Linksys E4200 134.99 at local Costco

[CougTek]

How about the Cisco routers? Not the Linksys made by Cisco, the real freaking Cisco routers. Are they any better? I was considering getting one and to start installing them to some customers.

 

[MaxBurn]

I have a cisco 871 here that work installed for a hardware VPN to connect my work phone. If you like rummaging around in command line cisco iOS and don't mind paying $500~900 for the router the cisco 800 series may fit the bill. Slightly too much money and a rather inconvenient interface for me. There may be a web GUI you can load. Other than that there was a 500 series that didn't seem to be less money and a 1900 that is much more.

 

[blakerwry]

How about the Cisco routers? Not the Linksys made by Cisco, the real freaking Cisco routers. Are they any better? I was considering getting one and to start installing them to some customers.

I work on Cisco equipment all day long. It's very reliable. I've had one switch flake out after 5+ years of service, but other than that I've administered dozens of switches/routers that probably had ~ 10+ years of use on the original chassis.

The GUI on lines over a couple years old is basically non-existant. ASA firewalls have a semi-decent GUI, and the newer 2960 and ISR routers have a functional GUI for basic configuration. Other than that, you're stuck in CLI.

The config options may seem like a contradiction if you're used to Linux devices... Cisco gear has tons of obscure possibilities and settings, but within a limited featureset. A lot of these limitations probably come about due to the use of super fast hardware ASICs that are normally paired with a meager CPU for software based operations.

Licensing with any high-end gear is a fact of life. Cisco licenses "feature sets", at the basic level you get IP routing + NAT, there's a firewall feature set (yes, you have to pay extra for a statefull firewall), IDS, VPN, SSH (yes you may find yourself paying extra to connect via SSH as well), IPX, ATM, etc. I believe Juniper may license based on packet per second or device table size.

There's a pretty big second hand market for Cisco gear, so you can certainly pick some up used for half price and know that you've got many years left of service.

 

[Santilli]

Just hooked up an ibook to this router. It's running about 70Mbps, and about 5 Mbps upload. Pretty good. Book seemed rather nice and thin lightweight, and with an SSD, it might even be fast.

Is apple still crippling their systems with garbage hard drives?

 

[CougTek]

How about the Cisco routers?

I meant something like this. It has a lifetime warranty. Must be reliable, don't you think? Cost ~200$ though.

There's also this one that looks interesting, but it cost even more. It seems to have less features too.

I just need a reliable router for one business customer. No VPN needed, just flawless reliability.

 

[CougTek]

Wow, I've read some reviews on Newegg about those two and it doesn't look good. Even if customers' reviews have to be taken lightly due to often poor technical skills of the reviewers, there's so many negative reviews that it is worrying.

 

[CougTek]

I ended up ordering the Buffalo WZR-HP-AG300H. It has about the fastest chip among current generation routers and it comes with DD-WRT pre-installed. I don't believe it will be any more (or less) reliable than any of the other routers on the market, be it the pro version like the above mentioned Cisco, or the consumer grade D-Link/Linksys. It's just that it's similar hardware at a cheaper price. I've heard good comments about Buffalo over the years so I'll take my chance with their product.

 

[ddrueding]

That does look like a nice unit, Coug. And a good gamble (they are all gambles).

 

[timwhit]

I would have gone with a Ubiquiti Routerstation Pro. I sound like a broken record.

 

[CougTek]

I would have gone with a Ubiquiti Routerstation Pro. I sound like a broken record.

The closest Ubiquiti reseller is 40Km away and it doesn'll sell the Router Station Pro. I've not been able to find an enclosure for it (only enclosures to put it outside on a pole) and the fact that it doesn't take Mini-PCI-E cards is a downer. Decent MiniPCI wireless cards are hard to find.

 

[MaxBurn]

Wow, I've read some reviews on Newegg about those two and it doesn't look good. Even if customers' reviews have to be taken lightly due to often poor technical skills of the reviewers, there's so many negative reviews that it is worrying.

Those reviews scared me off them too only I saw them on amazon, I posted a link to the first one a couple months ago when last this subject came up. I'm hoping they are just a little complex and technical for most people but I wasn't going to take the chance myself.

Time capsule is working fine for me, same experience as everyone else with one it appears. Gets hot enough to raise concern and looking at past models the power supply can fail at 18 months or so due to heat. Several options on replacing the power supply with something much better and having it run years after that or replacing the power supply caps every 18 months or so. The 5ghz N dropped my ipad but apparently that is a known problem with the first gen ipads. All my PC's are perfectly happy and now that I leave the big server off most of the time it is nice to have one always on network share again even if it is a bit slower than it should be IMO.

 

[blakerwry]

I meant something like this. It has a lifetime warranty. Must be reliable, don't you think? Cost ~200$ though.

There's also this one that looks interesting, but it cost even more. It seems to have less features too.

I just need a reliable router for one business customer. No VPN needed, just flawless reliability.

I haven't worked with any of the "desktop" (Cisco term) models of switches, routers, etc. Normally I'm working with racked gear, which usually start at ~ $1k, although might be found used for $200.

For something in the $200 price range I'm much more interested in the Ubiquiti gear or similar based on Linux which allows some expandability and guarantee the OS will be updated with features (ipv6 is a must) and security updates for the next few years.

 

[MaxBurn]

FYI I noticed that these are still a big stack in costco for the same price. I don't know that they are moving very well.

 

[LunarMist]

Is Costco a large supplier of wireless routers? It's not the first place i'd think to look for them.

 

[MaxBurn]

Is Costco a large supplier of wireless routers?

Not really but they have a couple models usually.

 

[Mercutio]

Is Costco a large supplier of wireless routers? It's not the first place i'd think to look for them.

Costco is a large supplier for everything Greg needs.

Except Xeons.

 

[Handruin]

Costco is a large supplier for everything Greg needs.

Except Xeons.

*and retired beach babe surfer girls.

 

[Mercutio]

*and retired beach babe surfer girls.

Oddly enough, Sam's Club has a whole aisle for those.

 

[Will Rickards]

What do you guys think about the E4200 v2?
It has a faster processor than the E4200, supposedly better performance for the USB port when connected to storage but features a marvell chip that insted dd-wrt supported. But it has IPv6 support.

I'm looking to get a router to hook up to my fios router. So I've got the problem where the fios router isn't gigabit but the ONT is gigabit. I want to get better range and support for wireless N. Do I need new adaptors to support the faster speeds? Or will wireless N support in the laptop suffice?

 

[MaxBurn]

The last one was crap as far as I was concerned and the apple base station extreme is actually a lower price though that likely won't last (as the linksys goes on sale). I didn't keep up to date on the last one but they had some serious firmware problems and I don't know if they ever fixed it. Unless they improved the wireless in the v2 the apple one had it beat there too but as they say 3x3 streams they might have upgraded the linksys one. I'd wait for another anandtech teardown/review.

Unless they find a way to put in esata or usb3 it still isn't as good as a time capsure for disk transfer speeds either.

 

[Mercutio]

I'm not impressed at all by Airport Extreme blahblah. They don't even appear to have good compatibility with Apple stuff in my experience.

 

[Will Rickards]

How about the Asus Black Diamond? I don't think I have any devices that can use the 3x3 streams anyway. And this got good marks on smallnetbuilder.com.

 

[Mercutio]

I can't speak to that model specifically, but Asus routers and APs usually have pretty obtuse firmware. Not as bad as Buffalo, but bad enough that I feel like I should mention it before you go buying one.

At the end of the day, Home Routers are one of those things where there's just no magic bullet right answer for everyone and everything. The OpenWRT people really like Netgear's dual band N equipment and have made those their development target, which speaks highly of those products, since they seem to be more interested in improving their software than just porting it to new platforms like the ddWRT folks.

 

[Will Rickards]

Researching the issues with each router just makes me more confused about which router to pick. I was set on the Buffalo WZR-HP-AG300H for a bit. Now I'm back to considering the Netgear WNDR4500.

 

[timwhit]

How about this? http://wiki.ubnt.com/RouterStation_Pro

 

[Will Rickards]

I was using amazon.com gift cards and needed something I could order from there. Otherwise I would have researched the routerstation pro more. I just ordered the netgear WNDR4500.

How long can you run network cable without loss?

 

[CougTek]

How long can you run network cable without loss?

The standard says 300ft.

 

[Mercutio]

Amazon sells Ubiquiti routers, Will.


Also, the reality is that yes, you can run an ethernet cable more than 100m and it probably will work. The standard just says it does HAVE to.

 

[Stereodude]

The standard says 300ft.

I thought it was 100m

 

[Will Rickards]

I couldn't find the routerstation pro on there. And actually I couldn't find it on the companies website either. I did look into it a few days ago.

What is the big deal with the router station pro?

 

[MaxBurn]

http://lifehacker.com/5873407/how-to-crack-a-wi+fi-networks-wpa-password-with-reaver

Another reason not to like the linksys/cisco gear. In my very small exposure with them they have exhibited very significant problems with the web page setup, so it is of no surprise to me that this article points out that the web control to WPS disable does nothing.

Also it appears DDWRT doesn't support WPS, nice.

Apple:

"However, the attack does begin if the "Add Wireless Clients" tool inside Airport Utility is open and waiting for a device to connect. I didn't let the attack run out, but it seems like the attack WILL work only if you have the "Add Wireless Clients" tool open. https://discussions.apple.com/message/17248516#17248516

That from a support communities post FWIW.

I might just get out reaver this weekend and try it out, they certainly made it easy enough with a live CD and all.

 

[Mercutio]

I've always viewed WPS as suspect. "Automatic" and "security" don't seem like concepts that readily go hand in hand.

 

[ddrueding]

I've always viewed WPS as suspect. "Automatic" and "security" don't seem like concepts that readily go hand in hand.

x2

 

[Will Rickards]

I don't get WPS. Why wouldn't you just setup the SSID/password yourself? It isn't anymore secure, just an easy way to set it up?

 

[Mercutio]

It's an idiot button for the people who can't be bothered to learn to work their hardware.

 

[Gilbo]

I can't disable WPS on the my WNDR3700's .


For people who make their own routers, what are you doing? Linux boxes with a wireless NIC?

What wireless NICs do you recommend for Linux? Are there compatible 5.4 Ghz ones yet? I looked into this about 3 years ago and came up empty.

 

[ddrueding]

Smoothwall and UniFi.

 

[BingBangBop]

I think WPS is a good thing. It encourages users to use big ass long complex hard to remember passwords because you don't have to remember or recite them back. I find that most people that can't get their wireless devices to work are having issues with security settings. People that have difficulties tend not to use security at all. WPS makes that much easier to deal with and anything that encourages people to add security to their wireless connection is a good thing

There is a theoretical security risk to devices sharing keys over the air waves but I think it is relatively low mainly because it requires simultaneous access to the HW/SW at both ends. Without someone pressing both buttons simultaneously (within 2 minutes of each other) nothing is shared. Without WPS many people will just not use security on their wireless connection I think it has a good risk to reward ratio.

 

[BingBangBop]

I can't disable WPS on the my WNDR3700's .

Are you saying that on your WNDR3700 that a wireless NIC can automatically read the security settings by pressing its WPS button without you having to press the routers button? I have a WNDR3700 and it does not do that on mine.

Or are you just complaining that it has the WPS feature and you can't disable it. Well don't press your routers WPS button and it is disabled. Nothing is exchanged if you don't press that button within 2 minutes of a wireless NIC pressing its WPS button.

 

[Mercutio]

I can't disable WPS on the my WNDR3700's .


For people who make their own routers, what are you doing? Linux boxes with a wireless NIC?

I built a MIPS system that has a couple miniPCI slots for NICs (they've been changed several times; I believe they're Atheros-based at the moment), boots off a CF card and has just enough Slackware on it to do what I want to do. I actually suspect that its CPU is actually a bottleneck for my home network, so it's possible that I might retire it to just act as an AP someday soon.