapter yet. I really just need a high enough transfer rate for gaming(sometimes streaming) / torrents / hd video streams. So I'm thinking about going with the WRT54GL which is like 60$ on amazon. Should I get WMP54G Wireless-G PCI Adapter [$26.29] http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WMP54G-Wireless-G-PCI-Adapter/dp/B000085BD8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1277763762&sr=1-1 or WMP54G - Network adapter - PCI - 802.11b, 802.11g [$34.10] http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-Wireless-G-PCI-Card-WMP54G/dp/B0002LHSKW/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1277763814&sr=1-6There's one that comes with speedbooster but that that adapter is more expensive than the router wtf >_<
Right. If your connection to your ISP is less than about 15 Mb/s or so (in the previous post I said 1-2 MB/s, note bytes not bits), the bottleneck will be your ISP connection rather than your home wireless. The WRT54GL is a pretty good cheapish router. I remember some grad students I know working on some wireless research project that involved using a bunch of them with 3rd-party firmware in some mesh configuration.
Unfortunately I don't have experience with cheap client adapters. All I know is that speedbooster is a 3rd party extension to 802.11g that adds a new mode that can achieve double the data rate. You need both a router and an adapter with speedbooster to get any improvement. So don't worry about not having it. On a side note, speedbooster mode was officially added to 802.11n so standard 802.11n devices are capable of it, though it's no longer called by that name.
Also, be wary of cheap adapters, or at least read up on reviews before you make a purchase. I know that some cheaper models implement roaming in a terrible way such that periodically your connection will go down for a couple seconds at a time. However, this could just be a problem with cheap laptop Wi-Fi adapters--I'm not sure. Laptops and other mobile devices need to worry about roaming from one router to another, while desktops do not.
edit: CM, DD-WRT is a popular free 3rd-party firmware that can be run on a number of consumer-grade routers to add additional functionality, some of which is normally only seen in enterprise models.
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EPT
