How advise friend about Netgear N150 Wireless Router (WNR1000) purchase?

[zjohnr]

A friend recently asked me for help setting up a Netgear N150 / RANGEMAX 150 WIRELESS ROUTER (WNR1000) which she just purchased from the local Wal-Mart for $50.

I'm not sure what, if anything, to say to her beyond. "Sure. I can help."

While I don't know her well, my understanding is that her network usage is pretty much limited to surfing the Internet. All she wants the router to do is allow her to wirelessly connect her ancient Pentium 3 laptop through the cable modem service she is also getting. (The ISP is Time Warner in upstate NY in case anyone is curious).

I've never been clear on just what the potential problems might be with the "Single Stream Draft 802.11n" products. They're not anything I would ever see myself buying because I'm always hungry for more throughput. But I'm not sure if my friend is even going to notice a difference between what she bought and another router.

Posting this note just to see if I could persuade those who understand the underlying issues better to elaborate on this topic once again.

Thanks,

-irrational john

 

[thiggins]

This article may help.
Three Things You Should Know About The Linksys WRT120N
It's a different router, but the issues are the same.

If your friend has an old notebook that doesn't have N wireless adpater, then the "N150" router will act like an 11g router. That's fine if she didn't pay a premium for her product. But wasted money if she did.

 

[zjohnr]

It still beats the heck out of me ...

This article may help.
Three Things You Should Know About The Linksys WRT120N
If your friend has an old notebook that doesn't have N wireless adapter, then the "N150" router will act like an 11g router. That's fine if she didn't pay a premium for her product. But wasted money if she did.

Thanks for the link, Tim. I'll check it out.

I suppose whether or not she paid a premium for the N150 is the bulk of my question.

Frankly after looking around just a bit on newegg I got the impression that unless one considers paying $10 to $20 more is "too much", then it's a wash. I didn't see what I considered a significant price difference between the 802.11g and the low-end 802.11n ("sorta") routers I looked at on newegg.

I think I'm going to end up deciding that having the ability to walk it back to Wal-Mart if she's unhappy trumps any marginal cost savings buying another router might bring. For some people mail-order tech is potentially just too frustrating.

-irrational john