My Netgear RP614 wired router bit the dust. Time to gear up for a wireless laptop and Wi-Fi TV, both coming soon.

I'm looking for a combined b/g/n router and gigabit switch, all for $100 or less. Oh yeah, why are these things so expensive when I can buy an entire netbook for $200?

Anyway, what brand router have you had that's easy to set up, has high speed, long range and reliable connectivity? TIA...

 

Cant answer your other questions, But I would say just ask your ISP/ cable provider if they offer any..

Our modem and router are one piece we just rent from our cable company...

 

Bob, I like Linksys.
My setup is a little different than you want though, as my wireless was an add on a few Christmas's back when I got my Dell laptop which is hooked up via wireless only here.

Mine consists of the Motorola 5100 Surfboard modem, a Linksys Vonage router for my landline and three cat 5s out for PCs, and a Linksys wireless access point that takes up one of the cat 5 ports on the router.

You can get a wireless router from Linksys that is both wireless cat 5.
This way your PCs can use the cat 5 ports, and your laptop will be wireless.

That is the way I would go if I did not have Vonage.
But I am locked into their router since it does my phone too.

Here is what you would probably need.
http://www.linksysbycisco.com/US/en/products/Routers

My access point is the WAP54G further down the page.
Your local Best Buy will carry these, and they should be able to steer you in the right direction for Comcast.

Linksys got bought out a few years back by Cisco, a very big company.
I like their stuff better than Netgear.

 

Good advice guys, thanks.

scuba, you make a good point about renting from Comcast. I'm working on my third new DOCSIS 3 cable modem in the past month. Do not "upgrade" to one of these, Motorola definitely has a heat failure problem with them. Had I bought instead of rented, I'd have had serious downtime.

Corey, I read the long thread about your setup. Pretty technical setting up a home network! I'll check out the Cisco and have read good things about their stuff.

 

Yeah, it took awhile to get my whole home networked.
I have three PCs.

My main PC which is the gamer rig I built back when I got the Dell laptop, and the old PC before my gamer rig.

The old one is only used now for recording TVs shows when the Comcast DVR can not do so due to a recording conflict, as it can only do two at a time.

But from any PC or the laptop I can pull files and share them.
From the laptop I can wireless pull movies from my gaming rig or MP3s and broadcast them over my new TV via cable from the laptop, pretty cool.

I did have some snags setting up the wireless, as it did not require a username, only a password unlike the router which required both to access the setup page via Firefox.

 

I'd recommend the D-Link DIR-655, that's what I run. It's speed is limited by your cable throughput but it really excels for transfers between computers connected to your home network.

 

if you have a fry's near you i can honestly NOT recommend AirLink... it's like their in-store brand.

i tried to save some $ and like they say - you get what you pay for.

i'm going back to linksys.

 

Good to hear. Research kept leading me back to that one. It's now at the top of my short list.

 

I picked up a nice 8-port gig-E switch at Frys about a year ago for under $100. And a few years back I installed a Buffalo Air Station wireless router. If you have any Buffalo WiFi cards, it makes a nice setup as they have a really clean setup utility (AOSS) built in to set up the network keys and all that stuff. I think you can also use their drivers with a lot of other wireless cards as well. I also saw a decent speedup in cable modem throughput swapping my old Link Sys wireless router for the Buffalo unit (http://buffalotech.com/). I have everything wired plugged into the switch then a single cable from switch to the wireless router and a single cable from there to the Comcast-supplied Ambit DOCSIS3 cable modem.

 

http://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-WNR854.../dp/B000FGI970

I have set up several of these excellent range and speed. Gigabit ports and A/G/N compatible. If you look around you should be able to find it for less than 100.00 even at 112.00 a good deal.

If you have any questions this is my area of occupation so I figure it's my turn to answer some questions..

 

I'd go with Linksys, they are owned by CISCO. I have gone through 3 D-Link routers in the past 5 years and have had quite a time with them. I'm not a fan of Netgear either, I don't like the user interface with them. I have setup 3 of these in the past 6 months and they work great. The GB ports are nice but the average home user will not use it so why pay for it. I do this work for a living as well have side jobs installing home networks and PC repair. http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-WRT54G...9384729&sr=8-1

 

If you don't mind me asking, what all are you into?

 

I do networking, server, desktop, wireless.. Pretty much anything except web stuff and programming. I could never sit still in front of my computer long enough to code. I work in an IT dept and also have a side business of my own.

 

That's about where I am as well. Not much into programming or web stuff. The home business is coming but quite slow. I need to do some advertising, just word of mouth right now. Daylight job is basically Network Admin, we are but 2 in a company with over 200 machines so we stay quite busy.

 

I've used both Netgear and Linksys products. For me personally the Netgear seemed to have a better GUI for setting it up, but the Linksys equipment in general proved more reliable in the long run. I've also had issues with Netgear drivers on my wireless cards (in the PC) not working properly and I'd have to search around for a decent driver. That kind of left me with a bitter taste in my mouth. I've had no such issues with any Linksys stuff.

 

I agree in that the low-end Netgear products are crap, but I've also had problems with the Linksys boxes.

My home network is now pretty much all Netgear "ProSafe" series, easily identified by the dark blue metal cases that you can drive over. Those haven't given me any problems.