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wireless router recommendations

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godathunder View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote godathunder Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: wireless router recommendations
    Posted: 07 March 2009 at 8:32pm
any suggestions for something "affordable" for domestic use.
 
ve got a netgear dg834g at the mo but Im having a lot of trouble with signal loss unless Im in the same room (which rather defeats the purpose of having one).
 
Ive tried repositioning it but no joy. any thoughts chaps?
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nickyburnell View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote nickyburnell Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09 March 2009 at 9:14am
Netgear all the way. DLink go wrong, Belkin go wrong, Linksys have lost the plot.
 I deal with this all day. You can try an "N" spec one but in some situations it aint going to get any better. Thick walls, walls with foil back plasterboard, lights in ceiling with transformers and the most often overlooked walkabout phones too close to the router.
 First thing to try is removing the encryption from the network (tempory) and try like that. If it's lots better then in my experience dropping the encyption down to 64bit WEP can help. Sometimes it just wont go through the walls though, got customers here that can go up three floors but not one room next door. Thick cob walls. The BT home hub is very powerful and any router could be made strong enough, wouldn't want to live in a house with a radio mast thoughLOL. Most of the time now I use the new homeplug type things, can get wireless extenders built in now. Avoid the Belkin extender stuff, works fine with no encryption, a bitch with.
 PS. Best routers IMHO are Draytek, £££ though.
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James.L View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote James.L Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 11:25am
Originally posted by nickyburnell nickyburnell wrote:

Netgear all the way.


Absolutely. Netgear are the best routers i have ever used. If you're running more than 3 or so computers off one router and you have a beefy internet connection (10mb+) you may need to switch it off and on again (hehe) occasionally cause they seem get clogged. But this may just be down to the rediculous amount of traffic that goes through mine (student house).

Mines the WGT624v3
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote toastyghost Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 12:06pm
Any Netgear router you'd care to use has sod all memory to hold the routing tables and any heavy torrenting or an app that uses many concurrent connections can eventually cause it to respond to DNS requests slowly and possibly freeze up entirely, needing a manual reboot.

If you do get one, make sure it's got plenty of airflow and isn't placed on carpet because they also get pretty hot.

I personally use an old Linksys WRT54G flashed with custom firmware based on Linux, and just boost the output power of the aerials way beyond the legal EU limitations so that it reaches round the entire house.

I also have a reflashed original BT HomeHub which is actually just a reboxed Thomson Speedtouch 780, and a Thomson TG784 which is running some special firmware for the BT 21CN network trial I'm involved in (which isn't anywhere near the improvement you might expect). Those routers are pretty good, but they too get a bit slow as the newer versions seem to have less memory available than the older ones.

Just run cables, to be honest. A reel of Cat5e and some crimpers and ends is pretty cheap and it can be tucked nicely out of the way. If it's plugged in and the cable isn't physically damaged, it works.
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adambomb View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote adambomb Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 2:14pm
Originally posted by nickyburnell nickyburnell wrote:

Best routers IMHO are Draytek, £££ though.
 
Sorry, no offence but I REALLY have to disagree there... utter rubbish products IMHO... the ONLY reason to buy one is the functionality that some models give (3G broadband backup etc).
 
I go for Linksys for the most part.. although many require firmware upgrades before they will work perfectly, and Netgear are OK for your average household punter.
 
I do agree on the Belkin comments... another utterly sh*te set of routers.. belkin really should have just stuck to cables.
 
The worst ADSL WiFi routers going are the BT 2Wire boxes... simply because it cannot hold on to an ADSL signal for toffee.. shame as the rest of the router functionality is pretty good.
 
Overall I agree with Toasty... if you can run a cable do so.
 
If your looking to get extra range out of your current router buy a honking great aerial for it and anything your connecting to it with - cost about £10 each (might not be nescecery for laptops as they usually have a pretty good aerial built into the screen bezel).


Edited by adambomb - 18 March 2009 at 2:18pm
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote toastyghost Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 2:17pm
Originally posted by adambomb adambomb wrote:


Sorry, no offence but I REALLY have to disagree there... utter rubbish products IMHO... the ONLY reason to buy one is the functionality that some models give (3G broadband backup etc).


The 2820 is actually quite an improvement on the 2800 (it can handle an SnR margin fluctuation of more than 1dB without spazzing right out for a start!) but it's still not up to the heady days of the 2600 being launched.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote adambomb Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 2:21pm

I'll be honest, I havent played with any of the later models... I was put off enough by the older stuff... I do own one draytek router which I use for temporarely rescuing clients with no broadband connection (lines down etc) using the 3G modem feature.. apart from that I try to avoid them.

My main gripe is that Draytek seam to have there very own set of terminology, so finding something that would be pretty straight forward on any other brand is a right ball ache with the draytek.
 
It's a shame as for the money they do offer alot of usefull stuff.


Edited by adambomb - 18 March 2009 at 2:25pm
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote toastyghost Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 2:37pm
The main gripe with Draytek is that they're only based in Taiwan and their UK distributor is a joke. The issues with the 2800 were never resolved because Draytek don't have anyone remotely capable of fixing their dodgy line handling code and hardware in the UK, where we're in the lovely position of using a bastardised version of ADSL to get the infamous 'up to' 8Mbit connections.

If you're buying new now, it's not worth considering a router that doesn't do ADSL2+.

21CN is coming up very fast despite being an utter shambles with the most piss poor 'diagnostic' tools I've ever seen and failing processes left right and centre - faults can't be passed back to BT Wholesale diagnostics teams once they've been rejected under the current system for example, so every fault has a maximum of 1 chance to be fixed and if that doesn't happen you have to wait 5 days to raise the fault again!
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote nickyburnell Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 9:28pm
OK, my experience with the Drayteks, and comments, is based on three 2600's that have been going for an age. They even seem to survive lightning stuff (lots here) that two Zyxels in the same building have died from (different lines of course). I am happy to stand corrected if they are now not as good.
 The Netgear comment is fair enough but come on, that's way, way above most peoples needs. I also always re-boot my Netgear weekly as a matter of course, countryside, long lines, bad weather...
 I bought a modern Linksys kit the other day, with their N spec USB adapter, adapter refused to stay connected on re-boot even after all the tricks, winsock fix etc. Lousy connection as well. Took it back swapped for Netgear G spec and all is well.  My own Netgear DG834g is sitting next to me and it's not hot in any way, just slightly warm.
 I've done the BT flash trick myself, wasn't impressed. The new four port BT home hub does seem like good kit though, if your on BT.
 If you spend your days gaming/torrenting than maybe you want cusom specs. Out of the hundreds of routers I've put out over the last few years Netgear have been the most reilable apart from the three old Drayteks.
 Nick
PS. Totally agree, run a cable. A big reel of it and some homeplug thingys in the boot at all times. Wireless is an arse, just cabled an archaeology company that was on wireless because it just collapsed sending 10 to 25mb Illustrator files from one PC to another, all good now.


Edited by nickyburnell - 18 March 2009 at 9:32pm
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JaKe View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote JaKe Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18 March 2009 at 9:57pm
Originally posted by godathunder godathunder wrote:

any suggestions for something "affordable" for domestic use.
 
ve got a netgear dg834g at the mo but Im having a lot of trouble with signal loss unless Im in the same room (which rather defeats the purpose of having one).
 
Ive tried repositioning it but no joy. any thoughts chaps?


Before you go changing the router, have you tried setting the router to a different channel? Also a small change in positiong of the aerial can make a big difference. I can't remember if the dg834g has a removeable aerial, if it has then a higher gain aerial may help, check out http://www.solwise.co.uk/wireless-indoorantenna-24.htm for WIFI bits.

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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote toastyghost Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 March 2009 at 11:23am
If you use a Netgear DG834Gv2 or above, update the firmware to the latest. We worked with them a lot about a year or so back to fix some stupid bugs in their chipset's modem code and it'll give you much better stability particularly on long lines.

nickyburnell: After the 2600 it seems Draytek got on crack basically, they've not made anything anywhere near as good since. We recalled all of the 2800s we sold and replaced them with Speedtouch 605s routers at our expense because they were that bad.
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nickyburnell View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote nickyburnell Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19 March 2009 at 4:16pm
Originally posted by toastyghost toastyghost wrote:

If you use a Netgear DG834Gv2 or above, update the firmware to the latest. We worked with them a lot about a year or so back to fix some stupid bugs in their chipset's modem code and it'll give you much better stability particularly on long lines.

nickyburnell: After the 2600 it seems Draytek got on crack basically, they've not made anything anywhere near as good since. We recalled all of the 2800s we sold and replaced them with Speedtouch 605s routers at our expense because they were that bad.
 
Thanks, thats good to know. I recon Linksys had the same dealer though, crack dealer that isSmile
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