I'm very enthusiastically eyeing the new Netgear WNDR3400 versus the Linksys E2000 to take over college apartment wifi duties. This will be my sole internet access point in a medium sized apartment (3 rooms) for use with 2 wireless b/g/n card equipped laptops and 2 b/g Nokia phones. I don't have a game or video streaming console to link constantly to the 5GHz, I don't do online gaming. Just browsing, torrents, occasional Youtube.
I've glanced at the EnGenius ESR-7750 and seems ok I guess, hard to find info on it and seems the brand is not widely used. I've looked at D-Link but the 'go-to' DIR655 firmware issues seem to be unresolved and no way for a 3rd party flash. The Buffalo WZR-HP-G300NH, their top model, has features close to the Netgear or Linksys, but for more money. I do plan to look more into Asus though, they have a $10-$20 mail in rebate going until the end of August.
Staples is the only place I can find that sells the Netgear. It doesn't have gigabit ethernet ports which isn't a big deal for me but it is simultaneous dual band and the firmware can be changed to Tomato or DD-WRT. It has a USB port and separate on/off switches for the whole box and wifi. I don't know why but I like things like that. It also has push-button WPS and I recently bought an HP printer which connects to the wifi with that method. Haven't figured out if I can manually configure the printer for wifi solely through the driver menus in Vista or otherwise (there must be a way) but if no, or if it proves unreliable, the printer would get hooked to the USB on the router.
The Netgear has 99.9% of the things I want for $80 and the Linksys is about the same price. The E2000 seems like an appropriate step down and is reliable. My brother uses one and it does very well but I've not played with the firmware settings yet. The Netgear almost seems too good to be true but I can experiment with firmware and since I can buy it locally (Staples), if I have problems I bring it back there. Still more research to do though.
So a few random questions.
First off, has anyone bought or used a Netgear WNDR3400?
What is n draft, some kind of early version of 802.11n? I read this a lot in regards to the DIR655.
Is the USB port on a router more or less device universal? Having USB HDD connectivity and storage is pushed hard by router manufacturers but for me, a printer is much more practical. (Was actually somewhat embarrased to ask that one.)
Are guest networking, QoS and SPI features of the firmware or are there hardware requirements too? Linksys's website is so dumbed down (a la Valet) that it really gives no information other than FAST, EASY, SECURE. The previous 3 features are important to me though and there's no further documetaion on the Linksys site. Not that I can upgrade firmware anyway on the E2000, but my reading leads me to believe that these things are 'soft' features.
Thank you.
I've glanced at the EnGenius ESR-7750 and seems ok I guess, hard to find info on it and seems the brand is not widely used. I've looked at D-Link but the 'go-to' DIR655 firmware issues seem to be unresolved and no way for a 3rd party flash. The Buffalo WZR-HP-G300NH, their top model, has features close to the Netgear or Linksys, but for more money. I do plan to look more into Asus though, they have a $10-$20 mail in rebate going until the end of August.
Staples is the only place I can find that sells the Netgear. It doesn't have gigabit ethernet ports which isn't a big deal for me but it is simultaneous dual band and the firmware can be changed to Tomato or DD-WRT. It has a USB port and separate on/off switches for the whole box and wifi. I don't know why but I like things like that. It also has push-button WPS and I recently bought an HP printer which connects to the wifi with that method. Haven't figured out if I can manually configure the printer for wifi solely through the driver menus in Vista or otherwise (there must be a way) but if no, or if it proves unreliable, the printer would get hooked to the USB on the router.
The Netgear has 99.9% of the things I want for $80 and the Linksys is about the same price. The E2000 seems like an appropriate step down and is reliable. My brother uses one and it does very well but I've not played with the firmware settings yet. The Netgear almost seems too good to be true but I can experiment with firmware and since I can buy it locally (Staples), if I have problems I bring it back there. Still more research to do though.
So a few random questions.
First off, has anyone bought or used a Netgear WNDR3400?
What is n draft, some kind of early version of 802.11n? I read this a lot in regards to the DIR655.
Is the USB port on a router more or less device universal? Having USB HDD connectivity and storage is pushed hard by router manufacturers but for me, a printer is much more practical. (Was actually somewhat embarrased to ask that one.)
Are guest networking, QoS and SPI features of the firmware or are there hardware requirements too? Linksys's website is so dumbed down (a la Valet) that it really gives no information other than FAST, EASY, SECURE. The previous 3 features are important to me though and there's no further documetaion on the Linksys site. Not that I can upgrade firmware anyway on the E2000, but my reading leads me to believe that these things are 'soft' features.
Thank you.
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